Walking with God: Dry Bones

Wow. It's impossible to know where to begin in the description of my time in Mozambique.

Challenging? Yes.
Rewarding? Incredibly so.
Struggle? Everyday.

I lived with a woman named Adelaide. She is 67 and caring for many people. Everyday we had different people coming and going, eating and sleeping. I had a sister, Helena who was twenty and with her comes my itty bitty nephew. And then there were my brothers. Five living with us and multiple stopping by to say hi. It was a three "room", thatched roof, mud-brick home. Simple with most of the living taking place outside on the veranda on the mat. What I did? Now that's funny. It seems intangible almost to think about. Activities like sitting, watching, observing, learning, helping and just simply living occupied my day. It was hard. Extremely hard. There were moments that my attitude was and is still shameful. My journal reads a story that every page is night and day from one another. Moments of such joy and contentment and others of anger and frustration. All of this can be put into another blog, but I have to set up what I want to write about. Dry bones.

For many days as I flipped through the pages of my bible I ran face to face with Ezekiel. Never stopping for more than a split second, just enough to downplay its relevance. Until one day I stopped. Ezekiel 37. The Valley of Dry Bones. I read and wept.

"son of man, can these bones live?"

Suddenly I was aware of what The Lord had been asking me all along. I could see his gentle smirk as I complained, groaned, cried and pouted at my circumstances. "son of man, can these bones live?" He was testing the amount of trust I held that He could turn this situation into something God breathed. He wanted to know if I trusted Him give it life. Did I believe?

As I read on I was jumping and giddy with excitment as my eyes grazed over the story of God raising an "exceedingly great army" from a valley filled with dead, dry, bones. He did it!!! He is awesome! What can stop our Lord? What can't He do? I found myself smitten, completely in awe of this Father who in His power you see His great love, nurture and provision.

I knew it wasnt accidental that as I read this passage I felt as if my day to day existence was dry and often dead. I couldn't do anything like I wanted to. I was totally and utterly dependent on the people. I felt burdensome and needy. I couldn't talk to them, I couldn't form relationship how I wanted. I couldn't serve the way I saw fit because their ways were so different from anything I had ever done. All I could do was sit, muster a smile and let them serve me. So many times as I went about the day I heard a gentle whisper, "son of man, can these bones live?" I knew who it was from and who it was for.

So I am left here in a place of wonder. I am sure you're wanting an end to this story. A beautiful wrap up of an incredible Holy Spirit encounter that made everything make sense. Well, I am sorry to say that didn't happen. No big change of events, no miraculous healing or crazy stories of impossible communication made possible. I still just sat, I remained silent, I helped when I could, smiled as often as possible and prayed every night for God to change my heart. And you know what I may never know if he did. I do know he rescued me time and time again, breathing life into my bones. I have no idea if I was apart of any change in the lives of those people. No clue if they will even remember me in ten years. I may have offended people or missed opportunities for service. I dropped the ball over and over. Yet, every morning breath. Every morning a gentle whisper "son of man, can these bones live?" and each day life was breathed into my dry, dead bones...just for the day, or for moments of the day, yet I always knew He was near. I constantly felt His presence, I felt His life begging me to believe.

Here are some pictures to give you a glimpse into the sights of Mozambique. It is a beautiful place, with great potential. There is hope. There is life to be breathed. There is an army to rise up.

My mom, sister, and nephew preparing the Cassava for dinner.