To most people, this probably looks like rows of shacks, barely staying together by nails and concrete if they’re lucky. Most people probably think, “Those poor people. They don’t have any money or work or hope.” This is where I say that I believe those thinking and believing that are incredibly wrong.
The designer and artist inside of me walking down these dirt streets is fascinated. Everywhere my eyes look, they see textures and colors and flowers, randomly growing in what most see as a dark place. My eyes see a place perfectly put together in a beautiful, chaotic collage.
The reader and writer inside me longs to hear the stories. This place is a compilation of stories, so many still untold. Where they’re from, what they left behind, where they’re going. What they believe and the hope they hold inside their hearts. They are all a family. They love and care for one another and their lives are vibrant and overflowing with joy. And while they may not have much money, these people are rich in ways we can’t be, because our focus is so often on ourselves.
I’ll borrow a few words from Jamie Tworkowski here, who borrowed from Bono, in his book, “If You Feel Too Much.” He says we all have God-sized holes inside us. I think a majority of the time, we try to fill those holes with a lot of things, a lot of people and stuff. But it’s a God-sized hole, and God is big, which means it’s a big hole, so why do we think we can ever fill it with anything but Him? Why do we think we can fill it with anything other than the only One big enough to fill it?
South Africa has changed a lot of things for me. God has used this country as a place of rest, but also as a place of change and ripping my heart wide open to receive the more and better He has. I had to make a decision to fill the God-sized hole. I had to make a decision of wanting to live a better story, to co-write with the Writer who is shaping my character to become a better character. Because this Writer Write much better stories that I can alone.
I’ve known in my head for years that God is good, always, even through losing my grandmothers last year. I knew there was a greater and bigger thing behind it. There is, however, a vast difference between head knowledge and heart knowledge. Here in South Africa, my heart has ripped open and God is pouring in heart knowledge I’ve been missing for months and years. Because I want to live a better story.
I want to know that what I believed I believed with all I had, and that also means taking action and having conversations, and taking risks.
Leaving for the Race was a risk. But I think the worse thing would have been to keep living a story with no risk.
“…I kept resisting my story. But you can only do that for so long. It’s true what Steven Pressfield says: there is a force resisting the beautiful things in the world, and too many of us are giving in. [God wants] us to have courage [and faith]. The world needs us to write something better.”—Donald Miller, A Million Miles In A Thousand Years
