September Sabbatical

Its hard to even begin to write about this because none have you have been in my heart and head over the last 3 months as the Lord deals with me at the root level of my sin.  He is transforming my heart and my life yet again… a continual process.  It is hard.  But it is good and worth it and in the end it brings great freedom!

So, one thing I’ve learned… I’m a relationship junkie.

The Lord has made me to be a extremely relational person.  I just love people.  I love getting to know people and what makes them who they are.  I love stepping into the mess of people’s hearts and lives with them and seeing the Lord transform it.  I love knowing people and being known by people.  I love encouraging words and the difference that they make in someone’s life.  And I love being a part of a family and friend community where I feel loved and known and accepted.

This is a good thing, a great thing.  I think it is how the Lord has gifted me to do the work He has called me to do, both past and future.  And yet, I am starting to see the places where this part of my personality is also a detriment. 

1. I can easily get to the point where I begin believing I “need” people more than I “need” God.  It becomes easier to run to other people with my mess and my emotions than to run to God.  It becomes easy to find my identity in what other people think of me than in God.  All things I have to fight.

2. I am terrible at saying goodbye.  My goodbye tends to go like this, “Talk to you later.  See you later.  Let’s skype sometime.  I’ll talk to you soon.  Let’s catch up.  Call me sometime."  You get the point.  I don’t like for relationships to change and to ever not know someone as well as I once did.  That is so hard for me.

To that end, the internet is a blessing and a curse.  I have recently been convicted that the Lord is calling me to really LIVE here in Costa Rica and to really say a stronger goodbye to life at home.  To that end I am taking September sabbatical.

I still want to hear from people, don’t get me wrong.  I am just allowing myself freedom to not return every email, every phonecall, every facebook message.  I am not cutting off from the internet, I will still be blogging and keeping the people who read this up to date on my life and adventures in language learning.  But I will not be using skype or facebook or email to communicate with people in the US for the month of September.  But remember, you don’t all have blogs where I can stalk your life, so I would still love little updates every once in a while. :)

I am really praying that God uses this time to give me freedom to really invest here – in community, but mainly in Spanish language learning, time in the Word, and in resting.  That sounds strange to invest in resting.  But its something that has to be very intentional for someone like me who likes to be on the go.  I think that I will come out of this with a much healthier balance of living away and yet still loving people at home from a distance.

Thank you for your prayers and for your patience with me :)