On Saturday morning I dropped my students and some of my staff off at the airport and said good-bye for the last time. It was weird. Graduation was Friday night, and it was fun, and then I stayed up late talking and hanging out with students, and then on Saturday I got up and went to the airport for what felt like the thousandth time, said good-bye, got back in the van, and drove away. It was all very routine and easy, and I was sad, but I think what I was really sad about was that I could not really bring up the energy to let myself feel as sad as I am that I will probably never see most of those people again. These beautiful, amazing children of God, whom I have prayed for and hoped for and watched grow and change for the last six months, left New Zealand. In their uniqueness, they still ended up on an airplane headed home, just like the ones six months ago, and the ones six months before that. Which is where they should be headed. And as much as I love them, I'm too tired of this routine to really allow myself sadness at their going.
It strikes me that this is not really healthy. But then again, I kind of have this theory that we in the West are a little bit spoiled in our ability and willingness to be concerned about every little aspect of our emotional health, and are nevertheless no more emotionally healthy than those who are more concerned with other things. So... I don't know. I am still going to ramble on about myself, but you can know that I DO know it's not the most important thing in the world.
Anyway, I got to thinking about sacrifice. Because for me, it is a sacrifice to love people and allow myself to be known by people (at least to a degree) that I know I will not see again after a DTS is over. And I do it over and over again, and I guess I feel like I have somehow given up a bit of emotional normalcy because of it. I am kind of dreading the moment where I finally realize that these people that I have loved are gone for pretty much the rest of my life on earth.
I have a hard time with the idea of sacrifice, because... on the one hand, it is kind of at the core of my belief system. Jesus, of course, made the ultimate sacrifice of his life so that we could be reconciled to God. That is one heck of an example. On the other hand, there are these things we call "boundaries." Every once in a while around here, somebody goes on a boundaries rampage, telling us all that we need to take time for ourselves and set limits and not always be available and etc., etc. Which is a nice theory. And I tell my own staff these sorts of things, although I use different language, because I am not a huge fan of the pop-psychology word usage that seems to go with boundaries. I do send my staff to take days off when I can see they need one, and try to make sure that they are doing things they enjoy and looking after themselves.
But then, how does that fit in with this whole sacrifice thing? I mean, I've given things up to be here. I miss my family and friends and Portland and the convenience and familiarity of living in America. Does that mean I don't have to sacrifice anything else? I can just live here and do my job and keep good emotional "boundaries" and it's all good? The problem with that, of course, is that my job kind of entails NOT having those boundaries. It's pretty much my job to love people. I mean, I do lots of things, but at the very core of it all is to love others. And even if it wasn't my job, it's still pretty much the main thing that Jesus told us to do, only second to loving God. I can't really imagine Jesus being like, "love your neighbor as yourself, but only during office hours..."
The other day I read a comment by a guy who brought up William Wilberforce and the fact that he totally sacrificed his health for the cause of slavery. And he was passionate and driven and ultimately successful. According to the theory of boundaries, your own health is not an acceptable sacrifice. But if Wilberforce had not made the sacrifice, he would not have made such an impact in the world. I was talking to Patrick Dodson, one of our speakers about this, and he made the excellent point that worldwide slavery is perhaps not on the same scale of importance as what I am doing... but then again, maybe it is. Maybe one of the students that comes here is going to be the next William Wilberforce, and my decision to give up something in order to love them--even though they are only a very temporary friendship-- will be a key in their life. I guess the thing is, ultimately, to decide whether what I'm doing is actually important enough to make the sacrifices that I do make. Which are fairly paltry, in all honesty. But if what I'm doing makes no impact, then even paltry sacrifices could be put to better use elsewhere. And that is a very hard thing to measure.
Which is why I guess it comes down to trusting God. I do believe that when I committed to this place, it was what God was leading me to do. I believe that he can use me and does use me to show himself to the people around me. I don't know if it has to be the way that I have done it, exactly, or if there's some way to do this without feeling like I'm giving up my ability to connect in a normal emotional way to the situations around me.
Maybe next time I should just cry at the airport when I say good-bye. It might save me a lot of thinking. And also, does any of this make sense? Oh well. If you made it this far, great job. Now you know that I am actually crazy. And on that note, it's time for bed. For me. You can do whatever you want.
No comments:
Post a Comment