Hey Everyone,
Well it is finally here...my last update. I have been home for a few days now, getting back after a two or so days trip from Thailand to Seoul to San Francisco to here. I actually started writing an update a day or so after I got back. By the time I got to 4,000 words (about 15 double-spaced pages) and still wasn't finished, I decided not to send it out in order to spare you some time. There is simply no way to concisely, yet specifically, tell you about how I am feeling or how the trip went. I tried. If you want me to send you the long e-mail, please let me know. I would me more than happy to and would be overjoyed that you care to hear more (a lot more), but I won't subject you to it unwillingly.
Anywho though, in a nutshell, it feels like I am in a very good and bad place simultaneously after being back a few days. I can't convey how much loss I feel, how much I miss my community, the churches, the people, the ministries, the ways God spoke, and the joy he gave. I've simply never heard God speak so clearly and so consistently as He did in Kolkata, and I've never seen so many Biblical truths become actual realities. His Gospel has been made real to me in ways that I cannot explain, unfortunately, in an "update" e-mail. He's shown me that Life is found repeatedly in sacrifice and the giving up of oneself while depending on and seeking to glorify Him. He's shown me the fruits of complete dependence in Him, finally having trapped myself in a situation where I couldn't afford to do otherwise. He's given me a faith derived from experience after experience in which he came through for me in every situation of personal weakness, and shined through shortcoming and faults and personal failure. He conquered darkness (in its variety of senses) and redeemed it for good so many times that I can't even keep count. He's made me trust and believe in Him by showing Himself in so many people, so many ministries, churches, acts of loving kindness, through words, and even through suffering. The obviousness of His light in the midst of darkness is indescribable, and the joy and completion it brings is the same. I saw his love and transformation in everyone I met: from missionaries who had been working alone with people in sexual slavery for years to Indians who found satisfaction and Life in his presence despite horrible physical circumstances to the boys I worked with who lived in the slums to teammates to countless other Christians I met almost by chance. How can I thank God enough for that? How can I thank Him for giving me more than I could ever ask for every day for six weeks? How can I convey what that feels like? I don't know, but I desire now to follow him as faithfully and ernestly as I can for the rest of my life--knowing full well that I will not do so at many points--and I wish that I could somehow share a fraction of the blessings He's given me with you.
On the flip side, however, is the hurt and pain and darkness that I left behind, which is the reality for millions living without Christ and without much of any kind of spiritual, emotional, or (most of all) physical sustenance in Kolkata. The horribleness of man is in full display in Kolkata and I urge you to pray with all your heart for that to change. I urge you even more to let a part of that aspect of Kolkata into yourselves, whether you find it in your neighborhood, town, country, or in some far away place like Kolkata itself. Having been unable to avoid the terribleness of what humanity is like without Christ, I now see the inescapable need for him all the more, and it is much more difficult to remain apathetic and cold (as I was) about injustice that is easy to not see and hurt that is easy to never feel. Yet it is what most people in the world see and feel everyday and, having taken care of and loved some of those people trying to live life in the most abysmal of slums, or those who die in a Sister's of Charity home after being beaten down their whole lives (and feeling loved for one of the first times), apathy and the general trivialness of American concerns is no longer acceptable or an option--and that makes me very happy. It is a blessing of Christ to truly love and give yourself to those who need it. I pray that you will seek to explore and find that truth wholeheartedly and with joy, for it is where God is. I know that most of you and my other friends reflect Christ far more than I do in my life, so I am not trying to be patronizing but merely encouraging. Kolkata, as well as (I'm sure) countless places in America, need people who follow Christ and God. They need money and prayers, yes, but they also need so much more, especially people who are willing to follow Christ to them...and we need that too. God has designed our faith to be integrated with it and dead without it. I don't know what that looks for for everyone specifically, but I know it involves complete submission to God that Kolkata has only allowed me to taste, yet that is enough to want much much more. So I pray for that for Kolkata's sake, for America's sake, for mine and for yours.
I wish I could have shared more stories, because the stories of my experience are what lie behind everything I wrote above. They have really been amazing and, clearly, change my life. I'm excited to see where they lead next, and I ask that you pray that God will lead me in the right direction. Thank you again for everything you have given me in terms of encouragement, prayers, and general updates. I'm sure I will never know how much I owe you. Every e-mail you sent brought me happiness and made things a little less hard. So thank you! Thanks, also, for being willing to listen to and put up with these long and ranty e-mails. That means a lot too and I hope God has given you something through them, as he has for me. Hopefully I will get to share much more with many of you in person and hear what God has been doing for you as well!
In Him,
Jacob
P.S.--My other e-mail wasn't working for a little bit, that's why I used this address. Still send e-mail to my other one though. Thanks!
No comments:
Post a Comment