The Beauty in Babel

Just over 24 hours ago I was in a different part of the world. I was in El Salvador, which isn't just another country, but also has a different culture, climate, and language.

Obviously I realized all of these things before traveling there, which is why I was anxious to go. It wasn't my first time out of the country; I actually went on a similar trip last year and you can read about it here. The biggest difference this time from any other is the weight of responsibility and fear of failure that I felt. Let me expound upon that a little more...

Every three years Christian Camping International (CCI) and Pine Cove create a new partnership with a church or organization in Latin America. This year, we began a three year partnership with a church called Vida Nueva. This should be a really awesome and exciting thing (here comes the "but")...but, I was entrusted with the responsibility to co-lead this team. So here I am, 23 years old, co-leading a team of 19-22 year old college students to a country I have never been to before to partner with people I have never met before and who speak a language I cannot speak. Needless to say, the thought of this was slightly overwhelming. I had been on a trip like this before, but I had never been responsible for leading one. Naturally where fear lives there are also lies that like to cohabitate too. I began to feel unequipped, inadequate, and totally unprepared...which is exactly where I needed to be in order to learn the things that God wanted to teach me.

When I arrived in Dallas for our orientation time with all of the other Commission Camping teams, the Lord began to work. He immediately gave me an overwhelming peace that only His presence can. It didn't change the realization that this trip could be really hard, but it did reassure me that regardless of where I went or what happened that God would always be there with His hand on the situation and that my labor would not be in vain. The more I dug into the sea of fears swimming around inside my heart, I realized it all came down to the language barrier. I knew how to do camp, how to teach camp, how to be relational with our PC team, and I was even passionate about all of those things. What I didn't (and still don't) know how to do is communicate in a differently language, Spanish in this case. I was fearful of getting there and not being able to communicate our philosophy for camping, servant leadership, love, and the Gospel...and if I wasn't able to communicate any of those things then what was the point in even going?

My fear and anxiety was somewhat relieved when we were greeted in El Salvador by our contact, David, whose English was just as good if not better than mine! Although this was a huge relief, I knew that we would still need to meet/communicate with the National staff and the campers that would be coming to camp in a few days.

Now that you know where my heart was, let's fast forward and get to part where God does the really incredible stuff. So, we met the National staff and spent a full day getting to bond with them. A lot of them knew English, and the ones that didn't were put at ease when we attempted to speak Spanish to them, especially when one of the guys from our team introduced himself as "Yo soy Tejas" (that means "I am Texas" for all of you non-Spanish speakers like me). So God was gracious to allow us to communicate decently well and start to bond with the National staff.

The next morning in my quiet time, part of my bible reading for the day was to read Genesis 11 which talked about the people of Babel. They had become so confident and comfortable in themselves and their community that they wanted to build a tower to make a name for themselves. God decided this wasn't good and dispersed them among the face of the Earth and confused their languages. Well, that was a convenient passage to read considering I was experiencing firsthand the effects of the selfishness and pride of the people of Babel. I immediately related with the people of Babel and saw how comfortable I had become in relying on my words and only finding community in people who were similar to me because that was what was easy and familiar. Woof. Thankfully, we serve a gracious and loving God who has a plan and purpose for everything. Even though he scattered the people of Babel and confused their languages, they still all shared a common-thread of unity and brotherhood, which I realized was also the case for our relationship with the people of El Salvador. From that point on, God graciously allowed me to see this common-thread in all that we did. We weren't always able to articulate everything we wanted, but we shared a common bond in Christ and it always came back to that. So once I was freed of my fear and anxiety, God completely blew my expectations out of the water and showed me just how good, gracious, and powerful He was and is. I didn't let my fear of the language barrier keep me from loving these people deeply and learning to live in community with them. I saw this in the people on our team as well as the National team too. By the end of the first day of camp, we were laughing, dancing, and sharing life with people of a different language, culture, and Nationality...all in the name of Christ.

In one of our last meetings with the National staff, we posed a question. At that point we had discussed and modeled a lot of philosophy (mainly intentionality, servant leadership and "It's Not About Me"), so we wanted to ask them if they had any questions about why we did the things we did or wanted to know more about anything they had heard or seen. No one moved or raised a hand. It was quiet for a good 15 seconds and then one of the counselors, Christy, raised her hand. She explained that no one had any questions because they knew exactly why we had come and had done everything we had done. She continued by saying that from day one we had made it clear that we were there to show Christ's love and to serve just as he had in humility and love.

Wow.

What an incredible God we serve! For the longest time I had been so fearful of the language barrier and what a hindrance it would be for us to communicate our purpose, but in reality the whole time God was working in incredible ways by using our lack of verbal communication to show the people of El Salvador His love and servant-hood solely by our actions. Our words were nothing but babble (a term affectionately coined from the story of Babel) to them majority of the time, but it didn't matter. God had a message to share with the people of Vida Nueva in El Salvador and He not only did that, but He allowed our team to be a vessel for it and to be part of His plan.

So now I see the beauty in Babel. The beauty in being forced out of what is comfortable for the sake of not relying on something that is easy and familiar, but instead relying on something that runs much deeper and is so much sweeter. Instead of finding comfort in familiarity and seeking to build a name for myself, I now desire to continue to find the beauty in Babel by not allowing a different language, religion, culture, Nationality,or  physical appearance to keep me from finding community with someone in the name of Christ and to constantly seek the common-thread of brotherhood and unity with those that God puts in my path no matter how different they may be.

I will never forget seeing both the National staff and precious, tiny El Salvadorian campers stand in front of our team on the last day and testify to the work that God had done through us and the love they felt from us. Those words are burned into my memory forever and I am brought to tears every time I re-live those moments. God used those people in a  mighty way to show me the beauty in Babel and a compleley new aspect of His character.