I’ve had a crazy weekend of hanging out with new people. It’s been amazing. By far my favorite part of living here in Swazi is meeting new people and getting to know them. It’s such an amazing opportunity. It’s like God is saying, ‘You have no friends? Pshhh, here, take your pick!’. Such a blessing. He is an amazing God.
Some amazing people I’ve gotten to hang out with are the World Race team that is here. I feel like I’ve told most of you what the World Race is, and have talked about it in other blogs, so, if you don’t know what it is, look it up.
This team is all girls, all amazing, mature, kind young women. The first night I met them, a couple of weeks ago, they asked me if I would go up to the crafts market in Manzini with them the next Saturday. I said, sure!
I had done it before with a World Race team, acting as a sort of tour guide for them around the ‘big city’. Minus the big.
Manzini is always insane, and we had an insane day, but it was great. I got to know them better and had a great time just hanging out with them.
Apparently, in God’s eyes, Manzini, and, specifically, Manzini buses, are also a great place to teach spiritual lessons…J
When we had first gotten on the bus, we sat there for like 45 minutes waiting for it to fill up. That was a 45 minutes spent baking in the blazing African sun, being crowded together with lots of sweaty Swazis, and tuning out the piercing BEEEEEEEP of the bus’ horn as the bus driver tried to get out of the bus rank.
By the time we got on the road, finally, I was pretty miserable.
And that’s when God decided to test my obedience to him.
Yeahhh, His timing is usually impeccable.
I was sitting here in the window seat, SOAKED in my own sweat, and probably a little bit of the lady’s next to me, blasting my ipod in a desperate effort to tune out the screaming of everyone at the bus rank, the honking of the extremely obnoxious horn, and the yelling of some guy on the bus trying to sell candy, and not too happy, when God points out the little girl standing in the aisle next to my seat.
I had bought two beaded wrap-around type wire bracelets at the market that day, and was pretty happy with them--especially since they matched my outfit…J
I had been playing with the bracelets, wrapping them and unwrapping them from my wrist absentmindedly, when I saw the little girl eyeing them.
God said to me:
‘I want you to give one of your bracelets to that little girl.’
Now here’s what get’s me. God treasures me so much that he (a) gives me a choice…what bracelet will I give to her, and (b) says I only have to give away one. He’s such an amazing Father!
Right away, I thought, ‘No! I just got this bracelet, it matches my outfit, and this girl is absolutely fine, I mean, she had enough money to ride this bus, right? She isn’t suffering too bad.’ Yeah. I know; pathetic. But it was my thought process in the moment.
This went on for a little while in my head, me going back and forth, back and forth…to give the little girl the bracelet, or not.
Eventually, I came to my senses and thought ‘Would I rather NOT have this bracelet, or NOT have the guilt attached TO that bracelet every time I looked at it, thinking, ‘I didn’t obey God and give this away to that little girl.’’ So, I slowly unwrapped the white one from my arm, and wrapped it around her wrist.
She was beaming for the rest of the bus ride.
And so was I.
