Holy Surrendered

I have been having quite the "problem" lately. Depending on how you look at it, it may or may not be a problem. The problem is this- every time God teaches me a truth from the Bible, I am forced to come to grips with that truth in my life. In other words, what I'm learning from the Bible is all very real in my life.


Take for instance last Friday: I don't have class on Fridays so I was just planning on relaxing. I had had a rough week. My first week teaching all 80 kids. Thankfully on Tuesday I had help from four ladies on a team that was here. But on Thursday I was by myself and one class I had was extremely challenging. (What am I supposed to do with 20 unruly children who won't listen to me?) Also, we didn't have much power that week. The food in the fridge was getting warm and a few times we didn't have hot water for showers. Those amenities we do not have when there is no power. Anyways, I woke up and slowly got ready. Around 9:30 I did devotions. I was thinking a lot about what complete surrender to Jesus looks like. I spent a lot of time after I did my devotions just thinking about that. 


I had a Skype date with my friend at 11:00am, so at 10:50 I closed my journal and decided to take a quick shower. I turned on the shower and there was no water pressure. My toilet was not flushing again at that point, so I figured there just wasn't any water pressure. I thought, I'll just take a bucket bath! No big deal. I had taken bucket baths everyday in Jacmel with cold water. At least I had hot water! I filled up my bucket, found a cup to use and poured a full cup of water over my head. I looked down into the bucket and lo and behold there were black chunks near the bottom of the bucket. I brought my face closer to the bucket and peered down inside to get a closer look. Greenish black flakes were floating around in my bucket. Not cool. I poured the water out and tried again, filling the bucket back up. Problem not solved...there were even more black chunks in the water. By this time I was all wet, with those chunks in my hair, and really wanted my shower. I had the brilliant idea to use the shower head again, despite what little water was coming out.  I have a screen over the inside of the shower head; at least that way there hopefully wouldn't be black flakes in my water this way. I somehow managed to get the shampoo and black flakes rinsed out of my hair with a trickle of water. It was so disgusting. Needless to say, I was only a half hour late for my Skype date. 

On any other day I probably would not have been bothered by this. However, with the way my week went, I didn't have the patience to deal with anything else. I was mad at first. Then I thought, "Ok, God...you really got me this time. Real funny! Complete surrender, hunhh? Even from the comforts of a nice shower? Ok, fine- you win. Thanks for that lesson." When I was telling the story to my friend, I just laughed. Because in reality, I don't have it that bad. A lot of my missionary friends don't have a hot water heater. And most Haitians take bucket baths. At least I have a shower with warm water!

At the cross you beckon me

You draw me gently to my knees

And I am lost for words

   so lost in love

I am sweetly broken

Holy Surrendered

~Jeremy Riddle Sweetly Broken