Travels

Spring brings about rain, flowers, and the hope of long summer days. Summer's laden with promises of fun in the sun but to me the need to travel is once again rising up within me. In my mind's eye I picture the lush, green vegetation that surrounds the valleys in central Sri Lanka to the big bold city lights with the sounds of car horns, people shouting and police sirens wailing. Then the canvas changes to the muddy yellow colors of the sands of the African deserts’ intensity draining you of energy as the sun joins in the promotion of the suffocating heat. 

There is beauty in the rain pouring down from the heavens in the cool of an African night. Our eyes appear wider as the variety of huge colorful lizards lay in silent wait for the ceasing of the rains. The architectural highlights of each country beckon the aimless wanderers. Malaysia’s own twin towers, Japan’s sophisticated streets, or England’s familiar Big Ben. 

The masses of humanity throng dangerously close to each other as the smells tear through ones mind. The images, sounds, and scents forever embedded into one’s memory. Who can forget the first time they walked through the white sands to the blue oceans of Hawaii’s magnificent beaches, gingerly stepped down the stairs to India’s slums, ran through the streams in South Korea’s prayer mountains, or climbed to the most breathtaking view from the height of Sigiriya’s leveled peak? 

If one looks closely, they find uniqueness in faces of the masses that pass by. In a small village on the outskirts of a city in Nigeria, men, women, and children live, work, and survive. They go about their daily activities of school and work in the fields, never venturing outside the perimeter of their village. In the open Chapel area on a breezy afternoon, they sing and praise the Lord with faith and passion. Here they reside, shunned by society. Outcasts. Their decomposing bodies a shocking sight to others around. They are a community of lepers, worshipping the Lord amid their poverty and lack of a dignified place in society. 

Contentment that is what I saw in the lives of the leper community. It stems from knowing who you are in Christ Jesus. There is nothing else, how can there be when everyday, your very life is decaying, literally before your eyes? Yet there is this contentment. 

Do you let yourself identify with your circumstances, your ideals, your status symbols? Are you letting culture dominate your life or is it your religion? Let your relationship with Christ deepen so that you learn to identify with Him. Then no matter what cross you have to bear that day, you have the confidence to face it, knowing who you are in Christ.

There is something about us humans that draws us to higher heights, constantly trying to outdo our last success. Never satisfied with what we have, always striving for what is thought to be better. Why else would this constant need for travel, change, and better things be driving our lives? People travel aimlessly everyday, consuming the latest and the greatest, living for nothing. Go, travel, live, give, love, and learn, but know that there is always a greater impact in other’s lives when you live for Christ. To live is Christ, to die is gain. To truly live with passion for life, with satisfaction in our every single action, is to live in Christ. 

There is one question that I have to ask myself at the end of the day, am I content in Christ? What are my motives? I know I will never be satisfied no matter how many countries I set foot in, or how many frames I hang on my walls, or whether I get the right career, and life, unless I first allow myself to be content in the arms of Christ.