The Little Things

Currently, I’m in Florida serving with a new Adventures in Mission base dedicated to disaster relief for Hurricane Ian. I will write more about this experience later. However, for now, I need to catch you up on the last two months in Eswatini.

They were a crazy two months full of sweet moments, yet honestly very hard. Due to the struggles I was facing, I fell behind on keeping you updated. However, I want to let you into my life in Eswatini. Hopefully, through the next couple blogs, you’ll see the beauty of Eswatini, the importance of community, and God’s heart for His people all around the world.

To begin my recap, here is a blog that I wrote one month into my time in Eswatini that I just never posted:

“I keep saying this, but I think it will always shock me – I can’t believe how fast time is passing! We’ve already been in Eswatini for a month. Forgive me for not writing an update sooner.

Over this past month, we have started Carepoint ministry. Carepoints are an Adventures in Mission ministry led by local Swazis. They provide food for kids of ages ranging from babies to 21-year-olds as they also teach them about Jesus. For me, working with this ministry means playing with the kids and serving the food. Since the kids are learning English in school, it’s fun to talk with them and get to know them. For the young ones who haven’t learned English yet, we just hold them and love them.

One moment that amused me recently was when a girl asked me to read her school book. However, the book was written in Saswati! She had fun watching me try to pronounce the words and then teaching me how to actually say them.

Outside of ministry time, we get a lot of rest. Our base where we’re staying is not close to much. We have one small grocery store that’s a 5-minute drive away (or a long walk) and then the “Safari Restaurant,” where we often eat on the weekends. Since we don’t have much to do, I have started noticing more of the “little things”.

One of my favorite activities in my free time is to take my camera and chase butterflies around trying to get pictures. I’m sure I look quite funny while doing it, but I enjoy it a lot. I also love watching the sunsets with my team as we sit on top of the shipping containers. These sunsets have some of the brightest colors and sharpest rays I’ve ever seen.”

I saw a lot of beautiful things in Africa. In that first month alone, I got to sleep at a nature reserve with zebras nearby, go on a safari with my parents, and see the Indian Ocean in Saint Lucia. It was truly a blessing to visit all of those places. However, those trips were just the beginning of the beauty I saw. I will never forget the smiles of the people I met, the sound of children laughing and giggling, and the excitement of a game of “touch” (their name for tag). From Sundays, I will fondly remember the indescribable harmonics of worship echoing through the one-room building where people gathered for church.

Nevertheless, with all this beauty surrounding me, I learned how people often become blind to it. In conversations with locals, I would mention how I loved the mountains or the sunsets, and they would react with surprise. “You think this is beautiful?” they would ask. Enthusiastically, I would reply, “Yes! Where I’m from, it’s flat, so I don’t get to see mountains like these”. Yet, I wouldn’t be surprised that if they visited my home, they would call it beautiful. I wonder what beauty is around us that we miss each day. I wonder what “little things” we can find as we praise God for it all.