Do you know a doctor who has gotten sick and had to be the patient? How about a physical therapist with an injury? It is very hard going from being the one with the knowledge and control to being the one needing the services. This is the situation I find myself in right now.

In the states, I was a teacher. I liked what I did, was good at it, parents and students liked me, I was creative and I felt smart and confident.  I was also a Northern Virginia mom. I chauffeured my kids around and got them where they needed to be all while driving in my Honda Pilot. Without me they were often trapped to the confines of our own neighborhood.

And then I moved to Guatemala.  I’ve gone from being a teacher to a student. I am finding Spanish school difficult and am often questioning my intellect. I speak childish Spanish and often get my verb tenses wrong. The other day my teacher was calling out large numbers in Spanish and I had to write them. I got a few of them wrong! This is an activity I did with my 5th grade students while teaching place value, and here I am, like a 10 year old student, writing out my numbers and not fully succeeding. It is humbling at best.  In Guatemala, I do not drive and I never go anywhere alone. I have been stripped of my independence.

These are not bad things in and of themselves as I am liking my life in Guatemala. These feelings are also not unique to me, as I have talked with many amazing women here who feel the same way I do. But I am finding that God is using these experiences to strip me of everything that I clung to as my identity.  So, as God peels away, layer by layer, the “Self” I am full of, I am encouraged by II Corinnthians 12:8…

“But He [Christ] said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.”

This is what God is working on in me, what is He working on in you? I would love to hear!

(Maureen)