Only one week left… wow. I am in awe because  it seems like such a long ways away, yet at the same time, it feels like I’m boarding the plane tomorrow. And with time crunching down, it feels like there are a million and a half things for me to do and tie up in the short time I have left here, mostly to prepare for when I come back.

Tony found me after the last service this past Sunday, and asked me to come up with a plan for when I come back, (and they “totally want [me] back”) since I can’t be down here and be a “drifter.” I need to have a solid compromise with the church in order for them to accept me again. Little did he know that I had been praying about this for a long, long time, and already had a plan roughly laid out in my head regarding the two years I’d be returning.

He is one of the many people I need to find time to talk to this week. I scheduled a meeting with Pastor Mimix for today, discussing a few personal things that I was led to share with her. With her being one of my leaders, that was one step I needed to take before the decision to come back would be more of a reality than something that existed mainly in my mind. By the end of the conversation, she was telling me how she had already asked Pastor Tony to have me in worship full time with her, and working with her in the mornings.

The only problem with that is the fact that I’m coming down here to be a full-time missionary, and the hours that Mimix would be giving me are more “part-time/casual.” But it turns out things always work out for the best, because she told me she offered to give me to extensions when she didn’t need my help or need me on stage, and maybe even helping out with Casa Nana, working with the orphans.

Luckily for me, I was going to ask Tony and Mimi if I could do all of these things anyway, so all that’s left for me to do is confirm with Tony that I am totally down for a full, busy schedule.

Her only condition was that I need to really get my Spanish skills down. I’ve gotten a lot better these past couple of months – speaking more Spanish with my bilingual friends and asking them lots of questions, and speaking much more with non-English speakers. I fully plan on devoting a good portion every day to becoming truly bilingual, and while I know it will take a long time to get to the point of being totally comfortable with Spanish as a second language, I am confident in my ability to increase my vocabulary and diction and mastery of grammar to the point where I can hold my own in daily conversation. It’ll help that help is readily available online, as well as in the form of my bilingual friends back in Chicago (*hint-hint, wink-wink, nudge-nudge*), and that the roommate I have lined up to share a house with when I get back isn’t very comfortable with English – I’ll have lots of ways to polish up my second language.

Mimix and Tony made it pretty clear they wanted me back – Mimi even told me she wants me back as soon as possible – and it alleviated a lot of unnecessary stress I was feeling. But I still had a nagging feeling that maybe not everyone who should want me back, will want me back. Like Pastor Obed, or Pastor Diego.

And as though God were trying to prove a point (and He probably was, if only to let me know that He’s taking care of literally everything), Pastor Diego, who is teaching the afternoon classes this week, came up to me during a break and asked me, “so you’re thinking of coming back, right?” We didn’t have the chance to continue the conversation after I answered with a simple, “yeah -” because he had to take a phone call, but he said with such a soft, and eager tone that I knew exactly where the conversation would have gone.

We ended this afternoon’s class on a bit of an emotional level, with Pastor Obed asking us to unite in worship and prayer. He spoke to us during this time, and started giving a word to a few students, and I was one of those he got a word for – and he told me (roughly):

Vas a regresar a tu tierra – hay muchos demonios que te espera alla. Cosas con las que tú has luchado durante toda tu vida… pero no olvides quien tu eres… vas a cantar mas fuerte, Miko… Vas a vencer tu depresion… Tú vas a regrasar a tu tierra – para regresar aca. Dios tiene un plan, Miko. Confías en Él.

Which means: You’re going to return to your land – there are many demons waiting for you there. Cosas that you’ve battled/struggled with your entire life… but do not forget who you are. You’re going to sing stronger, Miko… You will overcome your depression… You’re going back to your land – to return here. God has a plan, Miko. Trust in Him.
*There were things I excluded for sake of brevity, which is the purpose of the ellipses.*

Okay, then. In one day, God has calmed a lot of fear/stress I was feeling concerning this situation, making any doubts I may have had about coming back shrink into basically nothing.

Seeing as how this is my last post till I leave, I now ask that you guys pray for safe travels and that I find a way to get everything I need to bring back into the amount of baggage I’m allowed to take with me on my trip.

 

Thank you for the read – don’t forget to like, comment, share, and whatever else you can think of to let me know you read and enjoyed this post! Love you guys!

I have exactly six weeks left here in Mexico, and it’s hard to believe that that this year is almost over. It has been quite the experience, and I have grown a lot. But I know that there are big things to be done and achieved within this terrifyingly short time span.

Tomorrow is the first day of our ADN (DNA) conference, which also happens to be the last event I’ll be a part of with La Fuente for at least another eight months. I posted a video of it on the Miko In Mexico Facebook page (where I translated the Spanish, too), if you guys are interested in what La Fuente is doing in the creative department. But the basis of the conference is in having a solid grasp of what the church is and does, and where we as individuals fit into the greater whole – it covers a Christian’s “genetic makeup,” so to speak, hence the name, “ADN” (DNA).

I really enjoy events like these, because Vanguard contributes a lot of time and work into these conferences, giving us a break from schoolwork and giving real jobs to do in the church to prepare for the work that God is going to do and the way He’s going to move in the span of three days. For example, we had the usual prayer at the main church this morning at 8:30, and then we were split into teams, tasked with doing specific jobs: cleaning the sanctuary, cleaning the information area and the bathrooms, cleaning the kitchen, cleaning the area surrounding the church building (the sidewalk and the streets), painting, etc…

I helped with cleaning and organising the kitchen, and when I was done, I helped with basically everything else – anywhere they could put me. It reminded me how much I enjoyed helping in the church – and I continue to count down the days till I can come back and do what I initially came here for.

Until then, I have to focus on what’s right in front of me: Vanguard, the worship team, and how ends are going to be able to meet by or before December 20th. I know God will be faithful to provide for me, but I can’t help but worry about how things are going to work out.