What I am taking with me (Saturday)

I am looking over the wing of our Jet Blue airbus and I see Jamaica growing smaller as we leave. I just finished the delicious beef patty and festival that Gretchen, Teri, and Suzanne bought for the team to eat on the plane. We nearly missed our flight - the airport had to page each of our names individually! But things are a bit quieter now that the plane has taken off and I can use this time to reflect on the past eight days.

This was my third year on the trip and something has felt a little different this whole week. And it feels different now, too. Usually on the plane ride I am close to tears and I feel that I have been torn away from a world where everything is better and God is everywhere. I dread going home and facing the daily grind of life in NYC. I don't feel this right now - I feel an incredible peace and sense of purpose; a knowledge that it is not over and that this is just the beginning.

This year, I do not feel so much that I am leaving something I love behind, but that I am taking a whole lot of love with me to share when I get home. I have begun to learn how to live the lessons of Jamaica and Mustard Seed everyday - whether in Jamaica or in Hoboken or in New York - and I am realizing that "real life" does not actually have to be a whole lot different than the beautiful eight days we just spent in Kingston.


Some other things were different this year, too...


This year... we spent most of our time working at Mary's Child, where we had the privilege to share three days with the most beautiful, generous, light-hearted, and wise teenage girls I have ever met... girls that have persevered through unthinkable challenges and have come through with smiles on their faces and beautiful babies in their arms. They are sisters to one another, mothers to their babies, and teachers to each of us. These girls showed us unconditional love despite all of the hurt they have lived and the many reasons they had not to trust us.


This year... we ventured up the hill past Sophie's Place. We have never gone up the hill before. The uphill climb took us to dinner at a modest rooftop bar where the owner served us food his wife had cooked in his kitchen. He served the food from his own bowls onto the same plates that his family eats from. He opened his home to us, letting us use his family's bathroom, which was located through his bedroom. He welcomed 20 strangers into his home like we were family and he charged us a total of $100 for dinner. The owner showed us love even though he had just met us that evening.


This year... the much-anticipated peace and quiet of our annual Thursday morning prayers were interrupted by excessively loud Jamaican rap music. We had to block it out and struggle to focus on the prayer and worship before us. This challenge was a reminder to each of us of the constant distractions we face back home and the effort it will take to block them out to focus on what really matters - living a life of love and service to others.

This year... we brought five of our boys with HIV to see their first musical show. They felt so special having a night out on the town with us and we felt so lucky to be there with them. We've never had the chance to take the kids out somewhere as a team. You could see how much love they felt and how much love the team had for each of those boys that night.


This year... we did things more simply. We ate fewer of the American snacks we brought. We only had water to shower once during the week and nobody complained. We turned off more lights that weren't being used. We had a sign up for who was on dinner and dish duty, but we did not even need to use it. These little things added up to a strong feeling of camaraderie and love. We were a team and we were living simply for those eight days so that we could grow closer to one another and to God.

Jamaica has vanished behind us by now. The plane will land and we will all get off and go back to our homes and our lives. We will savor hot showers and wash off a week's worth of dirt and sweat. We will take off our team t-shirts and eventually we will remove the Mustard Seed crosses from around our necks. On Monday morning we will put on our work clothes and, along with them, everything that comes with living and working in New York.

My prayer right now is that each of us may bring the simple love we experienced this week to every moment of our day-to-day lives. May we do all things differently because of the love we have shared with these children, with each other, and with many new friends this past week. May we take every moment of this experience and live it out each and everyday for God and for each other.

--Carla, 3rd year