Just me...

Over the last few weeks I have been called an American, a volunteer, a missionary, an angel, “Tia Branca” (the white aunt), Tia Abi, a foreigner, a beautiful woman, the blonde girl, a student, and countless other names.  With each of these names comes an expectation.  Then I meet someone else who has the same title and seems to be living up to the expectation far better than I.  I begin to compare myself to them and focus on my insufficiencies.  Well, guess what?  I am just me—just Abigail.

I am a chocolate-and-coffee-loving female.  My obsessions include running and cooking.  Sitting still is difficult for me; I would rather be moving and busy.  I am serious most of the time, but my sisters bring out my outbursts of hysteria.  Small talk aggravates me.  I desire to go deep with others and hear their life stories, yet it takes me awhile to trust people with my story.  I enjoy observing people and trying to understand them.  When I do something, I want to pour my whole heart into that thing.  Sometimes this leaves me with a broken heart, but I am prone to setting my expectations low in hopes of avoiding emotional pain.   I think that I am tough, but it is the smallest things that make me break.  My heart comes alive when I am holding the hand of a dying individual or cuddling a sick child.  I want to go to places of suffering because I want to be moved to compassion—compassion that just might make a difference or give a glimpse of hope. 

Now, I am half a world away from my home and the people that know me.  The distance has made me question who I really am.  Over the years, I have lived with so many facades.  I desire to exceed the expectations of others, but then I get overwhelmed and find myself suffocating under the pressures of who people want me to be and the reality of my flaws.  Ultimately, I realize that I am just me.  I have only one voice to answer to and that is God’s voice.  He has called me to love Him with all of my heart, soul, and mind. This is not hard to do considering the fact that He is my greatest lover who fills my life with endless blessings. Secondly, He has called me to love my neighbor as myself—not more than myself, AS myself. 

In Matthew 25, Jesus says, “When I was hungry, you gave me something to eat, and when I was thirsty, you gave me something to drink.  When I was a stranger, you welcomed me, and when I was naked, you gave me clothes to wear.  When I was sick, you took care of me, and when I was in jail, you visited me.”  Jesus’s followers asked when they did this for Him, and He replied, “Whenever you did it for any of my people, no matter how unimportant they seemed; you did it for me.”  I have been given the opportunity to love Jesus—the one who never hurts me and always love me with unconditional love—by loving the broken and hurting of this world.  While this is often contrary to my flesh’s desires, the joy that this brings to my heart and soul is inconceivable.  On the other hand, when I choose to ignore the suffering of human beings, I have chosen to reject Jesus.  I have left Him naked, hungry, thirsty, suffering, and alone.  I have trampled on love and condemned myself as a result.

Jesus has changed my life.  Jesus has given me hope.  Jesus has given me freedom from the expectations of others.  Because of Jesus, grace and forgiveness have entered my life.  I don’t want to live one day in which I do not respond in love to Jesus’s image in others.  To be able to reciprocate a portion of the love that He constantly bestows on me makes my life a beautiful romance.  So, I am just me—loved and lover.