Day 30-
I keep saying that my days and weeks are a whirlwind, but they are. So many events rushed together are keeping me on my toes and enjoying life to the fullest right now. I will just try and give some highlights from the past week…
Sunday was “Car Free Day” in Brussels which happens once a year. When someone casually mentioned it to me at work, I thought, “Well that’s nice a couple people may not drive then”. Well I was wrong, Belgians may not arrive on time anywhere, and they may not know how to drive their cars carefully, BUT they for sure DO care about their environmental issues. Whether it is with their “car free” days or their nineteen different trash bags used to sort pieces of trash, they are CONSTANTLY trying to one up the world with their recycling habits. So on Sunday not only was I informed that people would get a huge ticket if they drove on car-free Sunday, but no one would be allowed in and out of Brussels by car, unless accompanied by an emergency vehicle. Sunday was also the day that our Resident Director Sabine emailed us girls with a long list of things we actually cannot throw in the trash. I guess the trash guy picked our stuff up and gave us a fine for having certain things in the wrong colored bags. Can I just say that there are like ten different bags and all have different colors and all mean different things. And all the directions for what to put in them are in Dutch, or French or even German. Perfect because I speak all three of those languages. Alright Brussels, I love you dearly but sounds like you need some Xanax when it comes to environmental issues. It’s all going to be alright, I promise.
Anyway, car free Sunday was really cool, lots of people riding bikes, skateboards and rollerblades in the middle of the street. And for some reason there was a HUGE festival going on downtown. Now when I say festival, let me tell you that I know for sure it was a festival and beyond that…I got nothing. But I smiled and took pictures of everything, sampled a bunch of food and jammed out to the music all afternoon. What were we celebrating? Well by the end of it I just told myself that Brussels was celebrating me coming to Europe. That had to be it. One thing that I have learned here is that Europeans sure do love ANY reason to take a few hours off of work, have a drink and socialize with their friends. While I have been here, Brussels has had probably three or four different festivals that all celebrate different things…the one common thread, a lot of people doing a lot of drinking. They sure do love their beer (I for sure do not, but they drink it like fish). So the festival was great, we walked for miles, ended up in the grand place somehow and celebrated whatever we were celebrating to the max.
In other news, I have decided that my work (or internship) is one of my favorite parts of my life here. It is so cool how God really does work things out for the best…I got turned down for one of the other internships that I thought I really wanted, and I wasn’t even supposed to interview for this one, but His ways are much higher than mine. Not only do I love the location (just outside EU headquarters) but I work with some awesome people. I work under one of the partners but in the office there are several “young professionals” (three boys and one girl) that are all from Holland, but speak English and probably 12 other langauges fluently. They always invite me to lunch or to get dinner with them after work; it has been so cool getting to know these people….they ask so many questions about American life and I ask so many questions about their lives..it’s been an awesome learning experience.
Monday at work there was a huge protest going on outside just outside our building…at one point my boss actually got up from her desk with her own camera to take a picture of the group protesting below us…so needless to say, I got my camera out as well. We found out that some Ethiopians were protesting about the taxes their government were putting on them. My boss said that different nationalities travel from all over Europe to gather in front of the EU headquarters to protest either what the EU is doing or to protest in order to get some kind of awareness or aid from the rest of the world. I was standing by the window in one of conference rooms taking pictures like a tourist when one of the “young professionals” I am friends with, Matisse, walks by and nonchalantly says, “Guess the oppressed minority of the day”. I remember passing by the large protest earlier that week (with people from Mauritania protesting about slavery) and thinking that it was some huge world issue that me and my stupid Americaness just hadn’t been informed of yet. Later at lunch Matisse told me, “You know all of us really didn’t know Mauritania had a problem with slavery, or Tanzania had an issue with their corrupt economy, or Morocco had an issue with their taxes, or we may not even have known that Mauritania existed…but hey, there yea go”. So if you didn’t know already…Ethiopia wasn’t too happy on Monday about their taxes from their government. Someone should really get on that.
After work, I got to have such a neat God moment. I went out to dinner with my three dutch friends, Esther, Matisse and Rudolph. Esther is an intern like me but Rudolph and Matisse actually have jobs at ICODA and described their positions to me as “we make somewhat unimportant people feel like they are the coolest person on the planet so they will vote the way we want them to vote”. So cool and fun..and hilarious. Anyway, we had a great time…I actually asked them questions about whether or not they remembered where they were when September 11 happened…they all looked at me with dumb founded expressions and said “of course we do!” It was so cool to here their point of view about 9/11 and what they think it has done to our country. So cool to be able to have those kind of conversations with people…makes my nerdiness come out in full force.
After a while, the conversation got interesting. One of the boys, Matisse, point blank asked me if I was religious. At that moment, my heart kind of stopped and I thought ok here we go…im jumping into the lions den, I’m sitting with three other people from Holland, most likely they are all going to be atheists and heavily criticize whatever I’m about to say. Knowing that, it was weird to say I was kind of excited to stand up for my faith in a daunting situation. It was one of the easiest things I have ever done to answer his question and say, “Yes, I am a follow of Christ but I don’t feel like I am religious”. In that moment, I could feel my heart smile so big…like I was finally openly proclaiming something my heart clings to so desperately every single day. I definitely do not hide the fact that I believe in Jesus, but I do not go around shouting it from the rooftops, I always pray that my actions can do that before my words have to, but when asked point blank about my faith…I was overjoyed to answer and to talk a little bit about my savior.
What happened next still shocks me. After hearing that I was a Christian, Matisse said, “well what kind..Catholic, Protestant, Anglican, Lutheran”….As he named off differnet denominations.. I shook my head and tried to explain that I really don’t like to put a label on it, my faith is faith and I really don’t follow a religion…I just believe in the sovereignty of my Father. As soon as those words came out of my mouth, Rudolph who was sitting next to me stuck out his hand to give me a high five with a huge grin on his face and said, “ME TOO”. I think all of you should have seen the look on my face when he said that…I kind of stopped him and explained again what I was talking about so he didn’t get confused…I. Believed. That. Christ. Was. Lord. And. Died. For. My. Sins. He smiled again and said…Me too Bailey, me too. For the next thirty minutes I got to hear awesome stories about Rudolph’s walk with God and what his faith means to him….and how he honestly tries to live his life by WWJD. Rudolph didn’t just say he was a Christian or a Catholic who went to church once in a while, he talked about the depth of his faith and how it means so much to him. I think my mouth dropped open at the beginning of that converstion and stayed that way for a good 45 minutes. Here I was, a young Christian girl excitedly and nervously sitting in an Irish Pub/Restaurant in the middle of a foregin city with three people she immediately assumed would look down upon her for having a belief in Christ. I guess God is bigger than steroypes huh? In that moment, He showed me that His love really does cross oceans and reach deeply into the hearts of people over here. It was so neat to hear Rudolph talk about the SAME Jesus I know, not just a divine being, not just a God who didn’t care about his people…but MY GOD, my loving, all sufficient, grace giving, incomprehensible, huge, magnificent, God. There is a link that my youth pastor once showed me of a pastor giving a message about Our King and as I talked to Rudolph all I could think about was this video…I kept thinking You know my King? That’s my King. Too! If you haven’t seen it, watch it. What’s really neat is that the preacher does this entire little speech without any notes.... talk about the anointing of God. Here’s the link I used to find it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzqTFNfeDnE.
Anyway as Rudolph and I finished our conversation, we turned to Esther and Matisse who had been babbling in Dutch and came to find out that Esther was a Chrsitian as well, but Matisse was a devout aethist. Pretty cool that God put three Chrsitains from different walks of life altogether just to sit down and have an indepth conversation about theology in some small restaurant one rainy night in Brussels. He really does have it all worked out doesn’t He? He really is going to take care of us. Whether we like what his plan is at the current moment or not, I am so glad his ways are higher than mine. Because according to my ways, I would have never had that internship and never been able to meet these people I know call friends.
While I was talking to Rudolph I got such a slight glimpse of what it was like to be a Christian in the early church days, back when they would draw fish in the sand to represent that they were a follower of Christ. As I told my friends that I believed in Christ, I could see myself bending down and carefully drawing my fish in the sand….and when Rudolph held out his hand for a high-five, It was as if he was tracing over my fish. My heart leapt as I felt him tug at the most core part of my being.
Remember today that we serve A BIG GOD. He may not make sense to you right now, and His plans may not either….but how cool is it that we get to serve a God so big, so strong, so majestic, that we don’t fully understand Him and His ways? I know I definitely wouldn’t want to serve a divine being that could fit into my finite view of Him…so Praise the Lord that our God is so much greater than that…He is so infinite, with such an infinite capability to love us, and show us His grace, mercy and provision for us when we least expect it…like when your surrounded by three foreigners in a small pub one dreary night in Brussels.
Love you all.
Bails
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