Learning Trust From A Soccer Ball

6,000 miles from home, and with just days left of our first month, I came to such a raw realization – my heart is never going to be the same after this year. Scattered across eleven different countries, beautifully broken by hands that held my fingers for a moment, but will hold pieces of me forever.

Last month, those pieces fell into the most unlikely hands. 15-30 boys anywhere from three to thirteen, who would meet us at the stairwell each afternoon with a soccer ball in hand.

They weren’t our “ministry.” We had no technical “obligation” to them. In fact, we barely even spoke each others languages..but what we did have, was a group of ornery neighborhood boys who lit up at the sight of us, and a whole lot of love.

When we made the decision earlier that month that we wanted to pour into these kids around us and be intentional in loving them hard, we had no idea how well they would love us back even harder though. Ornery as any group of boys could be, but with smiles and hearts that would just light up your day, these little guys would carry our groceries up three flights of stairs every time they would catch us on the way back to the market, write us letters (usually in French – thank goodness for our teammate of a translator, Alyssa, who has been an absolute blessing) every afternoon to slide under our front door to make sure we would be out to play with them before dinner. They would run and jump into our arms grinning from ear to ear after every goal, and stomp their feet and cross their arms in protest every time our ministry schedule cut into the time we would normally be out with them.

Trust is something that has never come easy to me. My story (along with the story of so many others I know) holds within it pages upon pages of moments of trust eroded by countless events unfolding through people who my life was trusted to utterly failing my heart time and time again. I learned so early on (to believe the lie) that trust isn’t safe, that despite the countless amazing people in my life today, part of me is still very deep in the process of learning how to heal these wounds.

So as you can imagine, stepping away from these people and things I love so dearly, and trusting that God will care for them better than even I ever could, has been one of the hardest hurdles I’ve ever endured, and one of the biggest lessons this last month has held.

I don’t want to let go, but I can’t hold on, because Ghana is calling. So with tear filled eyes we waved our last goodbyes in the wee hours of the morning as they hung out their windows before school, and leaned hard into a trust in our God greater than I’ve ever known. Because if He loved these little guys so hard He sent us all the way across the world to play some futbol and share so many laughs with them, I can only imagine what else His hands have in store for them to come.

What a blessing it has been to be a part of this chapter in your story boys. Jésus t’aime.