Wonderfully Lost: life.

Jesus gave his life for us on the cross. three days later, he arose. he defeated death and provided eternal life for all to come. today we celebrate the life that Jesus gave up in order to provide us with eternal life. Easter often causes me to reflect on the life that i have been given to this point and how i have used what God has given me into the life that i am living. this morning as i awoke, i awoke to the wonderful sound of dogs, frogs, chickens and cows all reminding me of the beautiful country i am now living in.
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let me rewind back to my departure from oregon late thursday night. upon arrival to the airport, i was oh-so-kindly informed that i was not allowed to leave the country without a confirmed return flight. unfortunately i had purchased a one-way ticket to haiti, not exactly sure when i would return. this meant that while standing in the airport, i went ahead and booked a flight home in about 20 minutes. i can honestly say i have never booked a flight so fast and without a whole lot of thought, but i knew i wanted to get on my plane so i went ahead and did it, knowing that i could go back and change it later {at some cost}. anyway, i did it and i made it to my flight {with enough extra time to pull up the end of the duck game on my computer and watch them move onto the elite 8!}. i traveled all night, quite uneventfully {aside from the man next to me being the loudest snorer on the plane}. i arrived in new york with a couple hours to kill and so i grabbed what would be my last starbucks for about 4.5 months and walked around the airport {attempting to get my 10,000 steps in!}. finally it was time to board my flight to haiti. i ended up sitting next to an american couple out of washington {of all places!}, that were headed down to serve with another organization. this ended up being quite the blessing in desiguise because i had multiple bags i needed to track down so aside from some very fruitful conversation, they were able to help me round up all my bags. i then hopped into our driver's van and headed up the mountain. due to a miscommunication {one of a few in my first few days here}, we didn't stop on our way up the mountain at the grocery store. thankfully i had brought enough snacks from the states to get me through the weekend. upon arriving at the guest house, i dropped my things and took a nap! i woke up to a message from a friend who was getting married yesterday, asking if i wanted to go back into Delmas (a suburb of Port-au-Prince) for what americans would consider a bachelor party. not having anything better to do, i agreed and waited for someone to pick me up. in typical haitian fashion, we arrived down where the party was to be and the groom was no where to be found {turns out he was at the salon getting a mani-pedi}. we sat on a balcony and chatted for over an hour before finally the groom showing up and we chatted for a bit and then headed back up the mountain.
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saturday was the wedding. let me tell you, if you want a solid cultural experience, go to a wedding in a different country! it started a little over an hour late but was a beautiful wedding with a beautiful bride! it is very interesting to compare american culture and tradition with other cultures. after the ceremony was over miscommunication/language barrier #2 occurred when i returned to the car i had arrived in to go to the reception. we piled in about 22 people into a 12 passenger van and drove around port-au-prince for a while dropping people off. i just figured that this was normal and those people didn't want to go to the reception. i sat next to a young haitian man and we chatted for a while {in french}, all the while the longer we drove the more i started to wonder if we were going to the reception. about half way up the mountain, i realized in fact we were not going to the reception. while i was bummed to miss out on another wonderful cultural experience, i continued to remind myself that God was using this time to form relationship and that He has a plan for this time. the rest of my day was spent reading, coloring {one thing everyone should bring with them to a new country: a coloring book!} and watching DVDs.
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sunday {today} consisted of church, which was a relatively normal service with a special choir and everyone looking extra dressed up! the message may have been pointed towards Jesus's resurrection, but i cannot confirm that because i only understood about 25% of it. on a typical sunday, only the older kids from the crèche** go to church on sunday mornings. today, all the children {even the very littles} came to church which was just so much fun to worship next to such small humans and then we all marched back down to the crèche and spent the afternoon napping and playing soccer in the sunshine. today was absolutely beautiful, it was sunny and about 70 degrees.
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back to today being Easter and all. being in haiti has provided me with so much time to reflect on my life and my relationships and who i am. growing up, i had {and still do have!} a wonderful family. i will always remember when i had bad dreams, my dad would come in and sing me back to sleep - no matter the hour of the night. one of my favorites that he would sing was "Up From The Grave He Arose".

up from the grave he arose

with a mighty triumph o'er his foes

he arose a victor from the dark domain

and lives forever, with his saints to reign

he arose! he arose! hallelujah! Christ arose!

this song is directly referring to why we celebrate Easter. He triumphed over all his doubters and He won the greatest war there ever was. i mean even the grave couldn't hold him captive. i have sinned hundreds of thousands of times in my life but because of the greatest sacrifice of all - Jesus's life - i can rest easy knowing that i will be forgiven and be given eternal life.