Rachel Hampton

Bitter-sweet December 30, 2009

I am home. That is the sweet part. Doulos is no longer home. That’s the bitter.

It is so strange for my crazy, world-traveling year to already be over. But as I rode on my freaking-long plane ride only hours ago, I listened to some worship songs and couldn’t help but smile as I mouthed the words “Lord you are good and your mercy endures forever”. This past year has been everything I hoped for but so much more than I expected! And it went by way too fast. Just a few things I feel God taught me:

1. Serving Him with gladness is so much better than serving Him out of  a sense of requirement.

2. People around the world are a lot more similar than we sometimes think.

3. Cultures are different but you can still build amazing, lasting, compromising friendships in spite of that fact.

4. God may not always show you how He’s working, but He IS faithful and will bring things to completion in HIS timing.

5. I have lived a blessed life.

6. There is a big world out there and I need to stop living selfishly and give more.

7. I serve an amazingly powerful God who is as capable of performing miracles now as he was in the Old Testament.

8. Planting spiritual seeds is just as important as harvesting, we should always be willing to do whichever God places before us.

9. It really is a small world.

10.  Serving God is a privilege and a blessing and I’m humbled to be given the opportunity every single day.

There is more I’ve learned but those are just off the top of my head. Though I am still headed to the Philippines for another year of service with Wycliffe, I am now home for three weeks to spend time with friends and family. I seem to adapt so quickly to everything that thus far, this just feels normal. Maybe I’m still in denial of leaving or the full impact hasn’t hit me, but for some reason it doesn’t feel odd to be sitting here on the couch between my parents while my mom watches tv (and comments to no one in particular cause no one is listening) and my dad reads a magazine.

I’m just overwhelmed by God’s goodness. It took me so long to get to the Doulos but it was definitely worth the wait. It would take a long time to express or explain all that I went through and no one but people who went through it with me would truly understand. I’m really looking forward to the next year and seeing what God will do then. But for now I’m just filled with thankfulness. God is good. All the time. I know this to be true. I’ve seen and experienced it. My prayer is that each one of you will see the same.