this world can be ugly, but isnt it beautiful?

The morning before we started ministry, I was feeling really insecure and insignificant. Worried I wouldn’t be good at interacting and pouring into the people, worried id be selfish and impatient with them. Wondering why, of everyone in the world, God wanted ME here when im not qualified for this at all.
ALL lies from the devil.
Over the past couple of days, ive never been so happy. Ive never been so sweaty, sunburnt or filthy, but Ive never felt such love and purpose, felt so alive.
These people and kids have such laughter and happiness, such joy, such appreciation, they see the beauty in the simple things like running, tickling, dancing, singing, the place they live and the community they live in. They don’t care about language barriers or dirt; how great is our God for creating the universal language of love.
As soon as I was with the kids, all my insecurities vanished. Ive run through dirt streets with them, carrying the most beautiful little girl on my back, playing volleyball, tickle tag, swinging them around, getting jumped and climbed on, singing with them and TO them, attempting conversation, cracking up and dancing with them, kissing their faces. We planted an avocado and mango tree field, and a plantain field at an orphanage, and I was caked in black mud up to my forehead, sweaty and disgusting, but the kids didn’t care. They brushed the dirt from my legs to sit on me and wiped my hands off so I could tickle them, and just wanted love, to be with me, for me to sing to them “Maria� from West Side Story for the millionth time.
Ive come to realize how limitless God and His love are, how theyre NOT bound by human conditions like language and location and social status. Im starting to see how RICH these people and kids are, and how POOR I truly am. They understand love and community and don’t strive for materialistic things. They LOVE. And I simply want to love them. I didn’t care that the children were filthy, drinking unclean water, living in the dirt ground trampled by stray animals and filled with trash, that my hands were in their sweaty armpits and my lips on their dirty faces and I was drinking from the straw I had let them drink from, or their urine scented bodies stretching out and ruining my new and few clothes. None of that mattered. The USA and my selfish ambitions and petty worries about wasting time didn’t matter. I suddenly understood a little more of the grace Christ has for me. He sees past all my junk and simply wants to love me.
Im exhausted, dirty, smelly, sunburnt, even after showering still covered in muddy plantain sap, I’m currently sitting in my bunk after a day at the beach covered in sand and salt and unable to shower because the storm is so crazy outside the powers been out for a long time, and I would be THRILLED to live every day this way. To love, and be loved. To see the beauty in everything. To have my heart broken and then filled by sassy, beautiful hearted orphans. To attempt to live my life like Jesus lived His. To have a new ‘first time for something’ everyday. To learn from people who have NOTHING but still have MORE than I ever will.

I keep praying for God to give me His eyes so I can see everything that ive been missing, to give me His love for humanity. To give me His arms for the broken hearted.

Im pretty sure He’s answered my prayers, because I would not be able to feel what I feel without Him. He is good, when theres nothing good in me.