Broken Spanish.
There’s no delicate way to put this. Our Spanish isn’t great, mine is especially terrible. We have several stories of where we tried to communicate even the simplest of phrases, but people would just look at us in confusion. And yes, I have the same problem in Spanish as I do in English, I speak too fast. Yet, for the purposes of this week, I wonder if it actually worked out ok. For the Pilas students, part of their program is to learn English. It’s interesting how throughout the week, we’ve been trying to help understand each other through language. By making ourselves vulnerable and taking the risk to speak Spanish, it also gives them permission to try and speak English. It would have been great to speak fluently in Spanish, but I wonder how that would have changed the dynamic of our relationship.
It reminds me of how important it is to come together in shared brokenness. The challenge of how much easier it is to hide our brokenness and not let anyone see it. It’s easy to share when everything is going well. There’s a huge amount of risk when we become vulnerable, but that’s exactly what Jesus does for us. It’s only when we become vulnerable that we provide permission and safety for others to do the same. Our call isn’t to hide our brokenness, but to reveal to those around us how God works within it.