For the last 5 years, I went out to the Navajo Reservation to lead a vacation bible school for the children of St. Mary's of the Moonlight. The church is near Monument Valley, Utah. St. Mary's and the land it sits upon is owned by the Episcopal Dioces, a rarity on the Reservation. This honor was given to the church due to the dedication and love of an Episcopal priest that built the church. This preist was one of the first belegana (white) pastors to lead the Navajo people to Christ in thier language.
It is a half-hour drive on an unmarked dirt road and sits at the base of a large mesa. On the church grounds, there is St. Mary's a house for people who visit during the summer and other times of the year and a trailor for the sexton. Most importantly there is a hogan.
The hogan is the symbol of life for the Navajo. There are two types of hogans, one female, one male. The female hogan is the traditional home, while the male hogan is used as a temporary shelter for the men while hunting.
The female hogan is round and made of a type of mud. Inside there are 9 cedar posts that support the structure symbolizing the 9 months of gestation. The door faces east to greet the rising sun. When walking into a hogan, you always walk in a clockwise direction as the sun shines. In the middle of the top of the hogan there is a hole and a fire is kept in the middle of the floor. The hogan is suprising cool, even when the temperature is well above 100.
The first year I was to go out on this mission trip, I cancelled at the last minute because my husband's sister had just given birth. Her son was in the PICU at Children's and the outlook at that time was grim. (It turned out that he survived and is doing quite well.)
The second year I was to go out, I had three children at home. My youngest was only 6 months old. My parents were very upset with me that I would go and leave my family for a week. When I tried to call my parents while out there because I heard that my mom had pnemonia, my dad would not return my calls. Phone reception is viturally impossible. We have to drive quite a distance in order for our cell phones to work. Obviously, I was crushed. Deep down I did not want to go either and the prospect of going into a desert with bugs and no air conditioning did not sound great to me.
The reason I went is because I believe in my heart that God gave me a direct order. Just a couple of months before this, I realized that to follow Jesus, I needed to let Him be the pilot. This is a very difficult thing to do when you are a control freak like me. (Yes, for all of you that have known me a long time, I admit it.) I also realize that when I give myself completely to the Will of God, I am not responsible for the outcome, good or bad. I prayed that dangerous prayer, "Let Your Will be done." I say it is dangerous, but in actuallity it is the safest place to be. To let go of the wheel and alow God to take you to places that He wants you to go means that He is driving and He promises to never put us to shame. He does warn us, however, that other people will not understand and some will be angry. This is a small price to pay for the immesurable blessings that flow when you do ultimately let go and let God.
Anyway, I was still a little miffed at God for "forcing" me to come to the desert. I was telling this to the resident priest, Fr. Ian, an Anglican priest from Great Britan. He asked me why I had decided to come out and I told him that it was all God's idea and I did not want to be out in the desert away from my family. He just smiled and said, "Oh, you are there are you?"
It was later in the trip that God began to rain down the blessings. I was still very upset about my family, but VBS had to go on. During VBS, we broke the children up into 3 activities: story, arts and crafts and games. I was the story teller and I used Godly Play stories.
Godly Play is a Montessori based christian education curriculum in which plain wooden figures are used to tell the story. The real difference in this method of teaching is that the story teller is not the teacher. Before the story begins, the story teller asks the Holy Spirit to take over. I pray something like this, "Let Your Will be done and let Your Words fill my mouth."
This day, the Holy Spirit did come and fill the hogan with His presence. I began telling the story after all the children were seated around the side of the hogan. I was seated on the ground facing the door. I began telling the story and using the figures. During this type of story telling, the story teller "memorizes" the story and is careful not to look at the children in the eye. Normal comprehension questions are avoided and in its place "wondering" questions are asked.
As I was saying, I began telling the story when I peeked up. When I did, I could not see the children. The sun coming in through the hole at the top of the hogan was so bright, that I could not see beyond the figures. It was a different bright. It did not hurt my eyes, but it did serve as a reminder not to look at the children.
When I finished the story and began the "wondering" questions, I was able to see. I began to also realize that the Holy Spirit was powerfully present in the hogan. I got goosebump as I looked at the children and they were fixated on the figures. They were also amazingly quite and attentive when they were not just minutes before in the church. I was overwhelmed at the thought that God was with us that morning. I went out to the desert and He showed me the way.
Upon returning home from home, I felt compeled again by God to do something. He pushed me into writing down my experience in the desert, long hand. Again, for those who know me, I am learning disabled and try to always type out anything I write so I can use spell check. He told me to write it and leave it on our church secretary's desk.
I did so and did not say anything about it because I was embarrased about my spelling. I was not home long when our home phone rang. It was the secretary and she had just read what I had written down. She said it was amazing. Just that Sunday before, one of the teens that had traveled out to the desert with me from her church stood before the congregation and said that she was in the presece of God in the hogan too. She knew she was because she said that I had disappeared during the story and reappeared during the wondering questions.
Eventually, the story was printed in Episcopal Today, a national buletin for the Episocpal Church in the USA.
God took my one, pitiful offering to lay down my will and turned it into a blessing that I will always treasure. The words of Fr. Ian still ring in my ears today. "Oh, are you still there?"
The next few years I could not wait to go out and see my friends in the desert. It is an amazing place that recharges the batteries and brings me closer on my walk with Him. This year, my husband went and I stayed home for many reasons. I was so thankful that he got a chance to go and experience St. Mary's and the wonderful people of Monument Valley. He too got to sleep outside on the deck of the house and look upon the Milky Way. He got to go into the hogan and also commented that it is an amazing feeling inside that cedar hut.
It is stil difficult for me to lay down my will, but when I get the courage to do so, it is always a a wonderful adventure. Fr. Ian, I think I am not still there, but it is a long walk.
