Most of us don’t think about life changing experiences on a daily basis. We’re busy living our lives on cruise control, done that, seen that and been there. Even when we’re put into a new environment our mind fights to find some daily routine to make life bearable, believing we find security in living life without having to think too hard. Then, when those defining moments happen, we are caught unaware. Often we miss them altogether, or their real significance.
I believe God uses defining moments to reveal Himself, His love, or His working to us. Yet they are totally personal and can only give impact to the person experiencing them. These are the moments when, after they happen, we long for them to repeat. But the very nature of them, short, powerful, personal, unpredictable, and infrequent, make them what they are.
Someone wrote and asked me if I have had any more great adventures lately. I think this was after I wrote about my hair cutting adventure. I thought no, most of the things I thought were adventures when we first started are becoming daily routine. Although they are still difficult I find comfort in knowing I have done them, seen that and been there. Now I see I was getting to the zone where defining moments can slip by without notice. It almost happened!
Here is my disclaimer. Defining moments are * personal. They probably mean little or nothing to others since God uses them on an individual basis. With that in mind, read on at your own risk.
I’ve had two defining moments in my travels around the world to this point. The first came a few years ago and the second, last week.
During our mission trip to Chile in 2002, Jean and I were staying at the home of a SIM missionary couple, Tim and Sharon Sandvig. The air on one beautiful spring morning was crisp and clean as the sun began to rise. While others were beginning to prepare for the day’s work, I decided to sit on a small wooden bench overlooking a grove of trees heavy-laden with apples. Many apples lay under a nearby tree where they had fallen. I had no inkling that something special was coming, but this is how defining moments happen. They don’t give warning signs.
My eyes began to scan the fruit on a nearby tree. Then, the instant my eyes focused on one apple it fell. Never before had I seen an apple, or any fruit, the moment it fell from a tree. To me, this was a miracle. I sat in stunned silence not believing what I had * seen. I felt God had shared a part of His creation in action with me and I was awed. Don’t ask what it means. I don’t know. Maybe nothing. Maybe everything. Which is the answer to same question about the second defining moment.
We ride these taxi-like pickups (song taews) back and forth from our apartment to language school every day. We have done this about 50 times so far. It has become routine. The drivers know us so well we don’t even have to signal when we want to be picked up or tell them where we want to get off. It’s not like we have gotten to be best friends with the drivers. These guys and gals are on a route to get as many passengers as possible to their destinations along the route as fast as they can. The more passengers, the faster, the more money they make. So, when we get off, I usually pass the fare money through the window with a nod of recognition (still don’t speak Thai!) and the driver is off to the next stop.
This defining moment happened at the moment I passed the money to the driver after one such trip. Nothing usual about the trip. Same old white people (that’s us) sitting in the back of the song taew with another group of poor Thais. I see our destination and push the signal button. The driver find a safe (ha, ha!), expedient place to pull over to drop us off. We hop off and I head to the cab to pass the money through the window. I’m pulling the 30 cents fare out of my pocket as the cab window comes rolling down. An older Thai man is sitting in the passenger’s seat between me and the driver’s open hand. This older, poor man has a less than a year old baby boy on his lap. As I reach across to hand the driver his fare the older man turns the baby so it was facing me. I didn’t find this odd because although most adult Thais have seen white people, we are still sort of a spectacle for the kids. Kids seem to find our white skin and light hair more interesting than the adults. We quite often get stares of curiosity. I suspect the old man wanted the baby to get a glimpse of the old white guy. Maybe his first. Anyway as I’m pulling my hand back, I realize what the old man is doing so I decide to pause a second and play along. The baby now puts on a big grin to the howls of laughter from the pickup cab. Just when I thought it was over, the baby reaches out his hand and I of course play my part. I put my index finger into the palm of the baby’s hand. Then, to the continual laughter from the cab, the baby squeezes my finger. Thinking, “The driver needs to get on with his business, and my hand is holding him back,” I shake his little hand and pull my hand out of the cab window. As the window rolls back up I can still hear the laughter of the two men.
Cute, but a defining moment? I almost missed it, but the significance of it came to me later. I may have been the first white person that baby had ever come into contact with. I left a good impression. I also left a good impression with the driver and his passenger as they got to see a white person show love, friendliness, and humanness. Most poor Thai people never interact with white people and know us mostly through what they see on television or in the movies (which, if you have seen either of those lately, doesn’t show us in the best of light). Even the white tourists here do not treat the Thai people very well. I played along with their desire to show off their cute child. My finger in the baby’s hand was east meets west, young meets old, white meets dark. In less then 3 seconds a lot happened.
As I wrote before, maybe the significance was nothing, maybe everything. That is the uniqueness of defining moments. They are for you. Don’t miss them.
Gary
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