The Bardi Party: Worth the Risk

It’s tough to keep saying goodbye to our friends as we live in a transient place with contracts usually shorter than 2 years. People come in and people go. There’s always a going away party for someone in our close circle of friends, and it’s a pretty weird culture when we think about it. This season is one during which the majority of our friends, and basically all of Wyatt’s friends, are leaving or have already left Zambia forever. Sounds dramatic, but just keepin’ it real y’all.

So when we found out that 7 Americans from the church we attended when we lived in Columbia, SC were coming to volunteer with CiH for 3 weeks, we were excited yet hesitant.

We drew boundaries that we thought would keep us “healthy,” like not seeing the group before or after our activities at the Chikondi Community Center. We’d help them with errands the first day, but that was it. We thought that by creating distance between us that we’d all be benefitted, because what lasting benefit could really happen in these friendships that only had 3 weeks to develop?

We were wrong. Oh, so wrong. We started building walls up against this group, brick by brick as they prepared to come. We were all about being friends during the workday, but didn’t see the benefit of having them invade “our time” in the evenings. Until we had them over for supper on the very first night.

These people traveled across the world to witness another culture and to be a part of God’s greater plan here in Zambia through Clothed in Hope. But I think God also had the intention of us mutually encouraging each other just as Paul talks about in the Bible. Like it’s healthy or something, right?

When we opened our hearts just a smidge and took down a couple of bricks just so we could see over the wall as we shared conversations and laughs with these strangers-turned-friends, we started to see the beauty in it all.

There was risk. We would put our hearts on the line with people who may only be our friends for 3 weeks. We knew we would have to say goodbye to this community of encouragers in 21 short days. It’s not like they came to scout out moving here- they were living in America and would (most likely) continue doing so after they returned.

But there’s beauty in risk. Sounds cliché, perhaps. But we witnessed that and we know it to be true. What good would’ve come from us distancing and guarding ourselves from these 7 people that God sent to us in this season of trying to find our own friends and community here?

Those friendships, those 7 people taught us something special- to go all in when it comes to making friends. In this transient culture, people will surely leave again and the goodbyes are inevitable, but even in that, the beauty exists. We get to share in seasons together, no matter how long or short. We get to share our commonalities and grow through our differences. We get to learn how to be friends with folks in different walks of life from different backgrounds. We get to celebrate life with folks, because who really knows when our last day is anyways? Why guard ourselves to be “protected” from the inevitable goodbye when we’re really just going to miss out on something so beautiful, so special?

We sat around the dinner table with these 7 friends for 4 nights every week. We shared what’s hard for us, we rejoiced over how we’ve seen God at work so visibly and so powerfully. We wrestled over the confusing things together, prayed for them as a group. We became a community for 21 days. One that encouraged us in our marriage far more than we could do by retreating and only reading blog posts from strangers. We were prayed over as we remain here in Zambia. We were blessed financially by these generous friends. We got to share our lives with people who now understand our context and can stand beside us even though an ocean separates us. And even if we never hear from them again, we rejoice because we know that for those 21 days, it was so, so worth it to share life with those 7 people.

Instead of safe-guarding from future hurts, let’s become a people who are engaged in the beauty and grace all around us, even if that means that a little bit of pain and sadness follow. Because isn’t life is all about ebbs and flows, seasons of joy and season of difficulty? So why not soak up the season of joy and even find the joy in the season of difficulty?

Let’s become a people who trust God in every season, who are willing to risk, knowing the one constant is Him who loves, who redeems, who comforts, who gives grace upon grace.

Thank you to you 7 crazies who came 6,000 miles to hang out with us for 21 days. You have no idea how much Jesus worked in and through each one of you to spur us on, to encourage us, to challenge us, and to bring so much joy to us in a season of change and goodbyes. …And if you ever wanted to move here, we wouldn’t hate it ;)