Hola Amigos,

I've been struggling for words or imagary to describe how I've been feeling since getting back home. It's as though I've been going through the motions of life, even as I visit family and friends. I've been avoiding important tasks, especially preparation for school, while simultaneously spending time doing inconsequential things like playing hockey on the PS2. However, I think that today I've figured it out.

I told the staff that my thoughts about them and the team as a whole reminded me of Peter's reaction to the Transfiguration (Matt 17). Not that I think any of you are Moses or Elijah, per se ;) - but that there was an overwhelming reality of God's presence within our team in Mexico City. I speak of God's presence in the 1 John 4 way - God is love - especially v. 12-13 - "No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit." It is God's love, the Spirit's presence that allows us fallen creatures to rise above sin, malice, greed, jealousy, bitterness, etc. and to truly love one another as God loves us. This is the presence of God I saw within our team this summer - not that we were perfect, but I can truly say that of all the teams/groups of which I have been a part, ours was a place where I had seen God's presence more than any other.

Back to Peter ... and so as Peter realizes he is in the presence of God he wants to stay on the mountain, to build houses for Elijah, Moses, and Jesus ... to stay in that place indefinitely ... and who wouldn't? I feel/felt the same way about my experience in DF, I knew that this experience of God's presence was unique and I believe I wanted to stay there, spiritually. However, Peter must go down the mountain as Jesus has more things planned - for himself and for Peter. However, I did not go down the mountain, I did not want to move on to the next things God has planned for me, I did not want to give up the specific experience of God from DF ... but of course I was no longer in DF with the team ... the mountain had moved from beneath me. So I find/found myself in a place of "inbetween", of nowhere - the way I was experiencing God in DF was removed, and I did not go down the mountain to follow a new experience of God. So I became left in limbo, with no mountain beneath my feet nor one to climb down in order to move on.

However, this afternoon the mountain reappeared in the form of the blog posts here. The openness and vulnerability of your sharing recreated that place of community of the summer, the place where God's Spirit dwelt. The mountain reappeared long enough for me to figure out my predicament and then make my way back down ... to the new things God has planned. Yet I will not forget what happened up there, like Peter would never forget what he learned about Jesus and God at the top of that mountain.

gracias a ustedes

gracias a Dios

Nick