Runway Jump, Montevideo, Uruguay

“Why are they pulling people off the plane?” I asked the woman seated next to me.

“The runway is under construction, the plane too heavy,” was her answer. She replied in English, for which I was grateful, because at 2 am my Spanish comprehension waned.

A man seated near us stood, reached for his bag, and departed.

“Under construction?” I asked.

“Yes. We need less weight to make the jump,” she shrugged.

The airline attendants rushed past us in the aisle, and I tried to discern their facial expressions.

In panic—or rather, uncertainty—I imagined volunteering my kilograms but stayed glued to my seat on account of a deficient Spanish vocabulary. Plus, my suitcase was checked below and contained the gifts for Mark and the kids, things I’d found them in Chile and Uruguay. I prayed we’d reunite, the suitcase, and me with my family.

Looking through the window, past the rain-smudged glass, past the airport vehicles, and at the twinkling skyline of Montevideo, there was the city we’d romanticized over the past year. Mark and I had a fascination with Uruguay for two reasons. One, the coastal location, and two, the mystery of a culture we’d not known existed until a ReachGlobal missionary mentioned the place.

Ten days earlier, on the flight from Chicago I’d felt jittery. Traveling as a tagalong journalist, I was to accompany two teams of missionaries for our church denomination. We held meetings and explored future partnerships. During the week in the Southern Cone my Spanish-speaking skills sputtered, my notetaking languished, and yet the week surpassed what I’d imagined. The company had been so gracious, so warm. I was a stranger welcomed as a friend among these seasoned missionaries. They entrusted me with some of their stories.

Santiago, Chile: sightseeing, culture, team meetings. With these missionaries—their laughter, their life experience—I felt God prodding me toward deeper trust and joy.   

Specifically, during Uber rides across Santiago through narrow streets and at full speed. Our group of thirteen would split into three or four to traverse the city. Once, to climb San Cristóbal Hill in a gondola. Several times to visit a local church as guests where we held our team meetings. I listened to conversations among these believers and felt compelled to examine my own worldview.

Could I, like them, laugh at the unknown, rest in the unfamiliar? (During the week we almost crashed in a tunnel when an Uber driver switched lanes, and we almost were devoured by a German shepherd guard dog we walked past in a neighborhood after sunset.)

Three days in Santiago led to the next leg of the trip: Montevideo, Uruguay.

When I’d first learned of the possibility for me to travel, and Mark agreed he’d stay home with the kids, we’d often discussed the draw Montevideo ignited in us. The past year we investigated the city called, “the southernmost capital in the Americas.” We watched documentaries and looked for books—on which, we found hardly any. Mystery hovered.

The extremeness of this “ends-of-the-earth” * place had appealed to my pride.

The tragicness of a place void of religion had appealed to my emotions. (An entire generation existed, raised without religion, due to the reign of a certain dictator, so we’d read).

The preciousness of the gospel reaching people, every person, appealed to Mark and me, and appeals to us still.

I’ll write a few sentences of what I encountered in Montevideo.

The team and I were hosted by members of a small church that sits on a street in a commercial district of Montevideo. The Southern Cone’s October springtime accounted for budding trees which dropped pollen tassels on sidewalks and in the city park where people walked their dogs. A coastal breeze mixed with the smell of the river that divides Uruguay and Argentina. I know the smell because it’s the same smell as the Mississippi River from where I live, except as the air warms in the South, the Northern Hemisphere cools and our trees drop their final leaves.

Sunday morning, we stood and worshipped with the small church. We sang every song in Spanish, and one to a Phil Wickham tune. Gathered were people from Uruguay, Cuba, Venezuela, Brazil. We met a young man who’d left Bolivia. He grew up in a Christian home and wanted to speak freely about Christ, so he came to Uruguay.

Like all places, Uruguay is a place where people appear curious about God. Who is Jesus? perhaps they contemplate. They hear snippets of Scripture from relatives caught in prosperity-gospel movements and they want to discern, what is real? They read John and are perplexed by phrases like, “Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe.” ** They seek for the compelling, for things beautiful. They are seeking this very moment.

We met with pastors who are networking, churches slowly expanding. They are teaching members how to read the Bible accurately, how to contemplate the storyline of Scripture, how to discern what God has revealed about himself, about Jesus. These little churches are transforming the landscape of Montevideo. Tiny pockets, here and there. Reminded me of seed packets—those ones in the spinning racks, chosen in hardware stores at springtime. Green Beans and cucumbers. Zinnias and sunflowers. Seeds sprinkled in soil a few months later burst plants and gardens. It’s a miracle. Only God, the Creator and Redeemer, could ideate . . .

We made the jump. Upon reclining my airplane seat, once ascended and headed to pass over the Andes Mountains then North, I thanked God we hadn’t skidded off the shortened runway. Extra grace: I slept soundly and awoke to a new day in the hemisphere that’s home.

At home, porches were decorated with pumpkins. It felt like I was transported in a time machine. My family unwrapped their gifts from the faraway places I gushed about tirelessly. They listened patiently and looked at photos I’d taken of landscapes and churches and of my new friends. These missionary believers laughed over meals and during meetings. They traveled with lightness and displayed peace amid the unknown.

I’d like to revisit the Southern Cone, and next time with Mark. I want to see what grows up from those little seed packets sprinkled, for no matter the place, the hemisphere, the continent, God loves the people he’s created, and he visits them in his time.

Ecclesiastes 3:11 “He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end” (ESV).

* Acts 1:8 (NIV)

** John 4:48 (ESV)

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(Photo on Unsplash by Baltasar Henderson, Montevideo, Uruguay)