Since we’ve begun coming to Fortaleza regularly in 1998 we’ve always stayed at the same hotel. Every day at 6:00 a.m. the tapioca lady shows up in front of the hotel to sell tapioca.

She stays for almost 3 hours. It takes her an hour and a half to bicycle from her home to her selling point in front of the hotel. On her bicycle she carries a butane tank, a cooker, all her supplies, herself and her husband (actually he pedals the bike). When she finishes up, it all goes back on the bike and they return home.

I’ve been amazed at her clientele. Everyday there are dozens of people lined up to get her tapioca (kind of like a flat taco shell, only made from tapioca flour and is soft). I’ved been more amazed at her tenacity. Rain, sun, heat, she’s always there. Nothing changes. The ride to “work” and back home is always the same. If you’d ever see the traffic here, you’d be astonished that she is still alive!

She has to do it; she really has no choice. It is how she pays her bills. If she didn’t do it, if she missed a day of work due to sickness, she’d literally go hungry. Paid vacation days do not exist. Company coming in for the weekend changes nothing. She is fixated on getting the job done so she can do it again tomorrow. If she can’t do it tomorrow, she dies.

Kinda starts you thinking . . .

What would happen if her faithfulness to her “job” was the attitude we had towards our walk in the Way? What would we be like if we lived as though there were no other choice but to show up to represent the Carpenter? Would not being a follower be the death of us because we can’t image not serving Him? We think it tough to have to get up to go to church on Sunday — would we be willing to sacrifice everything and endure any hardship to go to where the King appears?

The tapioca lady is “on,” 365 days a year, 24/7. She has absolutely no choice. She does it to live. Can I say the same? Can I be “on” 365/24/7? I really have no choice. Without doing it, I miss life . . .