Smol tok nomo |
Smol tok nomo |
Perhaps this is controversial to write and perhaps my story is one in a million, but I’d like to share about how God redeemed a situation otherwise viewed in my era as anti-family and anti - God. I don’t deny God’s perfect plans for family, I believe His design is one man and one woman, one family, one forever happily ever after. I must preface that this is my story and not my parents so the “whats” and “whys” before hand are frankly irrelevant to my point.
You see growing up for me I didn’t realize my family wasn’t normal. Yes, I saw other families who didn’t visit their Dads on the weekends, and I have to admit I was a tidbit jealous at times not to have my family together all of the time, but in other ways, many ways, I was happy for two families and two homes. The fact that I didn’t know better probably played a big role. I am going to be honest there was unrest at times sibling rivalry between step sibling parent rivalry at times and there were times I felt I had to play politician to keep every one happy, so yes, I can see how the situation wouldn’t be considered the healthiest by society. But as a child living in the situation, to me, I was the most loved girl in the world! My biological Father was the most loving and selfless Father to me. Filled with love and support and candy, always lots of candy. My step Father entered my world at the age of five and quickly became a disciplinarian in my life, as well as a constant friend and listener whom I adored. I lived much with my Grandfather and I had Uncles who were so very close and quick to mentor -all of whom were Pastors. I grew up in a story of redemption. When my mom and step-dad came home to tell the older siblings they had married, things were anything but peachy. Animosity and issues between step child and parent and siblings existed, all the normal things you would see,. However, as the years went by we became a family. My step sister is now one of my closest friends. I love her and couldn’t imagine her family not in my life, because truly family is more than blood. I have had the opportunity to learn that from some of the typically hardest situations can come some of the deepest loyalties and love. Family is not always blood relatives family are those we experience life with, our pack, our people. I consider it a story of redemption because after becoming a teen-ager I realized I was supposed to be pitied and considered less than. I had no idea. Seriously. None. To say I didn’t suffer from this in a sense would be wrong I suppose, but to say this wasn’t the most amazing and beautiful story filled with love and stories to make you cry and hardened hearts turned soft, and learning that love conquers all (the love of Christ that is), would also be wrong. I learned early on to help others change and to be changed, I learned how to work through less than perfect situations and in the end I was made better from it. I get it, to say I was better off coming from a broken home is almost anti Christian and of course I don’t believe this is Gods perfect plan, but to not be able to share the testimony of the beautiful redemptive power of my God would deny me the right to sing His praises! You see God took those broken things and despite the world and even the church worlds best attempts to create a victim mentality in me, I kept my eyes on Christ. I never believed I couldn’t do big things for Chirst. I never believed I would have to complete the cycle or family curse as some people say. I am who I am, and who I am is redeemed! God took those things and as we worked through so many hardships long ago I literally have one of the best most loving support systems. God flooded my life with mentors and God fans, people who saw all of the insecurities and assured me that God had big plans for my life. I literally have the best family in the world and am the furthest from a victim of it as you can get. You see GOD REDEEMED ME and my situation. I didn’t suffer, I placed it in His hands and such beauty has come from what has been deemed by many as ashes. Is my family perfect? No. Do I still pray daily for the family who has yet to come to know Christ as their Saviour? Yes. Do I lack in any way from the multitude God placed in my life? No. This is my story. Not the choices I made, but the choices that made me who I am. Redeemed, beautiful, healthy, a child of God in every way. I can still remember the day in my conservative Bible College class that without the professors knowledge, he momentarily made me slide down a bit in my seat. My heart began to race as I felt I had been marked. Statistically, he stated, those who come from divorced homes are more likely to divorce. All sound teaching I am sure but my mind left. I scanned the class I quickly realized I was the only one in a class of 32 who had in fact been marked. Many kids parents had attended Bible school as well. In fact, that was the pride of the area it seemed - families carrying on the batons for generations a spotless group from the loins of spotless seed. Then me. I remember my hand shooting up as my friends all shifted uncomfortably in their chairs. I don’t remember the full conversation with my professor but I do remember sounding more offended than I meant to as I made the point that it doesn’t mean you have to just because your parents did. Redeemed. I have had the blessing of being no one from nowhere. I have been able to see how my God rises above statistics as I have enjoyed a wonderful marriage for nearly a decade. Not taking flight when times got hard. Why? Because my eyes were on the God who gives beauty for ashes. Statistically the red sea shouldn’t have parted, statistically someone thrown into a well shouldn’t have become second to a king, statistically the Savior of the world shouldn’t have come from the seed of a harlot. Statistically I shouldn’t consider my upbringing one of privilege and love. Statistically I shouldn’t feel like one of the most loved girls in the world with a heart overflowing with thanksgiving for my family and our redemption. Maybe that’s how I can have grace for others. Please don’t discount this as anti biblical or even anti facts. This is just my testimony of what makes our infinite God so amazing. See I believe he does take ashes and gives back beauty. I don’t put him in the box and I write these words to say don’t let the church or world put you in a box. If we had to become what statistics say, if we could only do great things on the foundations of perfect generations before us, then why would we need God or redemption? I am happy for every generation who serves God spotlessly, but I am also happy to be called by God and for every one and everything God has allowed on my path. To realize my identity is in Christ and I thank God for the privilege to grow up in a redeemed home full of people who needed redeeming… people just like me - a redeemed person. That is why I am happy to follow the call to share this message with the world, God can redeem you, listen to Him. None of the other voices have the power to give you beauty for ashes but He does. A fairy tale you say? I like to think so, and I am pretty crazy about the Prince of Peace whose hand reached down, picked me up, dusted me off, and made me a child of the King
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My husband and I love architecture. In fact, many times during itineration we found ourselves in hotel rooms watching shows about houses, fixing up old houses, touring mansions, building new houses, buying houses, selling houses, decorating houses. Yep. We loved it all. My husband at one point much earlier in life had plans of attending school to become an architect and we each love attention to detail. Many times we, like most people, notice the intricate details that show us the focal points of the time frame of the house. We love the unusual trim or time spent to set a house apart from the normal cookie cutter manufactured look. I begin thinking about this thought today. I was making a special Sunday School for my two children and was getting just a little agitated as to why a children’s program had been started two or thee times here, and never made it past two Sundays. We struggle to keep kindergarten teachers in our schools too, “doesn’t anyone see the value in these children?” I exclaimed to my husband. “ where are the workers? Where are those who think children an important and worthy investment? Then it hit me, there is nothing glamorous about foundations. When we look at the beautiful finished project of an 18nth century house, I venture to say it has never been said, “did you see that gorgeous foundation?” When we work in children’s ministry we are working on the foundation of their lives. We seldom see the results as people go through many stages and move on and we cannot always follow their lives until the time of reaping from early investment. Human nature wants to be apart of the success stories, the instant gratification and recognition of being a world changers. Where are those willing to recognize the need for foundation even if they are never recognized for the time they take to lay it right? Years from now if a house is still standing we will look at the design points and highlights and might mention in passing, someone did a good job on that foundation for that house to still be standing, but what about a person’s foundation? Where are those that recognize the need to build on a child’s foundation even though it will undoubtedly not be recognized for what it is? It is hard and difficult to work with the weakest among us - the least self sufficient. It requires more patience than comes naturally to build and smooth that firm foundation, but if we are willing to be a part of this work, than I believe the results of that will be the kingdom of God standing on a firm foundation in our part of the world. There will come a time when God will reveal to those investing in children the difference their obedience to Him has made. Oh that more would hear the cry for the humble man, willing to work on a strong albeit forgotten foundation! You ever just have God come by in an awesome way and sweep you off of your feet? I am talking about like a knight on a white horse kind of sweeping here. The kind of thing that makes you wear a goofy smile as you drive down the street until you find someone staring at you like you have done lost your mind? You ever have the one you love show himself so strong when you feel so weak that He leaves you swooning? Laugh if you will, but God himself compares His love for us to this kind of love through the book of Songs of Solomon and this happened to me in the last few days. I have had a skip in my step and smile on my face. Here is how it all started. In distress. On Monday we started our teacher training I will save you all the boring details but to be able accomplish all we needed everything would have to “flow” just right. Instead we had to wait hours on some which left three communities waiting hours on us ( we were waiting on a guide to show us how to reach a village far away) our event cooks with good reasons were no shows. We had people on multiple sides with multiple emails asking favors and had legit needs we were trying to help with. To top it all off there was way more people than we planned for or invited to come and we were at a loss culturally so we decided to do our best by everyone {stretching ourselves through teaching so many and financially}. We were behind on so much of our own things helping so many others with theirs and honestly I had reached the breaking point. I shared with some dear friends my need of prayer. My exact words were “I am not sure I can put one foot in front of the other, we are just starting and I feel done!” I am not like this much, but situations were piling and I fell into an old trap once again of worry. I began to pray as I drove back and forth from town running for food supplies, copies, and keeping everything running. Occasionally, the weather has been good enough to get a station from, I don’t know where, that plays a lot of gospel music. I began to listen and worship. My biggest concern was that this training budget which was supposed to be small was going to triple and we would have everyone trained but no funds for even the bare necessities to start these schools. In my mind this was a catastrophe and poor planning on my part. Still my head kept telling me truth. “This is His work” He will make a way when we obey Him.” I wanted so desperately to believe what I knew to be true about God and His work. For me learning to relax and lean on him was a hard feat with my human habit of fretting. It seemed every single song on the radio was “I have come to far to turn back now” “ he which has begun a good work will complete it” “we will make it if we lean on him.” A few days of worship while driving and I got up this morning in prayer. I decided I would trust God. Yes, we are attempting big things but I wont focus on how big they are I will focus on how big God is. I said this morning I choose joy and faith. I even posted on social media my declaration to choose to walk in faith. Today I have seen bright smiles all over campus from our class. I thought of how I always thought someday Id work with woman's ministries and how these young girls without direction were learning a life skill. Not only that but the holy spirit was intricately laced through and through on every lesson we teach as we believe the best teachers are those who work as unto the Lord and recognize the opportunity and holy mandate of teaching future generations not only academics but the ways of our Lord. Suddenly, the extra expense didn’t matter. I drove past these smiling faces with supplies in my truck and the Holy Spirit all over me showing me a glimpse of what He was doing and I got the “tingly” feeling of love and adoration for my Lord. This is were God just shows off ;). Over a year ago I had wanted to ask a guest speaker to come to a retreat we were having. This was a lady whose spirit bore witness with mine. A lade who was “fruity” in the sense that she always consistently showed the fruit of the spirit. Every time I seen her she had the joy of the Lord all over her and yet she was a meek and quiet spirited woman and I just knew she was supposed to speak into our teachers lives. I never could find her or reach her then, but Nathan and I wanted to ask her to share at devotions for training saying once again we wished we could reach her. Only this time we ran into her husband at a store in town so we mentioned it to him. We ran into her the next day and a total of three times before the training that started the next week. Here I am pen in hand waiting to take notes on what this precious woman is going to share and she begins to talk about “waiting well” how when God has promised or is doing something it may not happen in our timing but He wants to wait with us. He wants us to lean on Him and trust Him to do what He says He will do. She gave personal testimonies of ways God provided not in her own ways but in His. I broke momentarily to snap a photo of girls enthralled on the front row - you could have literally heard a pen drop! I myself am fighting back tears as God uses this woman to speak life to me. His love begins to overwhelm me. I thank her for coming during the closing and before prayer I share of how I have been struggling too to trust God to provide for their schools and we all have the sweetest time of prayer as God shows up in the closing prayers. I have total peace, total joy, total gladness. While pausing for lunch I was looking at my own pledges to other missionaries and trying to figure out what was happening as many of them we have sent directly out of our pay, and I happen to glance down the page a little further at our own work funds and the had doubled this month! My heart leaps not at the finances, but at the faithfulness of God! I cannot worry about tomorrow, I can only know if I ever find myself in my own humanity again (which I will) , and I feel I cant put one foot in front of the other, it is then I can remember that last time I couldn’t put one foot in front of the other my Lord swept me off of my feet! -insert girly giggle here - Oh what a Saviour is He! Awe…. Strength for the journey Lord…. Great is thy faithfulness!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This adventure begin as many others, another trip to Big Bay. As I set the alarm for 5 a.m. anticipating the two hour drive and hopeful to be there in time to open school with them I hear the sound of an enormous amount of rain suddenly begin to beat on our tin roof. Nathan, my husband, huffs in slight frustration, "every single time we go to Big Bay it pours!" He follows it closely with a wise crack as to how if Vanuatu ever finds itself in drought again he will simply plan a trip to Big Bay and that will surely bring on a down pour. We head out a little late in the hustle and the bustle I have prepared a bundle of clothes and shoes to give to the village, Nathan is checking to make sure we are taking enough pencils and writing pads for all the kids, finally I round the corner looking rough with an arm load full and approach the truck. Pasta Peter Solomon and family are waiting in the truck bed, We are supposed to drop them off in the village of Matandas on our way. Pasta Peter looks at me and exclaims "every time you go to big bay it rains!" I smile to myself and tell him to be sure and share that jewel with Missy (missionary) Nathan when he comes out. I cant help but think about how we had finally decided that if we let rain stop us we would never go back! We head out late, but alas! We are on our way. We get a little over half way there and I am realizing even the places that are normally dry have more water than I have ever seen, my heart sinks knowing about the last three miles are solid mud even on a sunny day - its not looking too good for getting to Big Bay. We arrive at the beginning of muddy madness and Nate tries it for a minute and we quickly realize we are not going to make it in the truck. So by foot it is! We walk nearly three miles in one mud puddle after another each and every time the mud is "kakaing" (eating) my kids croc knockoff local shoes so with every puddle we pull them out and then their shoes. By the time we reach the river I feel like I have just been in a tough mudder. The river has changed with the heavy rainfalls from cyclone Donna. In fact, the last small road we turn on has completely disappeared, fallen into the river which is now that much wider. I realize as Nathan tries to find the best place to cross that the kids arent going to make it the last mile and a half trek after we cross the river and I make what I think at the time is the best decision, I will wait this side of the river and let the kids rest. Nathan should go on and handle the meetings without me. Nate tries to make it with the school books that we have lugged through the mud but the river is too swift and they must stay with me as well. So there we sit in the rain and an hour passes. I then make the decision to walk around and explore with the kids but just as I get up to walk with them a bull comes around the corner and we come into its view. It is several feet away but it has obviously been startled by our presence and begins to make these noises and motions. I cant really explain it other than instinct since I dont actually speak "cow" but I got the strong sense it was telling us to leave its territory. At this point I have probably never been more terrified in my life and all I can think about is what I am going to do with my kids. I scan my surroundings quickly and there is two options: if it charges I can jump into the rushing river or there is a tree I might could throw my kids up into. Neither option seems good. I slowly start walking backwards. I tell the kids to be absolutely quiet and oddly, after years in churches and food establishments of them not listening, this time they did! We followed the banks all the while with the bull several feet away on the higher ground still walking towards us threatening us and motioning us to leave. Maybe 25 feet from where we started I rounded a small curve where the tree was and noticed a small cubby hole in its roots. I swept the girls into the hole and could tell the bull was still looking for us. I could feel my heart in my throat and there was no sounds except Jules (obviously she wasn't too scared) still snacking on her dry noodles (Ramen) but making minimal noise. I peered my eyes just above level with ground and watched the bull on top. He had lost us when we rounded the curve. He continued to make threatening noises and "chase us out" of his space not knowing we were hidden in the tree roots. We sat there for nearly and hour until I could see some village people that look like tiny dots coming up from the other side of the river, followed shortly by Nathan. I found out later (yes, yall I am from Texas but blonde at heart) that cows also have horns so my wild bull could have been a wild cow with horns but my lesson was learned. Always, always, always, stick together because you never when you will happen upon a wild "cow's" territory (and he may want you to Moooooo 've :) Sorry couldnt resist a corny cow joke). Sometimes I feel as if there might be an unspoken rule. One about suffering in silence making you more holy or righteous…I am not really sure how it all works but I am quite certain it exists somewhere… I guess I respectfully disagree with it. I believe there are a lot of different personality types and I can honestly say I like them all!! There are strengths and of course its counterpart weaknesses in each. However God created them all with a purpose and a use.
All that to say, in case you couldn’t tell, I am in fact a sharer. I don’t know a lot of bloggers who aren’t sharers (or writers for that matter) I just hope I find that balance you know? The one that doesn’t only share the bad things because that would make you more of a complainer, am I right? As a missionary I can say with all honesty and without hesitation that the good completely outweighs the bad in my life. My personality? Well lets just say I avoid the need for professional therapy and hopefully burn out because as stated, for me sharing the good and the bad and just living an honest open life is simply me being a real person. Can God call and use real people? Imperfect people? I sure hope so or I am in a world of trouble. WARNING: If you find the idea of sharing about issues such as, well lets just say hypothetically, LAUNDRY on the mission field unholy than STOP reading now. Since we have moved to Jubilee I have loved the constant ministry opportunities. Our road is one of the last roads before the road to town and we catch a lot of people walking in from various villages. Last week nearly every single trip we took to town we picked up someone heading in to the hospital. There was a flu bug going around and it was mostly Mommas carrying a baby and sometimes two and let me just say I LOVED it. I loved getting to know the Mom’s and getting cooed at by the adorable babies even if they had sad hacking little coughs. I LOVE the community out here. I feel apart in every way as if I was literally made for Jubilee community. I love getting to know all the ladies ,and seeing the old Grandpa that walks his little grand daughter to school for two miles on his shoulders with a really big smile. My heart feels like it is going to explode when all the kids run by my house every morning on their way to school. I love them each and will never learn not to get attached and will be heartbroken if any choose a bad path in life but I will never not love every thing about what we do here for the Lord. It is literally in my mind a privilege and the best life in the world. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t get hard sometimes. Especially when you are trying to figure things out. We have been moved in two weeks and we have had a real time with our solar and our water issues. I am very worried that our rain tank won’t be enough for all our needs, which brings me full circle to tonight, my first attempt at laundry. With our solar, and water pump issues I have waited as gracefully as I can for my husband to figure out how to hook up our washer (yes, I bought a small washer) I knew it would run on a generator but we can’t find the piping fittings we need (its from Japan) and tonight was just hard I am not going to lie to you folks. I have lived three different places in Santo and spent a considerable amount of time in a fourth and I have never seen anything like the mildew that grows at Jubilee. In the two weeks that my laundry has been piling up ( while we also hosted a retreat that took both our our full time to prepare for) the mildew has been growing not just on my dirty clothes but on our clothes that are hanging up! I have been told before just to brush said mildew off, but it has been so humid and all my clothes are so damp that I am going to say if I resist my normal urge to exaggerate, a good 25% of our clothes and bedding is ruined with mildew stains. Yes we will continue to use it with stains, but is it ok that that makes me a little sad? Maybe even feel like a little bit of a failure in my woman work? So back to tonight, our first load was hilarious. Now, don’t get me wrong I am thankful for a washer this time! With a whole family hand washing was out. I would spend my full time washing and I have been there before and I am too slow for that (my hats off to my Ni - Van friends and neighbors, these women AMAZE me). So yeah, my washer is on the front porch I can’t hear the beeps over the generator and I am hauling buckets of water from my rain tank cringing at how much water it is using (my husband helped carry the water for me, he is a peach like that ;) ) I soon discover as we just hauled what felt like tons of water that half way through the load for the rinse cycle the water was just draining straight out and not operating correctly because yours truly isn’t doing it right. I tend to do this thing where I laugh instead of cry, I think it is God’s gift to me as a means of coping. With no fence I had a curious audience, mostly interested in my machine I think. By the end they were probably thinking “poor girl, hand washing is so much easier!” haha. Anyways, I am pretty sure all my clothes are still full of soap but this was my first attempt. Hi my name is Jennifer and I WILL conquer the laundry! (I am not as confident about the mildew.) So its rough sometimes and I feel so much better sharing that. I pray sharing it doesn’t make me a bad person but my thinking is when I share it helps me so I can go on for a lifetime and not burn out over silly little things like laundry when there are a million things I love about my life in Vanuatu. I am excited to have relationships growing deeper and more meaningful and I love so many here. I mean it when I say I would haul a hundred buckets of water for the honor of living among some of the best people on earth, but telling my stories of “figuring out” third world life is meaningful to me, a sharer. So thanks for letting me share that :) If I were to blog about all the lessons I am learning it would be entirely too long, If I were to blog about all the lessons I have left to learn it would be longer still, so I am going to focus on one that I took a while to learn but am finally starting too understand. If I share it than maybe it will help someone else like it is helping me. Its kind of common sense and you may think as you read this “she hasn’t already learned that!?!” and that’s ok. If so, than I am glad you have picked it up easier than I!
I am by nature a people pleaser. If I think someone is upset with me or doesn’t like how I do something I face temptation to dwell on it, and if it is something outside of my power to change, well I can tend to obsess. It is funny how God knows just where to put us to help us learn. Being driven by the need or opinions of others wouldn’t work where He has me now. In our case in particular, there is a very real felt need for schools. Many villages want one and don’t understand why they have to wait. If I am not careful I can think, “this is our job ,why we are here!” knowing that to them we are not doing our job because we aren’t meeting their personal need immediately. It is no fun feeling like you are constantly letting people down. I know that we have lots of work to do with the government to give these schools the best chance of making it after us, I know of the blessing the schools that have already started have been to their communities, and I know we have had to do a lot of observing culturally to develop the best policies and training in these formative years to unfold why so many schools have collapsed here. When I let my mind go to how God has lead us so far, and how He will continue to lead, I can have peace that He will show us how to move with each step He has us take. So what lesson am I learning? His timing is a game changer. There have been aspects involving government and politics that I have been tempted to want to try and fix. However He tends to speak in that still small voice, “not yet, not yet, ok now!” HAHA! When I wait for Him I have found some of the issues resolve themselves without any action on my part, I have watched God remove people opposed to Christian education, and I have seen impossible situations start to weld together in perfect sync, harmony, and unity. Because of this I can look ahead and see where God is taking this and that when we move in sync with Him and not by the pressures of men it is setting up to be done well -as He has intended. So the greatest lesson here? It was never up to me! I am just a tool in His hand moving when He says move and standing still when He says stand still. That is where He has me now. I am so excited too, because I see God setting things up to help us help others. So many pieces slowly coming together to an ultimate explosion of Christ centered education. I can foresee it done in a way that the villages can take pride and ownership for the role they play in their schools. So a quick recap of points to my God lessons in my personal walk: Wait on God’s timing. Don’t allow the pressures of men to cause action wait and listen to God. I f I try to meet all needs in myself I will break down and not meet any needs, so be faithful to the needs God places in front of me and willing to stretch as He opens doors to more needs. In short, keep your eyes on Jesus He promised to guide you and in the end, He is the one to please! Thats an honest open look at where God has me, Where does God have you? Any lessons you have learned lately that you want to share? Tonight I read a quote from A.W Towzer;
“ It is doubtful whether God can bless a man greatly until He has hurt him deeply.” This quote got me to thinking about my last few months. It is always perplexing to decide what you should share as a missionary or even how much you share. You are going to deal with the backlash of some who will say by sharing about your struggles (such as sickness) you are bringing the focus too much to yourself and not enough to Christ. I guess the more I grow I tend to disagree with that blanket statement. My mind goes to the scripture that says “we are made overcomes by the blood of the Lamb and the word of our testimony” (Revelations 12:11). How can someone be an overcomer if they did not first have something to overcome? What I overcome may look different than what you face or what you overcome but the central truth is this, “we all need Christ to overcome.” Most know this past year, 2016, I have struggled with my health. I spent time in the local hospital with a kidney infection and eventually spent four nights in the Australian hospital diagnosed with dysentery and an all out battle with E coli bacteria possibly affecting other areas/organs in my body. My immune system had been weakened and normal life had turned into a struggle with so much sickness. Which is why I was thankful and excited to finally get the right medicine in a better hospital, I was excited to be done with sickness. In January my whole family got sick with something between a cold and the flu and I was excited that I was that I didn’t succomb . I attributed it to the Daniel fast I was on and clean eating and was hopeful my immune system was getting stronger. They all got better and thats when I fell sick. We had scheduled training in Big Bay bush and I assumed it was merely a cold and went ahead thinking I could rest while Nathan handled the training. Things took a dark turn and I was no longer able to cough as my head pain was so severe. It was all the markings of a tropical illness and I become nauseous to the point of nearly throwing up with the pain. My neck begin to grow stiff and the base of my head where it meets my neck hurts so bad all I could do was lay silent with the tears falling. It was in that bed sweating in the heat and away from what had become my home, I begin to quote scripture. I quoted scriptures about healing, about how God was able and nothing was impossible. I went over Psalms 91 and claimed my healing. I won’t lie I did feel in my heart that God had brought me here, and I was here to serve Him and He should protect me and keep me. I pleaded this with God in bed for two days but no answer came. I fought so hard the creeping thoughts of how God had betrayed me, how I had given God everything I had not held back a drop and yet He required more suffering of me. I felt alone and betrayed in the middle of nowhere on the other side of the world. Eventually it did get worse and when I could I would read from Job, not that I think what I faced was even slightly akin to Job, but my threshold for pain was obviously far less so I thought if only I could lock in on how he championed his pain. We had to head home a day early and if moving to cough made tears escape, off roading down a mountainside was a new level of torture. I rode with a rag in my lap in case I threw up from the pain. My husband watched helplessly as every jolt the tears just streamed. Obviously I couldn’t fight this on my own and would need antibiotics. I took the walk of shame into the local clinic hoping to get medication and be on my way but was given another blow, my infection was too high and I would have to be admitted to the hospital again. Where are you God? Where are you?! I believe those two days in the bush feeling so far away from God will stick with me the rest of my life. To be honest I still didn’t have complete victory a few weeks later but I did still have a cough when I got tired. We begin work on Jubilee School a few weeks later and as we went the full week without a day off trying to get everything done, I could feel myself breaking down, and I found myself sick … again. This time unable to keep my food or even water, I went nearly seven days without eating. On day five I broke. I am not proud of my flesh, but I never regret being honest with God. He sees what is in our heart anyways so there really isn’t any hiding. Friends, it is hard to share with you the ugliness that came out of me. I accused God of failing, of abandoning me, I lifted myself up self-righteously as I reminded him of my faithfulness through the years and of how I had my fair share of pain and testimony material. Now He had surely left me, and unjustly so! Now if you are a Christian and reading this please don’t begin to say things like “I would never say or do that!” not because of the affect it would have on me, but I wouldn’t want you to ever find yourself in this place. It was a place of brokenness not like the times as a younger Christian where I was so broken over sin in my life and cried out for a Savior, but a place of brokenness where I felt it was out of my hands and I had been broken to the point of ashes. Ive been done wrong in my life, come from broken family situations, been poor in my youth and lived in hotels and church fellowship halls, but through every situation I have always had my Jesus to walk with me. Not being able to feel or find Him in the dark was not easy. I felt like Peter sinking into the water, "this might be it God, this might be the one I can’t handle, not so much the sickness but feeling you so far away from me!" I wept. I wept some more. Then I begin to form the words “help me” please God help me. The realization comes in that He truly is our only hope. Who have we on earth besides thee? Oh the desperation for my Savior! Oh God I can face anything but life without you is more than I can bare! Please don’t stay silent when I need you most. I began to understand David somehow and his desperation in the Psalms. I asked my husband to sing a specific Psalm for me when he got home and he sang the following: “ Create in me a clean heart go God, and renew a right Spirit within me, Cast me not away from your presence oh God! Take not your Holy Spirit from me! Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation…” Oh at last I feel Him come! He is here! He has entered the room. I don’t begin to understand why we are called to the fellowship of His suffering. Maybe it is necessary to purge our flesh and purify us. I do know that of any suffering I may face nothing compares to not having Him in my life. If He is calling me to suffer so that others have an opportunity to know Him than I want to say, “Yes. I won’t quite, I won’t walk away. Lord, I will work for you until you call me home." My cough still lingers at night and some days I am scared of what I might catch next, but He has restored my joy and if He wills it I trust He knows best and is crafting something with my suffering, perhaps growing me for my own good. One thing I do know as His love covers the four corners of my heart tonight, He is a good God and I am only in the middle of my journey - He sees the end. He has given me all that I need to fight every weapon that is formed against me. Someday we will sit down by the Jordon and I can tell you the story of how I overcome, and you can tell me yours! Then we can praise the Lamb who was slain for every victory - rather healing, or sanctification, or whatever He brought us through. He does all things well folks. When I first felt called to ministry I vowed to myself and God that when I had kids they would be highly valued and I would not choose ministering to others over ministering to them. There are a lot of theories on being in ministry with kids. Growing up in church and with lots of family in ministry I have seen over and over the neglect and hurt of these kids and sadly, the regret and self blame of their parents. Not that these parents didn’t have the best of intentions, just some where along the way their own children were lost in the attempt to reach others. I don’t claim with a three and five year old to have the answers to all parenting woes, sometimes I am more like, “Ok, how do you get a kid to learn to wipe themselves correctly?” but I am passionate about the concept behind my own (simple as it may be ) theory. Theory: "The same God who gave me these children also called me to ministry and He is not a God of oversight. He has entrusted me with these kids and just as I have a responsibility before God to give my best to the souls He has called me to, I am equally called to give my best to the souls he has given me to raise. If anything keeps me from this it is not of God." Now, don’t get me wrong there are exceptions like Hannah, in the Bible when she was led by God to give here child to the ministry at an early age to train with someone more capable than she. God paints a very specific picture of parenthood. A great example of this is that God compares His relationship with us to that of a Father and His child, that shows a lot about what He thinks that relationship should look like. So how do you do it? Ministry is different than a 9-5 job. It is a calling, a compelling, a responsibility whose outcome lasts for eternity. If I were honest (and I usually am to a fault ) this past year I had some moments that despite my best intentions, I failed. Moments of dragging my kids and myself until we were all sick, over commiting and perhaps worse of all and the key to the whole situation, working in my own strength and abilities. If you are an accountant you go to school, you learn numbers and you use that skill daily. It is within your power and your ability to help someone file their taxes or keep pristine records. However, as a minister, no training in the world will make you capable of personally saving a soul. So how are we to be successful in ministry and parenting? Spending time with God daily and drawing from His strength is really the only place to start. You may be talented, capable, educated and strong, but if you are not drawing strength from God in a divine encounter with Him you are not capable of true ministry. So will my kids grow up perfect? Likely not, but if they should wonder too far I can draw strength from the scripture that tells me if I train them right they won’t depart from that. If you have kids and are in ministry recognize that God has entrusted you with these little souls. When we walk with God He will order our steps and if our steps are keeping us from this it is the pressures of men not the call of God. Our kids are worth it. Please don’t reach out to the worst drug addict, the poorest, the sickest, the most despised people of society, and then pat yourself on the back all while your own children are being neglected. This is not God’s plan or will. We only have them for this small season. Please continue to reach out to the least of these, but pray to see your own kids through Christ’s eyes. They are so precious in His sight and what a responsibility we have, but what a Savior we have! We can ask Him for wisdom and guidance, and when we walk with Him great things can happen for the kingdom both at work and at home - in spite of us. Remember when you feel the need to accomplish much for the kingdom, He is the one who accomplishes things. We are to submit to Him and allow Him to order our steps. Do this and God will give you the wisdom and the strength to raise your little people. When He is allowed to lead all the pieces will fit, and if you don’t feel they fit right now than maybe your biggest accomplishment will happen when you spend time with the Master. Your kids are not an oversight, His plan not only includes them but also embraces them. I remember a time a few years ago that I was cleaning my house for company. I had polished the furniture, scrubbed the bathrooms, swept the floor, and my husband pitched in to vacuum every room (just in case my company found themselves in our laundry room!). The next day, after their arrival I noticed a spider’s web right in the corner where my wall and ceiling meet. It bugged me after staying up so late the night before to insure a sparkly house. What happened? How did I miss it? Light exposes things easily missed in the dark. As the bright sun broke through the windows, the offensive addition to my decor became much more apparent than in the dim lit living room the night before. Light exposes, that is what it does, and as children of God we are called to walk in the light. If we are saved then at the glorious point of salvation His light came in and it shone into our hearts. It exposed every sinful “spider web” in our hearts and we could see as things really are because the light had come. Walking in the light means walking in true liberty. We can choose to hide some areas of our life and only expose the ones we see as “the image we want others to have of us” but that is not walking in the light. When we turn the light off in one of the rooms or areas within our heart we are tucking it away hiding it from the only one who can give us liberty. Walking in the light makes us vulnerable and transparent. We can spend our lives perfecting the mask of what we allow others to see or limit the places we allow Christ to go in our hearts but the problem with this is hidden things are in the dark. Unless His light is allowed to shine in every area there is no hope of true change or growth. Children of the light experience amazing freedom and liberty because they do not carry the bondage of fear of the hidden being exposed. They can go ahead and pull back the curtains and open the windows and they can embrace the light. What if someone sees a "spider’s web" in us? Thats is the beautiful thing about walking in the light, it is His grace to shine light on the areas we need to change - He wants to make all things new. Don’t fear the light but rather embrace it. Let it shine across your heart and expose every corner. Some will call you crazy and some foolish (to the ways of this world) but God will call you His own - child of the light. Twas the week before Christmas and the cows got out
they ate all the crops and left SBTC without The generator is broken, and pumping well water is its job Let’s ask the Missionary to fix it, he is kinda like Mr Claus ;) There are speed the light trucks to be put in the shop Christmas groceries for Tanna to be taken to the dock Pastor’s are needing rides into town to buy presents for their little pk’s There are bills, and plumbing, and paint, and ten hour work days There are now two house crews to please and to do their bidding there are no groceries this year to make that figgy pudding No shopping malls, no snow, no Christmas programs or plays but who needs a warm fire when you are having a heat wave? Twas the week before Christmas and the cows got out but for now the Sunday message must be prepared on what Christmas is really all about! Glad to know He is the reason for the season!!!!! Merry Christmas everyone and I hope you enjoyed a comical look at our work week :) |
AuthorWife, Mother, Missionary, Teacher, Friend ... just a few of the many titles I gladly wear. Never dreamed this is the journey God would take me on. Archives
July 2022
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