God is good, always.
I just really wanted to open with that.
It’s funny how being away from home for even just a month and half will change you. It’s funny how God needs very little time to work in a person.
Actually it’s really not that funny, it’s more like God is working in you, and in doing so, you get a little bit more of a glimpse of who He is. And that is more awe inspiring than funny.
I’ll admit, I don’t always see myself clearly. Frankly it is a lot easier to believe the bad I have made up about myself as opposed to believe the good God has redeemed me into. There are several reasons for this, but not enough time to write. Instead I really want to write about something recent. We are now in month 2, and Swaziland is our host country. God gave me a verse after training camp for this year, I’m not going to say what it is because I really just want to keep that between my papa and myself for the time, but just within these last 2 months, I can see what the meaning of the verse was for this year. Anyway, this last week God put the name Barnabas over me, and I have always related to Barnabas because I have always seen him as a “background” worker, but still very important for the kingdom. But God was pressing me to look more into his character, this is what I discovered.
A word that has been spoken over me lately is “encourager”. I have never really seen much in that, kind of, “yeah, not a big deal”. But as I looked more into who Barnabas was, I quickly learned that Barnabas means “son of encouragement” , okay, I found that interesting. I think in the past when I read about him, I saw him not as a fighter because since he was called an encourager, in my mind it put a sense of weakness on him. But as I read through Acts, in chapter 9 it says that Paul had tried to join the disciples, but they were afraid of him, not believing that he was no longer the man who was persecuting the church. Enter Barnabas; he fought for him when the 12 didn’t want him, he fought for him to be seen as Gods chosen instrument for the Gentiles by those who walked with Jesus. Barnabas also was hopeful. I don’t think I had a good understanding of hope before, but since leaving for the race, I can see that every believer on this planet carries hope with them. There are certain things that happen on the race that sometimes make it very easy to lose hope, but to have Gods hope doesn’t only mean the good news of Christ but to remain hopeful in all circumstances knowing that God is here with us for whatever we may be going through, and He is good, always.
I think God has given me the name Barnabas to help me see myself clearer, to help me see who He has made me, I am a Barnabas. I am a daughter of encouragement, I am a fighter, and I am hopeful in the Lord.
