One thing that my team did this last month was ATL “Ask the Lord.” We went to a city without any contacts set up, and we just asked the Lord to lead us to where he wanted us to serve.The first day we were in town, Brady and I were out looking for a Hostel, when we met a nice homeless lady in an underground tunnel. We had a great hour talking to her, and then we left her, never expecting to see her again. (At least I wasn’t)
The next day, Brady and I went out to walk the streets and see where the Lord would lead us. I thought we needed to head East, and she thought we needed to head towards the river (also east), so (logically) we headed towards the train station to head East. When we got to the train station, we didn’t know which line to take, and we couldn’t find a map. We debated this for a few minutes, and then I said
“we don’t really know where we are headed anyway, so we can just pray and ask God to tell us which line to take”.
So we ask. I was expecting God to tell me a number, but instead He said,
“Follow the man with white hair.” I thought this was weird so I didn’t say anything, but Brady looked at me and asked what I had heard. I said,
“Follow the man with White hair.” She said
“I heard Follow the man with white hair.” So we “followed the man with White hair.”
It didn’t take us very long to figure out that the man with white hair was not taking a train, but instead crossing the street and walking East. We followed him and lost him, but we kept walking in the direction that he had lead us. We walked for about 20 minutes before the street ran into the river. About the time I was staring to think what now, I looked right and realized that we were at the entrance to the underground tunnel where we had met our friend the day before.
So we went and started talking to her, and pretty soon we were going through a phrase book teaching her English. After about a half hour, another girl sat down with us, so I started talking to her. About the time to leave, a street vendor sat down next to me. After I had taught him all the English phrases, he started teaching me Chinese. This was a lot more exciting for all the Chinese people that were now watching us and pretty soon, we had a whole group meeting on the stairs. Three hours later, I left the tunnel cold and hungry, and knowing that we walked exactly where God had wanted us to be that afternoon.
We were able to go back to that tunnel many times during our stay in that city. We became friends with the people that lived and worked there. We even helped the squishy ball vender’s sell their products. Two white girls in an underground tunnel is genius marketing.
Our last night, Brady took her guitar down there and played worship songs. She was even able to translate the words for them.
The day we left the city, a group of five or six of our tunnel friends met us at the train station to see us off. They also gave us bags full of Squishy balls, and as the told us “Merry Christmas.” I was so touched, I almost cried (but I didn’t.)
Hanging out in the tunnel has been one of my favorite ministries on the World Race so far. It is cool to see where the Lord will lead you when you are willing to be obedient. Even if sometimes his voice doesn’t sound too logical.
“Follow the man with the white hair.”
