The Sojourner….

Psalm 146. 9

 

          I grew up in a very safe enviroment.  Typical suburban house, pool in the back yard…even a golden retriever.  I have a family that is loving and supportive; a father that leads his family to church and a mom who is the inevitable taxi driver to us kids and baker to all and every birthday/special occasion.  I don’t know if i can necessarily be held at fault for taking all of this for granted, since i never really knew any different.  Not only did all of my friends also seemingly have the same life, i’m not sure it even hit me until only a few years ago that i was not in the majority.  My life wasn’t “typical”….rather it is not the norm at all. 

          From my skewed vantage point i just couldn’t see the bigger picture…it wasn’t until i ventured outside of my world, that i actually saw the world.  I began to understand why there are verses like this Psalm in the bible…it’s not one to pass over, but one to take to heart and consider.  Who are these sojourners and widows and fatherless children??  Where do they live and why does the Bible mention them so often??   

         As i sit here in my second week in Malawi, i finally understand.  It has finally hit home why God cares enough to single these groups out…and perhaps selfishly, it sinks in a bit deeper because i now feel a part of this verse.  This month, like the previous six, i have stepped outside of myself- my comfort of things, my perspective on family, my confident assurance that i can handle whatever comes my way…and i have trusted that the One who is watching over me will provide all i need.

         A sojourner is a person who resides temporarily in a place.  Well, if there wasn’t a better definition for my life this year, this would be it!  Today is my 14th day in Malawi and two days, i will be packing up and moving on.  And so it is on the World Race.  Infact it is what we signed up for, right?  Don’t get me wrong, i do actually love this adventure of “settling” someplace for a time, in order to give my time and energy into a project for the Kingdom, to only follow the Lord’s leading to the next spot i will call home, but at times it does make me tired.  There have been more than a couple of transitions where we have stayed in a place less than 12 hours in order to rest enough to continue on the next day.  We travel with a destination in mind, but getting there isn’t always the easiest. 

         Time and time again, we have sat back in what seems like a dead end situation and watched how with little effort of our own, the Lord does his beautiful dance of opening and closing doors in order to make our path straight.  It is a dance that i have come to love to watch…it is much more graceful and poetic than the way we stumble from one step to the next. 

         I have been with a different team this month and for two weeks now i have been watching them pray and talk thru what next month will look like for them.  It is an ATL month and hearing what the Lord wants for these kinds of months is much easier said than done. Finally it came to the night when they had to decide.  The deadline of letting AIM know was upon them.  There was still some talk of uncertainty, but it had been decided…well, they thought so.  Here is where His dance began:  What started with a random comment about a ministry that another squad had begun transitioned within minutes to coinciding with an email from one of our coaches asking if anyone was going to that ministry in August, then was confirmed by another teammate who hadn’t even been in the room as well as recieving the thumbs up from the AIM office…we all just sat there staring at each other- seemingly dizzy from the choreography of the Lord.  The journey is a beautiful thing…