Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! Matthew 7:9-11
Can I be honest with you? Ever since jumping in and answering the call to go on the World Race, I have just been waiting for something to ruin things and make this call impossible. Anytime a tough circumstance comes along, I immediately think, this is it, this is what ruins my going on The Race. It’s like I am Peter, stepping out on the water, trusting in the Lord, but secretly waiting for something to fail, waiting to start sinking. Why do I think this way?
These past few months have been learning to trust in God as a provider. A friend told me that I must finally stop waiting for something to blow up this call and simply trust The Lord despite the circumstances. Circumstances don’t define the calling. For so long, I organized my life in a way that I would only have to rely on me, all the while the Lord was waiting to show me what He can do when we choose to rely on Him.
As encouragement to myself and y’all, let me share how the Lord has provided every step of the way: (And for the record, no longer waiting for the call to be ruined, I’m ready to go January 2015!)
*Needed somewhere for all my furniture and stuff to go. My sweet mother bought my furniture after grad school to get me started, so I didn’t want to just sell what she bought. Cue friends that moved from Colorado to Dallas and needed furniture. The Lord provided.
*Needed somewhere to live August to December that would allow me to save money. If I had to sleep on an air mattress, that would be wompy, but I would do it. Cue the Lord providing a room in a house with great people, lower rent, and fully furnished.
*Need to fundraise over $16k. Cue the Lord using all sorts of people, far and wide to get me over 60% funded already. It has blown my mind to see who has supported this trip and how amazingly encouraging they have been. I have been humbled to see how generous people have been and desire for everyone to know that my supporters are apart of every victory that may occur over the next 11 months. My prayer is that we make an eternal impact all over the world!
*Needed a backpack and tent for the World Race. Cue to The Lord providing a past Racer who sweetly let me borrow her stuff and friends who gave me their two-person tent.
*I have a great full-time job at a fun company, but needed to be able to publicly fundraise while still keeping my job. Is five months notice okay? Cue the Lord allowing me to tell them in August I would be leaving, but them letting me stay until December.
*My Community Group had been through lots of change and I was leaving, so we needed new people who would love me well in this transition period and integrate well with the group. Cue the Lord providing two great women who have been so encouraging already. Not to mention the WONDERFUL community the Lord has given me over the past few years.
All of this makes me wonder what we miss out on by not trusting in The Lord as a provider. What accomplishments have been left undone? What dreams are sitting dusty on the shelf? How are we not living up to our fullest potential because we aren’t willing to fully TRUST that God knows everything we need? (Matthew 6:25-34). For years I wanted to do the World Race, but was too scared to because of logistics. When I finally took the step, I cried at the drop of a hat out of fear of failure. These days, I am literally rejoicing and praising God when a $300 item is donated, surprised how it’s all working out, and I think God is saying, “this is what I wanted to do all along.” God wanted me to stop relying on myself, too afraid to step out of the boat and take a chance, and start relying on Him. It’s about time we all start dreaming dreams that glorify God, but are much bigger than our talents and capabilities, and see what The Lord wants to do.
So let me challenge us all, what do we need to take a step of faith and trust the Lord in? For some who don’t know Him, it may simply be asking the Lord to show them who He is. For others it may starting a non-profit that combats many of the ills in the world. And for others still it may be sharing their faith with a family member. And often, it may be mean many “failures” in the world’s eyes, but the success in God’s.
I can’t wait to be on the sidelines cheering as I see people go after dreams that glorify God and am grateful for the opportunities I have already had to do so! This weekend there are 100 young adults around Dallas sharing their faith as part of the Unashamed weekend, an idea that was born out of a 20-something who wanted to see people not just go on mission trips, but be on mission in their city. While he had no experience in planning a weekend like this, he took the leap and God is using this to affect a city.
I’ll close with this, I have a friend who could give the Dos Equis most-interesting-man-in-the-world a run for his money. She has lived one of the fullest lives I have heard of and people can tell from talking to her that she is doing this well. One day she told me that as she graduated college, she asked God to always keep her in a place to where if He didn’t come through, she would be out of luck. Essentially asking God to put her in situations where her gifts, talents, and resources were not enough so that she would be fully reliant on Him. And amazing things have followed.
I could fill pages with stories like these of what happens when people trust God, but it’s about time we all start writing our own.
