I’ve been thinking a lot about trust lately. It started when Devin, my team leader, pulled me aside and told me that he sees me acting in a way that holds people at a distance when they try to correct me. On the Race we “call each other up” to the freedom Christ has given us, as opposed to “calling each other out” on our stuff. It means that if we notice someone regularly acting in a way that doesn’t look like the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5, we know that our identity is in looking like Christ, so we “call each other up” into that identity.
Photo from an Arabic friend
I took Devin’s words to the Lord, and wrote down some of my thoughts. I know that God meant for me not to be alone, which is why He gave us to each other as brothers and sisters. As I talked to Him, I visualized myself in a house with room for only one. The house had a wall all around it with no entrance. When I saw this, I wasn’t too surprised. I love people, but…that doesn’t necessarily mean I trust a lot of them. How close did I really want them to come? I thought about my team and how during these six months I haven’t given them nearly as much time as I wish I had. When I looked into my heart, I found that the source was from not really wanting to care, because caring involves loving, and loving can hurt like a sharp blade.
The Lord then impressed a question on my heart: did I want anyone to come inside? I continued to ask the Lord about it, and the question really was, is it worth it to know people from a distance and shut love out, or would it be better to let people inside and know love the way it was meant to know me?
And then I got a note from Sam. My team teaches English at her school. Nearly every day she comes up to me with a tap on the shoulder, then she looks away so I don’t think that it’s her. Yesterday, her little friend came over to me with a note from her. I teared up when I saw the vulnerable state of her heart, that she was willing to tell me that she needed me. How often do I admit that I need others?She wrote that she needs me to be her best friend. “I need your love! I need your time!” she wrote. All I could think of was the fact that she believed the best about me and that she simply trusted with the faith of a child.
It is Jesus’ faithfulness that gets us out of the places where we shouldn’t be, like a little enclosed house with room for only one. He is Love, and in His love He wants to make room for more Love. Love that will penetrate walls with just a gentle knock.
Sam, thank you for giving me an example of how to open my enclosed heart.
I love you, sweet girl.
