This week has been hard. I didn’t work at
all this week. The first few days were great. I got to relax. But then it
started driving me nuts. I thought, “what am I doing?” I was wasting my time
sleeping and watching tv and not doing anything productive at all. I couldn’t
handle it anymore. I needed some air and went for a walk. On my walk I
basically had a breakdown. I didn’t know where it was coming from but I cried
out to God. I didn’t know what I was doing anymore. I questioned my purpose for this missions trip. I felt inadequate and unqualified
to be doing the world race. All my fears came back again
and I doubted everything that was going on in my
life. So I asked Him to speak to me.
And He did. On my walk back home I went to
get the mail and there was a Gift Guide from Compassion. You could buy
livestock or help fund small business programs in countries of need, etc. I flipped
through the booklet and under each item it tells you which country you’ll be
helping. There was a recurring theme. Some of the gifts are for countries that
I’ll be going to. Rwanda.
India.
Uganda.
Nicaragua.
Tanzania.
El Salvador.
That’s a little more than half the route. And my heart just broke; knowing
that their need for basic necessities is great but that their need for hope is EVEN GREATER.
And then He spoke again. This time He used
some pretty cool people to do it. At my twentysomethings group that night we
did a study on serving. And we talked about the things that hold us back from
serving. Things like our fears. Things like our feelings of being unqualified
for the job. Some of us resonated with those feelings. And we were reminded
that we’re NOT
heroes but merely beggars helping other beggars.
And that sometimes it is through our fears and our feelings of being
unqualified that God uses us and changes us and makes us more,
even overqualified servants. And ultimately we are to
PERSEVERE through our fears and feelings. Because that
is when God builds us and shapes us. And make us into better Christians.
“And we rejoice in the hope of
the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our
sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance,
character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God
has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given
us.” — Romans 5:2-5
When things get tough it’s easy to want to
run away. I know I wanted to even though I was pretty committed into doing
this. Running away is the easy answer. Perseverance is the right answer.
