“I am pressed but not crushed. .
.”
– from “Trading My Sorrows” by
Darrell Evans
The
G-Squad really likes to sing this song a lot (I find it perfectly adequate, I
guess?) After 7 months of pressing in,
through, on, [insert your preposition of choice here], I feel just plain
pressed. . .
- As in, my buttons; (mostly)
petty pet peeves are enough to detonate the f-bomb sometimes (but only
mentally). Just the result of
living in community all the time? - For time; after this month,
we are 72.72% done and have only 27.28% left! Some of the most common questions: - “So, when are you coming
back?”
Answer: end of August - “What are you gonna do?”
Answer: I don’t know yet. - For progress: how much have I made? How much more is left? Am I really different from who I was
before I left? Why do I feel like
I’m reverting back into a few old patterns – like over-thinking?
Mostly
though, I feel like my heart is being pressed harder here in Eastern Europe,
especially here in Romania. I find
myself more easily bruised and brought to tears, even weeping – by the sudden
departure of a fellow missionary,
whom I’ve never met, the toll that illness takes, other teammates’ loss of
loved ones.
. .
And it’s
not just me. Dan shares the Ferdons’
heart for “the borderland”. Brandon’s heart overflows with compassion for
Pavel. Tangi hurts for those who are still unaware that
they have a Father who loves them. And we all know Christi is the most sensitive
person of our bunch.
This is
an excerpt from an email I sent my supporters the morning (?) after our team
meeting:
I . . . couldn’t voice the words without crying.
it’s strange, you’d wonder, after eight months of meeting so many people and
hearing their stories, why the big deal about just this one person?
i couldn’t explain how or why marius has made such an impact on me.
no, actually, you know the part of the bridge of the praise song,
“hosanna” by hillsong (brooke frasier), that goes “break my
heart for what breaks Yours”? you know how it’s almost become cliche
to sing that song as a prayer? or to really pray that?
yeah, i’m pretty sure God’s answering those prayers. . .
Do you
notice a thread that runs through the blogs and the comments thereof? At some point on the Race, in some form, we
made this rather reckless, really lofty request. Solomon asking for wisdom when God asks what
he wants = smart; asking to identify with God with respect to the world’s
brokenness = stupid.
We fell
for the pretty melody of the music, which is really the spoonful of sugar that
helps it go down smooth. And here we
are, our hearts aching and beating with our heavenly Father, simply because we asked
Him.
Oh and
today’s devotional seemed to drive all this home for me. . .
The Faith to Persevere from Oswald Chambers’s My Utmost for His Highest
Because you
have kept My command to persevere . . .
-Revelation 3:10
Perseverance means more than endurance- more than
simply holding on until the end. A saint’s life is in the hands of God like a
bow and arrow in the hands of an archer. God is aiming at something the
saint cannot see, but our Lord continues to stretch and strain, and every once
in a while the saint says, “I can’t take any more.” Yet God pays no
attention; He goes on stretching until His purpose is in sight, and then He
lets the arrow fly. Entrust yourself to God’s hands. Is there something in
your life for which you need perseverance right now? Maintain your intimate
relationship with Jesus Christ through the perseverance of faith. Proclaim as
Job did, “Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him” (Job 13:15).
Faith is not some weak and pitiful emotion, but is
strong and vigorous confidence built on the fact that God is holy love. And
even though you cannot see Him right now and cannot understand what He is
doing, you know Him. Disaster occurs in your life when you lack the
mental composure that comes from establishing yourself on the eternal truth
that God is holy love. Faith is the supreme effort of your life- throwing
yourself with abandon and total confidence upon God.
God ventured His all in Jesus Christ to save us, and
now He wants us to venture our all with total abandoned confidence in Him.
There are areas in our lives where that faith has not worked in us as yet-
places still untouched by the life of God. There were none of those places in
Jesus Christ’s life, and there are to be none in ours. Jesus prayed, “This
is eternal life, that they may know You . . .” (John 17:3).
The real meaning of eternal life is a life that can face anything it has to face
without wavering. If we will take this view, life will become one great
romance- a glorious opportunity of seeing wonderful things all the time. God is
disciplining us to get us into this central place of power.
