I wanted to write this blog to share what God has done in my life in terms of the big picture over the past three months. Where to begin….
I guess the best place is back at square one in Ecuador. That month was a month of breaking in my life. God broke me and shattered so many things that I thought I was or thought I had to be in order that he might show more of Himself to me. Needless to say that was a really rough month for me and I didn’t even realize how good it was for me until the next month. During Month One, God broke down walls that I had put up between me and the rest of my team. I didn’t wanna be there. I didn’t wanna be with these people who I didn’t know and I was not a happy camper for many days around the two week mark. It was so bad that I wanted to come home. I know that God called me to be on the Race and thats really the only reason that I stayed. I didn’t know why I was here, nor what part I played on my team and I was just done with it all. Through all of this, walls were coming down. Like I said, I didn’t even realize it until Perú. I just knew that I was going through hell on earth, or at least it seemed like it.
After we got to Perú, it was like all of a sudden those walls were gone. It was so strange. Month Two was definitely learning what freedom looks like and how to walk in that freedom. All of my team relationships were being strengthened and it was a solid month for team growth. I know a lot of my team had good growth with the local people, but I was definitely more disconnected with the locals, as compared to Ecuador that is. I was by no means disconnected with the people in Perú, just not as much as in Ecuador. I know that was because that month was all about my growing in my relationships while those walls were down. Also in Perú, I definitely found new freedom in following the Spirit and having confidence in that. I was asked to sing at church about 2 minutes before they wanted me to and I said, “OK!” Normally, I wouldn’t have obliged, but I did because I knew the Spirit had my back and wasn’t gonna let me down. In another service, I was asked to translate the service into Spanish, Nathan was preaching so it needed to be translated. I said ok, got up there and let the Spirit use me as a mouth piece to translate the sermon.
Month Three was definitely more interesting and challenging than last month was though. Here, I have been faced with the same walls that I started the Race with and have had the choice of whether or not to choose to love my team and continue growing with them or to let those walls come back between us. It has been hard. There have been days where I just wanted to run away from everybody and stay away for a week. Knowing the freedom that I walked in last month, though, I would never be able to walk away from the relationships I’ve developed. My love for my team has truly blossomed this month and that all comes from the choice of loving them. Choosing to love someone makes all the difference in whether or not you do. Two of my goals for this month was to continue to walk with my walls down, to keep them as a rock pile beneath my feet and to walk losing myself in His image. It definitely has been a challenge to do that, but I know that it comes with a choice and no matter how hard satan may attack me, if I make the choice to walk with my walls down, the power of Christ sustains me and the battle is over before it even begins. This past week has been especially hard in that area, but thankfully the Light of the World illuminated the issue at the heart of the problem and showed me that it was the deceiver at work trying to get my flesh to latch on to hateful feelings and bad attitudes and such towards a teammate. Once I saw that, the battle was done, that is once I brought it to light with the other person. I still feel him trying to throw up those walls, but I know that God has called me to walk this month with out those walls and that with the power of Christ, I can do it. I know that nothing in me would be able to walk in this freedom, but Christ allows me to do so and nothing can quench the power that comes in the very name of Christ.
