Written in Cambodia
Hey God,
The other day Chom asked us a powerful question, he asked how the world fell into sin creating distance between us and God. We explained Jesus was the answer and the plan all along to keep us in relation with God and save us from the sin we would inevitably fail to resist.
He said, “If God is so powerful then why does He make it complicated when He could just fix everything with His mighty power?”
I stared at the people I was with, it hit me like a freight train that question. It linked all these emotions I have been having into one and I knew the answer to His question but somehow, I hadn’t realized I had an answer until Chom asked it.
God didn’t make things complicated. He made things possible without compromising His goodness.
If He fixed everything He would be taking away the human rights He gave us to begin with. Free will. Without freewill it would just be a puppet master and his puppets and what kind of care and love is involved in forcing people to do things.
BUT still why couldn’t he just make it be their decision?
But if someone is making it your decision then it was never yours to begin with.
And He doesn’t want us to be forced to choose Him, He wants us to freely choose Him.
But if you know that people will forever be separated from you why wouldn’t you make the executive decision to force everyone to believe in you and later in eternity with you they would all be grateful and understand why?
Because then what makes you believe deep in your soul that your God is trustworthy and loving. Would you be able to be grateful for being deceived by the God who is supposed to perfect and righteous and a God of justice?
Being forced your whole life to choose into something when ultimately you weren’t actually making that decision yourself. That would be compromising who God is. So, while He knows what’s best for us He also isn’t going to force us because of His love and righteousness. I can go on forever with this but ultimately, I will never understand how the creator of the universe can exert His power and know EVERYTHING and yet still remain loving and unfailing in doing what is good and right.
And secondly, He did not even begin to be the one that separated us from Him. Mankind did that when Adam and Eve disobeyed and brought sin into the world for all generations to come. So instead of just leaving us to be separated from our maker forever God made a way! You sacrificed yourself so that you could regain a relationship with each and every one of us but just like it was Adam and Eve’s choice to sin we have to choose into what Jesus is offering us. It’s crazy how our relationship with our creator was messed up by a choice and how it can be mended by a choice. It’s even more beautiful that the Lord knew that He would have to sacrifice himself to bring us back to Him and He still chose to create us. And going back to freewill for a moment he knew we would screw things up with freewill but He still gives it to us because what kind of love and relationship would it be if someone forced you into it? It would be so far from genuine.
I thought back to the beginning of this month (Cambodia) when I was feeling broken about leaving Thailand and not ready to leave when I found out some of the kids we were teaching may not have a great home life and the huge need in my heart rose up to just want them to know my Jesus, my comforter. How I can’t fix their home life but I can tell them that in dark moments that the Lord can be your rescuer and somehow get you through. I thought back to my prayers in preschool when I couldn’t quite wrap my mind around why I was going to a different house to see my dad and why I couldn’t always call my mom before bed because this was dad’s time with us. Why wasn’t mom with us? Why didn’t Dad come to Mom’s house? They said they were separating but what in the world does that mean to a little mind. But I would talk to Jesus and slowly but surely, he would comfort me and make things seem alright even though they weren’t always ok or fair. I wanted them to have Jesus to talk to. It sounds so innocent but it made THE difference in my life. And as we left Thailand my heart was broken wondering how in the world am I supposed to give them Jesus like I experienced Jesus? What am I supposed to do Lord? Especially when that day was the last time I saw them at the end of our stay. I was never going to see them again but you let me feel your heart for them Lord the deep pain and love for them. Why? Pray for them. Okay. But why can’t you just force them to know you? You can comfort them if they can talk to you. Lord WHY don’t you make yourself known to them and teach them to start trusting in you and relying on you?
Then my first week in Cambodia during VBS week a child came in with his little sister, this tiny little thing. SO adorable, she didn’t speak but you could catch a smile if you gave her some of your time. By the end of VBS one of the girls, Maddie; who worked with us was a nurse and she noticed she had a fever. She was holding this little girl and giving her water. She wanted to do something more she wanted to talk to her parents but there was no translator. Her brother kept urging Maddie to let her sister go because they needed to go home. But Maddie said her fever felt high. They measured it and said it was in the 100’s and still going up. Maddie was crushed and wanted to keep her there for longer but brother was leaving and she had to let her go. And I cringed inside, what if she is gonna die, she needs help, she needs something to bring down her fever. Lord how can someone just be able to resume life? I may be acting dramatically but my heart is in pain watching them walk off somewhere not knowing if she will get medical attention or not. WHAT ARE YOU DOING LORD??? Pray. Okay but my heart hurts how will I know if it helps. How will I know she will come back to VBS the next day? Pray. I am! But I want an explanation. Pray. Okay.
Then this month (in Cambodia) our host told us that these KTV’s are all around Cambodia and by the second week here I started really seeing them. I passed a closed one with grass and plants growing all over the building and parking lot as I would ride my bike into town. My heart hurt every time I passed by. Thinking to myself of the darkness that would have existed right there in front of those doors. I could still feel the darkness. My heart dropped at the pain that place enabled by simply existing. I saw multiple ones as I got out to a busier road, sadly those were still open. When evening approached, they would begin to open and as I passed these places on my way back to where I lay my head at night I noticed benches near the entrances and girls crowded on the bench. Place after place these woman were lined up to draw men in. The pit of my stomach ached, Lord ouch what am I supposed to do with this hurt in the world you keep showing me? What is going through their heads? Do they know they are loved? They need you. To cry out to You and feel the love and protection more than ever but they don’t even know that you see them, that you care about them, that you want a relationship with them, Jesus. That you deem them worth it. DO THEY KNOW THEY HAVE WORTH? Is anyone fighting for them? DO they know anything different than what they are currently living? Not just the girls but also the people running and owning KTV’s. I can’t walk into a KTV I don’t know the culture, the language, it could be dangerous. How Lord? How do I do something about this hurt and pain that you have again let me see a piece of your heart for these girls, and for these people that run the KTV? How do I get in without an opening? Pray. Yea, but what is the way to get them to know you? What practically and physically needs to be done? Pray.
Then this month (in Cambodia) I have been handed this crazy God ordained encounter with a Buddhist man in Cambodia. When we came up to his business to hand out VBS flyers for the ministry we were serving at, we thought there was a child there but there was not. We lingered and somehow Katie told our new friend Chom about Jesus. He said “I have heard of Him but I have a lot of questions.” We said we would come back. We came back every day that we could. We learned that he was a man of reason and that his current religion was Buddhism and that he respects Buddha very much for the practical and good ways he tells us to live our lives but that he was not sure if Buddhism was the ‘right’ religion. He would love to hear about Christianity.. We formed an amazing friendship with Chom, his soon to be fiancé and her family as we stood under the hot tin roof just to be able to love on Chom and his people, to genuinely get to know him. We talked about Christianity and they explained things about Buddhism to us. He said he saw a warmth in us and was shocked to hear that we were not scared to die and that our God walks through our pain with us and heals us. You could tell that Chom was, like probably many Buddhists, very grieved by death day. He was interested in hearing how our life looked different with Jesus. We had more joy, less worry. And I came to a point in our friendship where I was begging God why won’t you just make it happen, MAKE Chom know you because he is such an amazing man and he sees that something is missing in life and he feels the weight of suffering in the world and he needs the hope that You bring to the world. You have the power Lord, JUST DO IT!! I can feel Your love and care for him, his honey and her family. And I know step one is Chom. You love them Lord, so why don’t You show yourself to them. Chom is asking questions about You, genuinely wanting to find the truth and you literally have what he is asking for so let Him know it undoubtedly like we do! Nothing is impossible for you so just make him believe You because it is what is best for him. And the Lord again said pray. I am just at a loss for the weight in my heart for all these things. All these painful things happening and your absence in people. I know You are there, but the lack of them knowing You are there. That someone cares deeply about them and wants a relationship with them, and that relationship will literally change their life. But they don’t know it, they don’t accept it! Jesus how do you sit here and love them so deeply and know there is a better way but you don’t fix it. I know You see them, I know Your heart for them is in way more pain than what You have allowed me to feel and that blows me away because what I feel hurts Lord. I can’t even imagine how hard it is for You to see the hurt in the world. All the bondage that this world puts on people and the lack of knowledge of a freedom that is meant for them. This got me in a mood, it wasn’t at all that I don’t trust God, it’s just I want everyone to know Jesus loves them. I want everyone to choose Him. And my human, sinful, selfish nature wants it even if there has to be a compromise and forcefulness because I know it is so good, I know it is the right God. And when I begin to feel the Lord’s overwhelming love for people and the pain that they don’t know Him yet and could pass up the opportunity all together to never know the love He wants to give. I want the Lord to make it impossible for that person to refuse the freedom Jesus gives. But even though my heart has the right intentions of leading them to the goodness of the Lord- I am in the wrong. I can’t take away their freewill of choosing for themselves to give them the freedom of Jesus. While I am aiming to be more righteous every day. He is righteousness. Never selfish. When I sit down and process these feelings I only grow to honor and fall more in love with my God. I trust him because he does not waiver in His goodness. He always does what is right even though it hurts Him to see people He created out of love not choose Him. He does not force us.
TTFN,
Jenny
