5 months ago I left everything I have ever known. I left my home of 22 years. I left my irreplaceable family. I left my incredible friends. I left everything that I call familiar.
I left because I knew there was something more that I was desperately seeking and longing for. Something that I couldn't find in a store or in my happy little comfort zone. Something that isn't defined in a dictionary and can't be learned from a self help book. Something that I wasn't going to find unless I was willing to give up everything I have ever known. Something that has to be fought for with everything, but in which the price has already been paid.
I had to fight the world's view of success: that after college you have to immediately have a 6 figure paying job to have worth. I had to fight the lie that 15,500 dollars would be too difficult to raise. I had to fight the selfishness in me that didn't want to walk away from the relationships that make me feel known.I had to fight the lie that I am not worthy for Jesus to send me as His hands and feet to the nations.
I had to fight hard to get here. And now after the last five months I have realized that I have to fight even harder to stay here. To stay present, to stay unoffendable, to stay seeking growth. Though the issues are different the fight is just as difficult.
I have to fight against feeling numbness to all of the broken lives I am seeing: starving children, sex-enslaved teens, forgotten widows, abandoned babies.I have to fight against the distraction of being in a foreign country with hundreds of souvenirs and worldly attractions.I have to fight against the temptation to get comfortable with my team and waste time by not being intentional with each other.I have to fight against the lie that my selfishness makes it impossible for the Lord to use me.
I have been fighting constantly, because I have to. In order to die to my fleshly desires, pick up my cross and follow Jesus, I have to fight. And this last month there were a lot of days that I lost the fight. However, the amazing thing about fighting battles with the Lord though is that I am never fighting alone, so even when my flesh loses the fight my Savior is still victorious.
Even on the days when I didn't choose intentionality with my team, didn't have a broken heart for the hurting lives around me, or didn't believe that I was good enough to share the indescribable love of Christ , Jesus was still fighting for me. He took the age old war against sin and nailed it to the cross 2,000 years ago because He was fighting for me. Despite my failures, despite my sin, despite my love for everything in the world that is not Him. He humbled Himself, died on a cross, and not only fought the fight against death but conquered it.
That doesn't mean that while on this earth we don't have to fight every day. To choose life and not death. To choose love and not hate. To choose others and not ourselves. To choose humility and not pride. To choose to truth and not lies. We have to fight because we are living in a fallen world. We have to fight ,but we are never fighting alone. We have to fight every single day, but the fight for forever..for eternal life, well it is finished: it has already been won.
