Have you ever intentionally asked the Lord what he specifically wants you to do for a few hours of your day? Have you walked out into your community ready to talk to whoever he puts in your path? Have you stepped out of your comfort zone and allowed the Lord to work through you even when you don’t feel qualified to do so?
Stepping out of my comfort zone has been difficult and honestly there’s been times on the Race when I just haven’t wanted to do it. Yet it never fails that God uses those moments of discomfort to teach me something new about his character or something new about myself. Saturday morning we set out to do something called ATL (Ask the Lord). This is a time where we pray for the Lord to tell is where to go, what to do and who to talk to. I was very nervous. I don’t speak enough Spanish to carry a conversation and I don’t completely love just walking up to people and evangelizing to them. I felt kinda pressured to have these huge conversations with people and tell them about Jesus in an intense way. We partnered up and went out in the streets of Jaco for two hours. My teammate Lindsey and I were together. Before leaving home we prayed and took some time to listen and see what God wanted us to do.
Almost immediately I felt that he wanted us to buy flowers and give them women in the community. We’ve been living in Jaco for about 3 weeks now and I’ve never seen a place to buy flowers. It’s a pretty small community that has all the main stores on one street so I had no idea where in the world we were going to find flowers. Neither of us speak very much Spanish so I used google translate to ask a few people where we could buy real flowers. Eventually there was a man we asked that graciously walked us over to the flower shop. We found the perfect flowers and bought 10 of them. As we left the shop we began to pray that God would show us where to go and who to give the flowers to. One by one, God highlighted specific women that we should give flowers to. A lady working at a souvenir shop, four young women standing on a corner, an older lady selling food on the street, and the list goes on. I would start out by asking them if they spoke any English to which the answer was always no! I wanted to ask if we could pray for them or chat with them for while but I just couldn’t carry a conversation. So instead I’d hand them the flower and simply say, “Dios te ama” which means God loves you. The smiles of these women are something I will never forget. Some were at a lose for words and some couldn’t stop say thank you. Others couldn’t stop smiling and couldn’t stop glancing at their flower. We went through the flowers so quickly that we had to go back and buy some more!
I was honestly not looking forward to ATL yesterday. But God showed up in a huge way and blessed me so much. He showed me that my lack of Spanish doesn’t hinder His love. It doesn’t hinder my ability to be His hands and feet and bring someone joy. I am honored that the Lord used me yesterday to reach out to each and every one of those women. I still can’t get over the fact that he blew all of my expectations out of the water and softened my heart in a way that I wasn’t prepared for.
If you’ve never done something like this before, I definitely want to encourage you to do it! Take an hour or two, pray and ask the Lord to let you know what to do, listen and then do it! It’s uncomfortable and it’s nerve wracking but it’s such a beautiful thing. I’d love to hear about your experience if it’s something you end up doing!
