Sunday afternoon came and our host told us he wanted to take us to do some traditional Cambodian fishing. So my team and I packed up a bucket, a bag of shrimp and a literal stick with some fishing line attached to it. We looked at the sticks and laughed wondering “how in the world are we ever going to catch anything with this?” We walked over to the lake where our hosts attached the shrimp and said “go have a good time!”. I’ve never been fishing before so I began to watch my teammates as they were casting our “fishing rods” into the water.
As the group usually does, we began to be dramatic and create some imaginary scenario saying things like:
“We’re fishing for our dinner tonight.”
“If we don’t catch anything we’ll starve!”
At first it was funny. It was almost like the fish were outsmarting us. They would eat around the skin of the shrimp and leave it on the hook if they left us anything at all. After about thirty minutes I made a joke.
“If i’m gonna spend all this time out here and catch nothing the Lord better at least give me a good revelation.”
We went back to our interesting attempts at fishing when my teammate AB started to pray. Soon after she actually caught a fish! When the celebration of one of us actually catching something settled we started laughing. This fish was no bigger than the size of your pinky. AB threw the fish back in the water and we were all determined because now we knew it was actually possible.
Soon after that our host came down ecstatic and told us that the man who has been driving us to our different ministry sites decided he wants to follow Jesus. That he wanted to go home and tell his family all about Jesus and have them come to church and follow Jesus too. Our hosts began to tell us that for years him and his family have been trying to talk to this man about Jesus and he didn’t want to hear it. Rejoicing took place and we we’re all praising God. And then I realized something.
We have never actually spoken to this man about Jesus.
I read this quote before leaving for the race that stuck we me.
“Before Jesus preached on the Kingdom He demonstrated it.”
This man spoke zero English. All we did was invite him to be more than our driver. Instead of having him stand around waiting for us to finish teaching we invited him to take all the English classes so that way he could learn English too. We asked him to play around with us before the church youth group started. On our off day we invited him to partake in all the activities we were doing. We told him to sit in on the church service where I gave my testimony and my teammate Dani shared a sermon. But all of this happened just because we invited him into our everyday lives.
Because intimacy precedes fruitfulness.
We didn’t do anything special. In fact we didn’t do anything at all. We just demonstrated what Kingdom looks like and gave away the Father’s love in the process. I think sometimes in our Christian lives we get so caught up in our religious actions and then get frustrated when our actions aren’t producing the results we want them too. I know I’m guilty of it. I left behind my life in the field of Physical Therapy because I felt like the Lord was calling me to ministry. And I’ve been so frustrated these past few years because I’ve been stuck in the “what now” part of that decision. But what the Lord showed me at the lake was that I was doing it all out of my own strength. And that the reality was that all I was doing was a bunch of religious duties. When you operate out of the intimacy that you have with the Lord you can’t help but share all the love you know with everyone you come in contact with. That’s what attracts people. That’s what brings people into the kingdom.
I went fishing for fish that day but the Lord gave me a better revelation.
So invite people in. Demonstrate Kingdom. Give all you know away.
Maybe you’ll catch something better than a pinky sized fish too.
Meet our driver, our friend and our new brother in Christ!!! He never goes a second without a smile.
Be praying for him as we continue to hang out with him for the rest of the month.
