When I first signed up for the race I never expected that a problem I would run into was being made fun of because of my weight. I was going to share the gospel with people across the nations – there was no room for silliness.
Or was there?
I first ran into this problem in Africa. Random people would make remarks to me about my weight. At times even little children would say things like..
– you eat too much
– are you pregnant?
– save food for others
This shook me up and at times made me lose interest in doing ministry in Africa. Sometimes I would sit at home crying – this was a touchy subject and having it thrown in your face continually wasn't easy. By Mozambique I was done. I wasn't going to allow this to bring me down anymore and steal away from my ministry. So I began praying and asked The Lord for very specific things.
1. For freedom in the way I view myself. To be so confident in truth that when remarks are made they don't effect me at all.
2. That The Lord would use those moments to bring glory to His name. Whatever that may look like.
I continually prayed this and day by day it became a bit easier to deal with. Instead of getting pissed off and stopping ministry, I would just smile and continue on. Small steps of growth were taking place. At my squad's month 8 debrief, our mentor Hope was talking to us girls about Thailand. One thing she mentioned was Thailand was a hard place for girls to be because most times Thai woman are significantly smaller than us. She also mentioned that there might be times where we would be told we would need a "superman size." Uhm, excuse me?
I was a bit nervous to come to Thailand but I came knowing I had breakthrough in this area. I was not going to allow myself to fall back into this struggle. Fast forward to week one in Thailand. Our team had the opportunity to go and do ministry at a juvenile detention center for teenage men. I volunteered to do the sermon – I was SO excited to share with them and to see all The Lord would do.
I got up to speak to them and started off by asking them a question. I made sure to tell them I wanted a reply. The answer I waited for never came instead one young man said, "You eat a lot." When our translator told me what he had said it didn't phase me at all – I looked at him and smiled then I began my message. Throughout my message The Lord kept putting this young man on my heart – I knew I would need to talk to him after I was done.
When I was done speaking I asked our translator if he would translate for me while I spoke to the young man – he agreed. I then asked the young man if I could talk to him for a minute. I started off the conversation by reminding him of the comment he made to me earlier. Then I told him I felt The Lord leading me to vocally tell him I forgave him and from there I began sharing the gospel with him. I told him how The Lord could forgive him of his sins and could purify his heart. Then The Lord laid words on my heart for him and I began sharing them. By the end of our conversation, he was in tears. There was one question I felt led to ask him..
"Do you want to know Jesus as your savior? Do you want to give your life to Him?"
Without skipping a beat, he said yes. Then with that he prayed and walked away a new person. In that moment I saw the faithfulness of our God. He answered my prayers in a way I never expected. Through a thing that used to ruin my ministry – He used it to bring glory to His name. A child entered the kingdom of God.
Pray bold prayers. Walk through your insecurities. Who knows how The Lord will use them.
