“This I declare about the LORD: He alone is my refuge, my place of safety, he is my God and I trust him.” Psalm 91:2
Some people are so so easy to trust.
This is where great friendships are forged and credit card scams succeed.Other times it takes some serious warming up to before there’s a feeling of security.
God has been both so easy to trust and so hard to trust. ??Part of it is I have this really great dad. One who I have felt known and loved by, who was there for me, and even on not so great days was always present and available. Super easy for me then to think of God as a good Father based on my experiences with my dad here on earth.
I started struggling real hard to trust the Lord after my dad’s stroke. (He had one last October that was like an 8/10 really bad kind of stroke) Worried in the background, subconsciously that maybe God too would forget my name or lose the ability to communicate with me. This bled into other areas. Can I trust God to take care of my family while I’m away for a year? Can I trust God with my relationships? With my future? But like this wasn’t just future stuff, it was the day to day as well. Like can I trust God that he will speak to me today as I read his Word, the Bible?Can I trust God as I share about him with a friend that he’ll do something in their heart, that I don’t have to try to save them, that’s entirely his work?
This is something the Lord really stretched me in at training camp. Here are some snapshots of the way the Lord met me where I was at, drew me closer to him and away from my fear that he isn’t dependable.
Health
Right off the bat, the first night once we had all pitched our tents at our campsites we worshipped together with music in the main training building. Wow is it incredible to be surrounded by other believers who passionately love and are pursuing the Lord. Wow is it distracting to have a headache. I think I can count the number of times I’ve head a headache in. my. life. As much as I wanted to jump and dance and sing along, this headache crippled me to sitting and praying. It humbled me and I sought the Lord for healing. Even when the healing didn’t come right away, I was learning to trust God in the between. When I know something is true of him (like he is a healer) but I don’t readily see it in that moment (the healing hasn’t come).
One of my squad mates I had only just met prayed for me towards the end of our time together in worship and it just went away. The pounding of my temple gave way to the pounding of my feet as I jump and joined in with my squamates and the other believers in the room worshipping the God who is trustworthy even when I don’t see it right away. The Lord proved trustworthy when it came to my health.
Community
The Lord also stretched me when it came to teams. Our squad is 27 incredible people who will all be traveling to the same 11 countries together. We’re further broken down into 4 teams within that 27. I love my squad mates and there are some I click with more than others. We did some team building activities and scenarios with different groupings of 6-7 people so that leadership could better place us together. After one group time that didn’t go in ways that I expected, I really started to feed into some doubt. I doubted I would have a “good” team (haha whatever that means, because really God can use whatever combination of people I get sent out with). I doubted if I was going to be able to be myself within a group, if the Lord could move well within certain dynamics. Typing it all out now, it seems a little silly but these were real thoughts I was having. ?
And, just like every time, the Lord met met me here. In my doubt, in my mistrust, in my fear the Lord was there. He encouraged me to remember who He was, to remember that I can trust him. He reminded me as well of why I was doing the World Race. Good Chrsitian community? Icing on the cake. My reason for going was to share the Gospel with the nations, to love others well. I didn’t sign up for something that was easy, I guess I just didn’t expect it to be hard in these particular ways.
Teams ended up sorting out and I love my team. While no team is perfect, its in our imperfections that the Lord’s light shines through. It’s in loving when its a lil’ hard that true love distinguishes itself from warm fuzzy feelings. The Lord proved trustworthy when it came to my team.
Physical
We did some physical training in addition to cultural and mental training. We hiked 2.2 miles with out “big pack” (the big hiking backpack that carries most of our stuff), we exercised together both outside of the schedule like the fun runs I did in the morning with some lovely women or within it like the ultimate frisbee I got to play (and catch the game winning point during).
One of the days we split off women and men and while the men went off on a hike the women stayed back on camp. We begun the day with group exercise. We had to do a certain number of pushups, burpees, squats according to the number of people on our squad, including the guys who weren’t there. Towards the end, I was tired. We all were tired. As we were finishing the last 100 or so things as a group of 20 women, other squads of women who would be traveling to different countries during their World Race came over, showed the love of Christ and helped us.
I saw Jesus in this one moment where I had about 26 more burpees to complete to do my share of them. This woman came over and offered to split them with me. She did 13 and I did 13. She paid the price of the burpees that were mine to bare. Even though it was HER work that finished them, I was able to go over to my squad mate Regan and say that I had finished the burpees. What a picture of Christ. I am able to say my sins are paid, the punished assigned to me already done not because I did it but Christ on my behalf. I have freedom, not from my own work but Christ’s just as I finished my burpees not by my own work but someone else’s and yet all the same was able to say, “they’re finished.”
God proved trustworthy in the physical aspects of the World Race. Providing friends to run the 2.2 mile hike with, providing people to cover for my weaknesses, in reminding me of who He is and what he’s done even in the little moments while sweat drips down my face and onto the hot Georgia ground.
Sharing the Gospel
The final way I saw the Lord prove trustworthy that I’ll share on this blog, through there are so so many more and I encourage you to ask me about it, was when we went out into the community and shared the Gospel. We went to a neighborhood a local church has assigned us and just struck up some conversations with people. I was waiting on the side of the road with a squad mate, praying for those already talking with people in the area when another squad mate Andrew pops over. They had started a conversation with two men who primarily spoke Spanish and wanted to use that language to talk about the things my squad mates had brought up to them.
I speak Spanish. My teammate B? Speaks so much more fluently than I do. So instantly, I pointed Andrew her way but she was already in a conversation at a house with someone who spoke Spanish primarily.
I hadn’t mentally prepared to speak Spanish that day. I hadn’t refreshed myself on verb tenses or vocabulary that might prove to be important to these kinds of conversations about Jesus. As I was trying to explain to Andrew, and lower expectations of my squad mates near me, that my Spanish wasn’t perfect and didn’t know if I should go the Lord spoke.
He made it clear he wasn’t asking me to be perfect but asking me to obey, to go and would I? Well… how could I not? I remembered that in my imperfections, in my weakness the Lord is shown to be strong. If I could do it all in my own strength, I wouldn’t run to the Lord to fill in the gaps when my language skills fail and probably wouldn’t have prayed so fervently as we walked up the men for His words and message to be made known and not mine.
The Lord proved trustworthy in my weakness, in my lack of skill he was faithful. That conversation was my favorite of the evening. We talked for a long time, these two men, my two squamates and I. We shared the Gospel, talked about life and family and a lot about Jesus. In a very safe environment the Lord stretched me and proved to be faithful, and now with so much more boldness as I enter uncharted personal territory in other cultural contexts (in the 11 countries we’ll travel to) I have a new reassurance and security in who the Lord is, who he says I am and what he’s capable of.
FOR YOU
In what ways it hard for you to trust the Lord?
?What have you been trusting him with lately?
??I would love to hear from you! Feel free to leave comment, text me, Skype me, FaceTime me, message me on Facebook.
?Disclaimer: This is definitely a season I’m in and not something I’ve mastered by any means. I am grateful thought that while I grow in this and am challenged by the Lord beyond my comfort zone that he time and again has proven faithful. The Lord will never forget my name. The Lord will never suddenly not be able to communicate with me. My dad, that the Lord has blessed me with, is good but oh so much more is the Lord.
