I love it when things come full circle. Something I have found to be true though is that the really good full circle moments take some time to culminate. The best full circle stories I have are the ones that took years to unfold.
Some of you have heard the first part of this one. Some of you were there for it. I can’t remember exactly when it began. Maybe 6 or 7 years ago. I was at a worship night with house church, and I remember telling God that I felt like his love wasn’t fully mine. I didn’t really feel like his daughter.
At the end of the night a friend of mine walked up to me and asked if I had a minute to chat. The chat started with him explaining the meaning behind some of the things he was wearing as jewelry. He pointed out a leather bracelet and a couple of other things and finally he landed on a gold nugget ring that was on his pinky. It didn’t fit him anywhere else.
He told me how his dad gave it to him when he was in 3rd grade and that growing up it always represented the Father’s love to him. Then came the kicker. He told me that God told him during worship to take it off and give it to me. He said it wasn’t from him, but from the Father, and that it now represented the Father’s love for me. He said I could keep it as long as I wanted or give it away to someone else.
I never wanted to give it away.
I wore that ring almost every day for the past 6ish years, and to me it really did represent the Father’s love. A couple of years before getting the ring, I had even written a song inspired by the prodigal son story in the Bible. The first line of the song said, “Clothe me with a robe of splendor. Place your ring on my finger, so all can see that I belong to you.” And that’s exactly what happened. He placed a ring on my finger and I didn’t really want to let it go. I thought about giving it away sometimes, but it meant so much to me that I didn’t want to let it go lightly.
As I have been on the race this year, something in me started to feel a stronger desire to give the ring away. I knew that the Lord might be calling me to pass it on to someone else, and the day I finally felt called to take a step of faith and give it away, it was strangely not the amazing moment I had hoped for.
The girl I gave it to was working in the restaurant of a hostel. She was Cambodian and Buddhist. She actually didn’t want the ring at first. She said I should “give it to a Christian or a Catholic.” She said it wouldn’t fit her. And she was right! It really only fit her pinky, just like the guy who gave it to me in the first place. I told her it represented God’s love. She didn’t need to be a Christian to have it. It was okay if it didn’t fit her. I just wanted her to have it.
This whole encounter made me think of the country of Cambodia as a whole. A predominately Buddhist country, maybe some people believe that the love of Jesus just doesn’t seem to “fit” into their concept of religion. I am not sure about this, but I wonder if it is true for anyone.
The girl at the hostel took the ring, but I am not sure she sees yet what it represents – the Father’s love for her. I can pray that she will one day discover that love. Maybe it will take some time to seep in, just like it did for me.
But that is not the end of the story. About a week later, we were getting ready to leave Cambodia. We exchanged gifts with the teachers of the school where we worked, and one teacher handed me a paper box. I opened it, and inside there was a weathered, gold ring. This teacher had no idea I had just given away a different gold ring, and I was in disbelieve that it was replaced so soon with a new one. I wish I knew the story behind this one. What it meant to this teacher and why they chose to give it away.
I am in awe of how God brings things full circle. I can’t believe that within one week of giving away the ring that meant so much to me that he would immediately compel someone in Cambodia to give me a new one in its place. I mean it’s not every day someone gives you a ring, am I right?
When I think about this new ring and the country it represents, a country thirsty for love, a country that has so much beauty but so much lingering brokenness, a country that still carries scars from a genocide and reminded us through the unexpected death of one of the sweet students at the school where we taught that the people would just drink deep of His love if it were poured out on them…my heart starts to ache.
It’s bittersweet looking back at a month that was filled with so much beauty and laughter but where we also saw suffering and sadness and a land still filled with the lingering memory of losing millions of people to genocide. Seeing some of the pictures of our students makes me feel that ache. Knowing that they continue living their daily lives and so do we…sitting here in the vastly different atmosphere of the Philippines which might as well be a world away…there is an ache in that.
As I watched my team pour themselves out every day in Cambodia…loving on kids even when the heat was excruciating, picking them up, giving everything they had to give even when they were dirty and tired and dehydrated, I believe the Father was pouring himself out over the people there through them. I think leaving behind a ring only represents the tangible love he wants to continue to lavish on that place.
Wearing this new ring not only reminds me of the Father’s goodness, but now I carry the memory of Cambodia…the good stuff, hard stuff and the subtle ache I get when I think of it all.
Maybe a young woman who works in a hostel restaurant will one day make the connection between the ring and all the ways that Father God has sought her out and called her his own. I hope that for her and for the whole nation of Cambodia.
Come Father God and pour out your love out on us! Show us what it means to be your sons and daughters.
Thank you all for everything you have done to get me here! Three and a half more months to go….thank you for helping me finish strong!
Here are some more gems from Cambodia….The really precious kind!
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