The stupidity of time travel is this: we can't… but, for some reason, we try to all the time.
When we arrived at our ministry site in Haripur, Sarlahi, Nepal; I started to notice that my team had started to anticipate me better than I could anticipate me. God was and is and has been making me new, but does he really make me so new that I look different? That I sound and feel different? He can, He does, He is, and He has been; my words are stronger, my posture straighter, my vision sharper, and my thoughts clearer.
WALDO Women
With that clarity, though, I started craving long-term direction so I could start consciously giving my heart some kind of direction and so I could start logistically figure out where my life’s going, because I honestly have no idea; and yes, friends and family, I am aware that my lack of a home, degree, marketable skills, and or even a sliver of an idea as to what I want to do with my life, is strange and scary.
But all of that being completely unknown is exactly what God wants for me right now. He doesn’t want us to live in the future, planning and piecing together things that may or may not work out. That belongs to Him, He is the Alpha and Omega and Author of time – and, we, by our very nature, cannot live in any time but the present.
“Don’t worry about the future, what you will wear or eat,” He says. “I’m there and I’ll meet you when you get there – that’s part of what I meant when I promised to go before you. Don’t dwell in the past. I, as your rear-guard, am the only One who can redeem what already has been in the dark of your past and keep the light of it unscarred.”
He’s going to redeem what has been and, with more care and attention to detail than we can imagine, He’s going to orchestrate the future – but He doesn’t intend to meet with us in our past or future, just in our right now, because that's the only place that we – His precious little children – can be.
I’ve been trying hard to live in the future recently. What in the world will I do after the race? What state will I live in? Will I even been in the US? Bible school? Maybe I’ll move back to SoCal, work at a coffee shop, get plugged into a sweet beach church, and talk to everyone I meet about my Savior. That could happen…or it could not. See how these thoughts can take me completely out of where I am – and, therefore, where God is meeting with me – and pull me into the future, where I am quite obviously not right now?
The reality is that I wont know what I’m doing after the race until I’m there, at that time, after the race; but it’s so easy to let that thought process take my mind and run wildly out of where I am and into where I am not. I don’t know what my future holds, I wont know until the appointed time, which wont be until after parts of my heart and passions are awakened and aligned with Papa’s plan for me – because that’s how He LOVES to operate in his childrens’ lives: He delights in giving us what our hearts desire, and I don’t have a clue what that is and I wont until I commit to living in the present, where Papa actively meets with me and reveals Himself to me and transforms my heart more and more to bear the image and fragrance of His.
I think I've also been trying to live in the future because it's legitimately hard to not see or speak to my family for weeks at a time, it had been around a month since the last time I spoke to my mom until today, but Jesus promises, "There is no one who has left a house, wife or brothers, parents or children because of the kingdom of God, who will not receive many times more at this time, and eternal life in the age to come."
Jesus said I'm going to receive many times more than what I've left for His kingdom "at this time," which is just more evidence to me that I need to be present "at this time."
In the present, I am sitting on a mattress in a hostel in the middle of Thamel, Kathmandu, Nepal. This is the only place I can be right now, and this is the place I have to be if I want to spend time with my sweet Savior.
Where are you right now? That’s where Papa’s trying to meet with you. At one of the first Nepali church services we attended, a woman was speaking and she said, “I know that God is always with me, but am I always with God?”
The only way to be always with God is to be always exactly where He has you, not worrying about what’s to come, or trying to relive, or even change, what has already been; just be here. In this place, there is sweetness in a depth you can’t imagine, there is romance and wisdom to be showered on you, there is truth about who God is and, therefore, who you are to be spoken over you – and when God speaks that kind of truth over you, He expects you to hear it.
Are you listening? In this place, Papa makes His face to shine upon you and whispers,
“hello, my Beloved, I’ve got something new to show you; would you like to see?”
