Decision. Choice. Embrace.
Sometimes, because we live in Africa, we have a BBN. A bad bug night. Our kitchen floor is covered in little bugs, big bugs, spiders, moths, praying mantises, dragonflies. The only way to get them out is to spray the whole floor in insect killer, sweep them into the dustpan, and dump them outside. These BBN’s are rough. No one likes them. They’re kind of gross and give you the heebee geebees. But then your eagle scout teammate, Matt, goes outside, builds a fire and you listen to music, look at the stars, and talk about all the funny things you could do in a grocery store.
Sometimes, when your team is running out of food for the week, and you don’t know what to eat for a meal, your amazing hosts invite you over for a Sunday dinner and it’s pretty much the best meal you’ve had in two and a half months. Steak, chicken, salad, scalloped potatoes, brown sugar almond cake..you get the picture.
Sometimes, God puts you on a team and the girls on that team may never have chosen each other. The four girls may not have formed a friendship with each other. But then, in Kumakwane, Botswana, you realize they make you laugh SO hard and there is no one you would rather cut hair in the bathroom with at midnight. There is no one you would rather eat with, talk with, or choose. You end up spending so much time with them, doing crazy things, laughing uncontrollably, that the guys nickname your room the ‘lair’. (for reference, the official definition of lair is ‘a wild animal’s resting place’)
Sometimes, your ministry is planting 100 individual stems of tomato and 100 basil plants in tiny cups that float in fish water (a farming technique called ‘aquaponics’, for those of you particularly insterested in African agriculture). But you listen to the La La Land soundtrack and Shawn Mendes and it’s a party.
Sometimes things don’t go your way, even from the get-go. Sometimes things aren’t what you expected. Sometimes you’re not sure how things will play out. Those ‘sometimes’ are all the time on the race. So far, every single day is different than what I had planned on or expected and it’s not always easy or fun to be so consistently surprised with ‘new and different’. It forces you into one of two places: A corner that you hide in to avoid the change, the pressure, the effort that flexibility requires. Or it forces you into dependance. Dependance on your team and, more importantly, the Lord. The more I chose fear, the unexpected ‘sometimes’ times overwhelm me and crush me. I start to hate discipline and growth, and I become apathetic, lazy, and dull. The more I DECIDEDLY embrace the unexpected and chose dependance and effort, the more I begin to love the outcome of discipline and growth. The more I SEE and get to celebrate the things I overcome with the help of a really good Dad.
Here is my suggestion, my challenge, my dream:
Decide. Chose. Embrace the things that you never saw coming. Believe that there IS someone in control, someone in the driver’s seat, and someone in the pilot’s chair. Know that He has little moments of joy and huge moments of reward for your faith. He has so much peace it surpasses the borders of your mind. His goodness and beauty begins to fill ALL your vision, the things in focus, the things in your peripheral, the things in your blind spots.
Ah. How can you not praise a God like that? Even when the ‘sometimes’ don’t turn into joy right away, even when the unexpected is tragic, even when you don’t see that God is good, he is. He is. HE IS. He CANT be overcome. Promise. Even when it’s easier said than believed, it’s something that is true and unshakeable. What’s even better is that when we believe it, we become unshakeable, even when the winds of ‘sometimes’ blow and the unexpected earthquakes rock your foundation. He turns our mourning to joy, our weeping to dancing. Yeah. That’s good. I want that.
‘I want to stay close you you. It’s really that simple. I want to stay close to you. My whole life long.’ -NO FEAR, steffany gretzinger
