“You’re the missionaries.”
A pit in my throat started to grow when I was addressed as a missionary. We were welcomed with warm smiles, and open arms when we walked into the hostel to meet a friend that we met the previous day who was intrigued with our God conversation. There was no reason for this pit to be there. I chose to ignore it. As I raised my glass to take a drink of my flor de caña I realized that I’m not the ideal christian. I don’t have a great amount of knowledge of the Bible, I don’t know many common Christian songs, and never shared the gospel. Who am I to be representing Christ? How can I minister to someone? What do I have to offer besides myself?
The past few months I have been struggling to see how the Lord could use me to further his kingdom. I was blinded by this image that I had to be an ideal Christian to further the kingdom. I was falling into the spirit of comparison amongst my fellow teammates, questioning why the Lord has lead me on a different path than most.
“Anyone who runs ahead and does not continue in the teaching of Christ does not have God; whoever continues in the teaching has both the Father and the Son.” (2 John 9) This is the verse that started Dar Vida’s conversation recognizing that when you “run ahead” you have to leave something behind. You are not being patient, you have to be content on where you are with the Holy Spirit in your life now or you’ll lose what you have worked hard for. Our relationship with Jesus is like other relationships in our lives, that we must not look too far ahead or have expectations on how the relationship should be like. If we do this then we miss out on what the Lord has for you at the present moment and we’ll miss how the relationship will naturally form.
I was not being patient or content on where I was with the Holy Spirit. I was wishing I could see the Lord’s work within me. The truth is that the Lord is having me grow just in a slower pace than I was expecting or hoping for. One of the leaders spoke life to the situation. She said that because the Lord is working at a slower pace, there will not be a lot of highs and there won’t be a lot of lows either. I will stay consistent in my faith and because of that my faith will be stronger. Where I am at with my relationship with the Lord is where it needs to be.
Back at the hostel with our new friend we had several deep conversation on several hard topics. “I feel more comfortable and more opened with you guys than I usually am. The both are you are more opened minded than most.” Our new friend’s words brought a new perspective to mind. What I do offer is myself, and that’s all that the Lord needs. The Lord is greater than me. He knows where I am at in my faith and in my relationship with him. I just have to be who I am and the Lord will do the rest. My willingness to step out, letting the Holy Spirit do its work within me and within our friend, I trust that my small steps will move mountains. The rest belongs to the Lord. Is this not a beautiful thing how the Lord can use where I am at to further his kingdom? If I was at a different place in my relationship with the Lord then I wouldn’t have been able to change my friend’s outlook on Christians.
