God teaches me so much through my own words. Most of the time that I spend encouraging other people I am actually speaking those words into my life without realizing it.
A few days ago, Pemphero (If you don’t know him, you should. He’s an awesome brother!) and I were casually talking about American culture and how it differs from Malawian culture. Sometime down the rabbit hole we got onto the subject of roller coasters. Malwai doesn’t have roller coasters 🙁 so I described the best place on planet earth: Cedar Point.
I love roller coasters, guys. If I could be anywhere in the world, it would probably be on the Millennium Force. Since I have spent so much time at Cedar Point, I have a few funny and not so funny stories from that place. As we were talking, my favorite story from that place popped into my head. Let me set the scene. It was 2007, so I was about 12 at the time. Cedar Point released a brand new ride called the Maverick. It’s proclaimed more than 90 degree drop made it a huge attraction for the season. Huge as in more than three hours of a wait to ride. But by golly, my sister and I were going to ride this ride.
We waited the three hours and finally made it to the inner pavilion. The sun was starting to set and the night breeze was cooling the sticky, hot summer air. We saw that the line for the very front seats was short. Typically, my sister and I opt for the very back of the train, but we thought this ride would be really cool to sit in the front. We scurried to the front line and quickly realized why it was so short. Summer nights on Lake Erie are full of mosquito and gnats. The people getting off the front seats were splattered with dead bugs. EW. But we committed to the front and it was too late to change our minds.
My 12 year old self had only one thought: there is no way I am getting covered by bugs. I turned to my sister and said, “I’m going to pray that I don’t get covered in bugs.” She laughed at me and said that wouldn’t work. Oh, ye of little faith. I prayed. We rode the twists and exciting drops and pulled back into the station. I laughed with such a glee. Not because the ride was fantastic, but because I did not have a single dead bug on my body. Jen, on the other hand, was covered from head to toe.
Pemphero pointed out that this was scientifically impossible. My prayer literally defied the laws of nature. It struck me while I was telling this story how seemingly insignificant this prayer was, yet the Lord came through. He wanted to be a part of even the little things in my life.
I heard the Lord speak through my own story. Invite me into the small spaces. I can do miraculous things from the smallest of requests. You just have to invite me in. I care about everything in your life. I realized that I don’t ask Him for the small things. The things I think I can handle without His help. This is something I am going to work on. I invite you to think about how and when you invite the Lord into your life and try to expand it!
