These are some initial thoughts about some events that happened this morning:
In between the missions house that our contact’s church owns and the empty lot to the right of it, sits a gigantic jungle tree (I call it a jungle tree, because it is made up of a bunch of vines/trunks all interwoven and grown together and it reminds me of the jungle book) so large, that it would take a few grown men to wrap their arms around it. The branches of this tree stretch over each lot, casting both equally in its shade. As we have spent the past few nights living in this house that has been abandoned for almost five years, we have laughed and bonded beneath the tree, prayed and worshiped, and spoken truth and life into one another. We have eaten a lot underneath its branches as well. You see, we are hungry people seeking to fill ourselves with the water that truly quenches your thirst, the bread that satisfies. We meet with Jesus every day, eagerly grabbing hold of His Word and other days just seeking the desire to open our Bibles. No matter what, our Heavenly Father always gives us our daily bread. He is faithful like that.
In the empty lot to the right of our casa sits a stone table under the branches of the jungle tree, bathed in the shade of the leaves. It is the perfect meeting spot for hungry people. They sit down at the table starving, waiting to be filled. Their hungry eyes track both tourists and locals walking down the street as they wait for something, for anything. They feed the gnawing hunger in their spirits and minds with weed and whatever else the man with the backpack might hand them in exchange for their colones (Costa Rica’s currency). The man with the backpack, strolling down the street in his dirty white Chuck Taylors, lank hair hanging in his face, is starving as well.
This morning we had no scheduled ministry and once I reached my wits end of finding some useful task to accomplish, I finally went to my room, grabbed my guitar and started worshiping Jesus and praying for the hungry people at the table, covered by the shade of the jungle tree. The shade that their Abba in heaven had provided for them and for us. As I worshipped and prayed, my heart broke and through tears I began praying for our neighbors, our hungry starving neighbors. I know what it is like to be hungry and I know that temporary fixes only make the hunger, the starvation more acute, letting the wounds that lie beneath fester.
I believe that the stone table will become a table of feasting. The people who gather there will be full of the bread that truly satisfies and the water that quenches their eternal thirst. They will walk under the shade of the tree and as the coolness hits them, know that their Abba cares for them, provides for them and loves them. That empty lot is going to be thick with the Presence of the Holy Spirit. It will be a place of redemption and salvation. It will be irresistible to the man with the backpack and his customers alike. I want to invite ya’ll to pray that the heart wounds that exist in my starving neighbors will come to the surface and that the Holy Spirit will come in power to bring healing to what only He can heal. Also, pray for hope and faith in me, that this is not an impossible thing to ask or seek, but that this is what Jesus does. He feeds them and heals them, starting from their spirits out.
