Brokenness found me again, this time on a back porch in a tiny village in the mountains of Nepal. I sat on a woven mat staring into the eyes of a man in utter despair, our tear streaked faces matching each other’s. Mute, unable to walk, cataracts on his eyes, and pain throughout his body, he sat with his hands together in a position of prayer and humility. Over and over again he cried out, the only verbal communication he was capable of, as the tears dripped from his chin to his folded hands. As my heart shattered, I could barely stand to sit there. But as I locked eyes with him, I couldn’t stand to leave.
I didn’t get it. I should be used to this by now. The sad reality is that throughout the world I’ve met and prayed for people who were far poorer and much sicker than this man. But I was stricken in a way I hadn’t been in a long time.
And then I panicked.
“What am I doing with my life? Why on earth did I just agree to move to Georgia and work in an office? I should be here. I should be doing the thing – using my hands and my feet, my words. What happened to abandonment? What happened to reaching ‘the least of these?’ People need healing and love and served and Jesus. And I can give it to them.”
“Am I a sellout?”
I rolled the thoughts around in my mind as we went to take our baths in the river and trekked back to where we were sleeping for the week. I journaled and prayed and questioned. And then that evening during team time my precious friend Lauren, one of the racers I’ve been leading around the world, reminded me of solid and simple truth.
“Just because you’re going back to the US doesn’t mean God can’t use you anymore.”
Of course it doesn’t. But I want to be in the fight, you know? I want to be on the front lines! Over the next few days as I continued to wonder about that experience along with what Lauren said, I began to see the picture more clearly.
I was right. I’m not going to be on the front lines, at least for a while. I’m not going to be out in the nations looking people in the eye, talking to them about Jesus, maybe for the first time in their life. I’m not going to be half way across the world bringing Kingdom, fighting for justice, laying my hands on people praying for their healing, giving them food or building them a house.
I’m going to be sitting behind a desk.
But the thing is… from behind that desk my reach will be much bigger than it has been for the last two years as I’ve been in the nations.
From behind that desk I’m going to be raising up, equipping and sending out hundreds of college students who will be in the nations. Looking people in the eye. And bringing Kingdom. And fighting for justice. And loving them. And telling them about Jesus. For a lot of these students it might be the first time they’ve ever done anything like this. And hopefully it will set them up for a life of reaching people for the Kingdom.
From behind that desk my impact will be multiplied.
Instead of me sitting on a porch loving on one person in Nepal, in a way I’ll be sitting on hundreds of porches, loving hundreds of people. I'm staying so that so many more can be sent. And that's the whole vision of this next season of ministry for me.
So no, my heart.
You’re not a sellout.
***I am raising support to be able to start my new position with Adventures in Missions in mid-June. In order to begin, I need to raise $5,800 in the next month. I am also in need of monthly financial partners who will continue to support my position.
THANK YOU for your support!
To donate on-line to my AIM support account, click here.
To learn more about Passport, the program I will be working with at AIM, click here.
If you have questions about my new position or supporting me, contact me here.
