Well I can’t believe it’s here…the final month of squad leading and out of all of the countries and places around the world to end it at, God blessed me to end it at a place that has became like a second home to me, a place where so much of my journey started. I made it back to a place where I lived for 6 months two nights ago: Guatemala! I have been able to visit my friends at the house where I lived in Antigua and it has been so refreshing, inspiring, and just good for my soul! We are leaving today to head out to meet up with the different teams from our squad. This month I and the other squad leaders will be training and doing life with the new raised up squad leaders who will be taking our place after this month. I am excited for this month, but it’s also very surreal to be back in Guatemala to see so many friendly faces and people who I love. I feel like it’s two worlds colliding and yet i’m trying to process the fact that within 25 days or so I will be saying goodbye to 47 people who I dearly love and care about. It’s going to very challenging as I watch them leave to fly to Thailand as I stay in Guatemala. I will be staying an extra week here in Guatemala to stay at the “Adventures in Missions” base, where I lived while living in Antigua, Guatemala.
But before I get too far ahead within this month, I want to take some time to reflect upon last month and share some stories and lessons that the Lord taught me while being in Honduras. Month 4 of squad leading in Honduras was probably my most challenging month while squad leading so far. There were many extra duties and things to do this month compared to the previous months. Not only did I travel to three separate teams, but there were many conversations, prayers, emails, and facetime calls about the upcoming decisions that we had to make. This past week we announced all those decisions at a week long squad debrief (retreat) but boy did it take some time to make them.
There are six people on our leadership team: the three squad leaders (including myself) and our boss who is our squad mentor. Then we also have our squad coaches who are like parents and pastors to the squad (who are also our bosses too). I have been so blessed to work with and learn from these five amazing servants and leaders of God. We are all different and sometimes we have different point of views and we can clash, but we have learned to trust each other. We each have different gifts and we have learned to trust the person’s gift and character, especially in hearing from the Lord and making decisions about the squad. And let me tell you, through this process, wow does the Lord sharpen us!
But through all the conversations (sometimes debates) we have come to truly trust that we each hear from the Lord. We have seen the Lord clarify and speak to each of us in ways that only He can. The same God who speaks to me, speaks to my boss ben, and the same God who speaks to him speaks to the others as well. God may speak different to each of us, but HE SPEAKS! And we are all in the process of truly learning how to listen!
So when we first heard from the Lord and then made the decision about the upcoming new raised up squad leaders, team changes, new team leaders, and many other changes and transitions that we had to pray through…we have learned not only to trust each other, but most of all trust the Lord in and through each other! We don’t make any decisions unless everyone is on board and has a peace about it. If one of us isn’t on board or doesn’t have peace, then we don’t make the decision. We fight for unity with each other, even in the midst of debates, challenges, and feedback. Yet we choose to trust each other and most of all we choose to trust our Christ in each other!
Yet through this process I am learning that I and we are humans and yet we make mistakes. But even through the mistakes, God works through the mistakes and uses it for our good and His glory (Romans 8:28.) I think this is one of the biggest lessons I have learned this past month. Do I trust God deep enough to trust that He will redeem a situation for me even if I mess it up or make a mistake? Also do I trust myself enough that even when I mess up or choose a wrong decision or choice, that my heart is still good? Do I trust myself enough that even when I’m at my weakest, I still truly want and desire God’s will deep down? Do I trust God enough to trust my own heart and that He lives and dwells in me?
So I guess I am on the journey of trusting myself….I know sounds weird right? But seriously, do we trust that we are good people? Do we trust that there is more light in us than darkness? Do we trust that we love God and that He loves us? Do we trust that we genuinely want the good for others, even when others have wrong or skewed perceptions of us? Do I and we trust that Jesus Christ truly lives and dwells inside of us by the power of the Holy Spirit (Colossians 1:27)?
In the midst of the crazy month that I had last month, I also had two different churches reach out to me asking me if I would be interested in interviewing for their open youth pastor positions. As many of you know youth, college students, and young adults are the age range that I feel called to work with the most. Yet being a youth pastor has always scared the heck out of me! I have been scared of being “boxed in”, scared of “settling”, and scared of becoming “religious.” I never want to be known as “religious”, I want to be known as a servant, friend, and son of the living God who is radically in love with Jesus Christ. I want to be known and remembered as a Christian who deeply knew God and who loved to spend time in His presence like Mary did. I want to have a relationship with God where I will go anywhere he tells me and do anything he asks me to whether I would get payed for it or not. So the thought of becoming a “pastor” scares me because I never want to make ministry into a career or make it my “work.” I always want ministry to be a calling, to be a privilege, and to be the overflow of God and my personal and intimate relationship!
So when these two different churches reached out to me, the same week let me add lol. My normal self would have said “no thank you” and not even have gave it another thought. Yet when I prayed (only took 30 seconds by the way) I felt like God said, “Ryan, it’s time to start taking some risks in your life” Wow…that nailed me. So i wrote back to both of them and said, “yes I’m interested and would love to knock on this door with you and pray through this possibility with you.” This was a huge step for me!
Some of you may think of me as a very risky person since I have been traveling around the world doing missions for the last three years off and on, yet in the area of dating and the area of making life decisions about putting down roots and choosing a job for a long commitment, I have let fear conquer , consume, and control me…
But I have always felt like a transition and big change will come when I turn 30 and I am turning 30 in two months, so I’m declaring that I will trust in God and start taking risks! Even if I fail flat on my face, I would rather fail then continue to be controlle by fear.
So i interviewed for both of the positions that reached out to me. Not sure the results yet or what will happen, but I’m just proud of myself that I went into the game and knocked on the door!
So where ever you are at today and whatever you are going through, ask yourself, “do you truly trust God and do you truly trust yourself?” Then choose to live by faith and not by fear…
Thank you for all of your support and prayers for not only this journey, but for all of the journeys that I have went on and will continue to go on. I would not make it very far in life without the friends and family that God has blessed me with along the journey to help me, support me, inspire me, love me, and BELIEVE in me!
Thank you! Let’s “LIVE LIFE” and live our lives with “Faith over Fear” together!
