In one of the earlier days at camp we role played a scenario in which half our bags were lost. That meant half the group couldn’t access anything not in their day pack and all of us were sharing tents.
I got to be one of the ones who didn’t lose my bags.
We pretty much randomly decided our roommates and I welcomed Eva into my humble abode. Which, mind you, we got to set up in the rain and that was the unfun part.
But my tent kept us nice and dry inside when we climbed in that night. I tried to make room for both of us the best I could and I wanted it to be as comfortable as possible. Now, due to the weather, an exception was made at the last minute that all of us could access our sleeping bags. Turns out they actually don’t want us getting sick at training. That did change the plans a little bit. I had a sleeping bag and a sheet liner for the bag and the good news was we no longer needed to share those. Which honestly would have been awful because it was pretty cold, but we would have made it work, remembering that if this really happens in another country there won’t be exceptions.
I also had my sleeping pad, which is like a reduced air mattress that’s a couple inches thick when fully inflated. Eva, however, did not have access to hers. I think she struggled a bit with losing her stuff for the day. I’ll be honest, it wasn’t exactly easy to read what she was thinking, other than the cliché that we all knew it was coming and we were all prepared to be the ones who lost our bags even though we all hoped we wouldn’t be the ones who lost them. But, I know Eva was disappointed with the loss, even though it was temporary and set to end some unknown time the next day, because I would have been disappointed too.
I offered to put my sleeping pad for both of us as a pillow or uninflated as a liner on the ground for half of our bodies.
Eva said no.
Eva said, “It’s yours. You’re going to use it.”
I was not going to use it.
I was not going to use it when someone would be lying next to me on the cold, hard ground. We were going to sleep in cold solidarity because we are a team and anything else just would not sit with me.
But what she said next made me stop in my tracks.
“God’s trying to teach me something, not you.”
Those were very powerful words that made me think. Obviously, I’m still pondering them. And I’ve kind of come up with a couple of ways of responding to that thought process. I think these words hit me so hard because they fit so well in so many situations and I think there’s never a set right way of responding. It’s hard to know what God really intends in the lessons He’s trying to teach.
What I mean, first off, is that I have no doubt God had a lesson for Eva that night. I have no doubt that sleeping on the cold, hard ground of a half-stranger’s tent was intended to provide Eva with a lesson. God is always teaching us. Believe me, the first thing I wanted to say was that God was teaching me something too. Which, for starters, was the whole messy and muddy tent thing. We were using my tent in the middle of a rain storm. You can imagine it got plenty of mud. And, of course, I’ve already mentioned this lesson a little bit in my lesson 1 blog. So God was teaching us both something. And in that way I don’t think Eva was alone. But the lessons were different. I was learning about mud and apparently she was learning about the cold, hard ground.
But I wanted to learn that lesson with her. I didn’t want her to learn that lesson alone. And maybe that wasn’t the right way to think about the situation. I’m not really sure. Maybe it’s different from lesson to lesson. Sometimes, I think we are meant to learn our lessons alone in communion with the Holy Spirit to guide us. Other times, I think we should welcome learning together as a community. It’s hard to face things alone. Really hard. We all know that.
So, let me try and figure out my point. Or maybe I have a few of them.
First off, sometimes I probably need to back off. Sometimes, I need to let someone learn a lesson alone. For me, as the person not learning the lesson, I think the point is clearly that you should always seek guidance from the Holy Spirit about how to respond when someone else is being taught a lesson by God.
Second off, Eva didn’t have to be alone. As the person learning the lesson, I think the point is clearly that you might not be meant to learn a lesson alone. Other people, and always God, might be meant to walk through it with you. If they are, let them.
So taking those 2 points, let me tell you how that night ended. I didn’t sleep well. I was cold. My sleeping bag is meant to be in tandem with an inflated sleeping pad and not a cold, hard ground. I don’t think I’ll ever know for sure if I made a mistake by rejecting the comfort of the blessing of a sleeping pad that was readily available to me. I don’t know if it was the right choice to lie on the cold, hard ground in solidarity with my new friends. I don’t know if it even mattered.
But I do know it made me think. I know it’s still making me think. And, Eva, if you’ve got it figured out please enlighten me!
Sometimes my lesson isn’t your lesson, but you can still learn it with me. And sometimes I’m gonna have to learn it on my own. I think the more we seek God and learn to understand His will, the better we are at figuring out our role in these situations. So, I think that’s my challenge to you. Strive to know the Father so well that you always know your role. And always be willing to let others play their role too.
And never forget that you’re not the only one with something to learn.
