It seems like yesterday that I got the call saying I was accepted for The Race. Now there are less than three months until training camp! Time seems to be flying by so fast that it is almost overwhelming, and draining. These moments we need a little reminder of hope in our lives and boy did I find it this past weekend.
Every year my church has a Detroit mission weekend, where we go all over the city to spread Gods love in any way possible. We go Downtown, Midtown, Westside, and even the dreaded Eastside. Each time we go I fall more in love with the city.
On the second day of the trip we visited a Convalescent home that we go to every year. It is full of residents with all kinds of different health conditions, and variety of different personalities. The team made Easter baskets for the residents, and went to each room to talk and pray with them. Some were more willing/able to open up than others. The group I was a part of finished and wanted to go to the second floor. Not sure what we should do I left to find Pastor Renee. I turned down one of the halls and heard a man talking to someone, so I stuck my head in the room to find Pastor Renee with a smile on her face taking in every word. I soon realized she hasn’t left this room since we got here over 30 minutes ago. Walking in I was hoping I could cut off the man for a few second to ask Pastor Renee if we could move floors, but instead I listened. The man she had been talking to was a triple amputee leaving him with only his right arm. Once he saw me enter the room he told me the story of how it happened. He was an alcoholic and one night he passed out. While he was passed out the house he was in caught on fire, authorities are still not sure how it happened. The fire surprisingly didn’t wake him up, burning 59% of his body resulting in him losing both legs and left arm from the elbow down. As he told the story I thought to myself how devastated I would have been waking up and seeing that I was missing half my body. It was a terrifying thought. As I continued to listen I realized that he wasn’t scared, or depressed, he was happy. He believed that this was a second chance at life for him. After 20 minutes of him making jokes about being polish, and the nursing staff, Pastor Renee looked at the clock and chimed in, telling him that we had to get back to our group. Before we left Pastor Renee encouraged him, and told him that God loves him through this whole thing. The man smiled and said I have a bible, pointing to his night stand. “My favorite story is the one of Job, he lost everything, but got more back. I feel like that’s how my life is,” he said. Spotting a notepad and a pen I wrote down a verse for him to look up then telling him you have to promise me you will look this up once we leave, he agreed. Leaving the man’s room I had the biggest smile on my face, completely blown away by his positive outlook on life.
In that moment God reminded me of something so simple, yet so powerful. We all go through attacks on our lives, some being worse than others. We can either feel bad for ourselves and let the lie of the enemy run our lives, or we can turn to God, give him our sorrows and use the situation for good. To have hope in all that we go through.
