Stop tape and rewind 3 years. The night before Jim was meant to teach in the LEadership Training Program (LTP) for university age students, he woke me up in the middle of the night to ask if I was getting bitten by bugs. We slept in the same bed, but I was fine. We turned the light on to find that indeed he had visible bites and a few welts to boot. But no bugs to be found. The invisible opposition to our teaching Gods love and truth to the next generation of His faithful here in BD was real and the effect right there for our eyes to see. He went on to teach, even with one of the welts swelling his lip, and Gods Word strengthened many.
Fast forward to yesterday, the day before my time to teach, and the team prayed for me because i had crazy pain in my one hip the night before, making it hard to even walk. Very unusual for me. After prayer, that pain did not flair up again.
Fast forward once more to this early morning Wednesday.... at around 4am, JJ and I turned lights out to doze for a couple hours before the day began and I was to teach that morning, and when I got up around 6:30am, my right eye looked like a dented water ballon. Crazy swollen for no apparent reason. Once again the team went to prayer (with a bit of raised voice and animation I hear 😃), and as the morning went on, the swelling came down so that from a short distance, the puffiness was not really obvious.
So....all that drama before 9am, yet I stood before the LTP students to be a vessel through which God challenged us all to consider 2 more questions: What are You Seeking? and Why Are You Afraid?
To answer What Are You Seeking? requires looking at the true desires of our hearts. We will seek satisfaction for what we believe our greatest needs and desires are. God declares that our hearts are to recognize HIM as our greatest need and desire. We looked at Solomon who, when given the opportunity in the very presence of God to ask for ANY thing, he sought Gods wisdom and to rule His people well. In response, God gave Solomon just that AND was pleased to grant Solomon wealth and great honor among his people as well. After searching some additional Scripture we learn that a heart who desires God most of all will seek humility, wisdom from God, to be in His presence often, and to bring others to God. Yet, we often deal with fear, so Jesus asks Why Are You Afraid? A handful of passages from Matthew and Luke demonstrate God is well aware of the things we are afraid of: not having what we need when we need it, fear of the unknown in following God, fear of damage and life-risk due to natural disaster, fear of not having the right words about our faith when we need them. Life experiences also reveal our fear of rejection and loneliness. Why are we afraid? We of little faith don't have that faith in the right place. Looking at the prophet Daniel's friends who publically refused to bow to the nation's idols at command of the king. The king's anger sent them to their death in an uber hot furnace, adding the arrogance of statement "what god can save you now?" (paraphrased). Their response was faith in God Himself, whether He rescued them or not. The worst they could face was eclipsed by their faith that God is good, in this life AND the next. Students were then able to have small group discussion to begin to process their personal answers to those questions.
Lunch this day was a special treat - outside by the river. Beatiful, relaxing, refreshing.
Day 2 with the younger kids was another blessing as our team acted out a couple of Jesus' miracles to emphasize His great love and tender attentiveness to our cries to Him for help. Our dramatically gifted teammate gave her testimony as well. We then had the chance for spending time among the girls as we assisted them to make beads for a necklace. The craft itself less important than just being with the girls and loving them. We all had full hearts as the day closed.
No comments:
Post a Comment