It frustrates me to no end knowing that prayer is a last resort for many people. It makes me sick that it's often a last resort for me. I knew it before, but it really caught my attention at camp this summer. When someone would get hurt, the first response was always to try the first aid kit, and if that wasn't enough, then we would go to the nurse. Sometimes the problem was beyond her expertise, and we would just sit there perplexed, waiting for some improvement. And I hated that I didn't have the boldness to skip all of that and make God my Plan A. I mean, sure, I prayed when someone got hurt, but it was always a private prayer while Nurse Emily was trying to help the patient. I don't understand. It's a Christian camp, and the nurse was our primary healer... This isn't to put down camp, because it's a great camp, and this is definitely not to belittle Nurse Emily, because she did a great job all summer. I'm just frustrated with my own timidity and fear of not getting an answer to prayer. I'm tired of making the Lord, the Healer and Provider of all good things, Jehovah-Rapha and Jehovah-Jireh, my last resort. I want to fearlessly claim the promises of Jeremiah 17:14 and Mark 11:24, knowing that God is faithful to respond to expectant prayer.
I'm really encouraged by my friend Rebekah, who, whether she realizes it or not, gives off a sense that she lives in constant communion with God through prayer. Whatever problems she faces, she doesn't hesitate to immediately and completely commit it to the Lord in prayer. Whatever joy she is presented with, she thanks God out of her deep love for Him because she knows His blessings flow from His love for her, and thanksgiving welcomes increased blessings. I was just reading her blog, which is what got me thinking about all of this, and in one post she wrote that she "prayed endlessly" about a decision she had to make and that it would allow God to be glorified all the more adequately. And the thing is, I believe it. Often people will say, "I'm praying for you," but in too many cases, it's just something people say. In reality, what they mean is, "I sympathize with you, and you have my thoughts until I move on to the next thing." But I know that Rebekah means it when she says that she's praying endlessly about something. And I get the feeling that it's not a last resort for her. It's not just something that she tags onto a practical method of obtaining blessings as a way of improving her chances of getting what she asks for. Prayer is her method. Everything else is an answer to prayer, so prayer should come before anything else.
God is convicting me right now, showing me that I allowed my busy schedule at camp to crowd prayer out of my life this summer. Rather than being a time to meet with God personally, I allowed prayer to become a quick, mindless means of getting something I needed, and only when other methods didn't work. I did find time to truly pray, but those times were few and far between, and they became more scarce as the summer wore on. But now I want to return to that place of complete dependence on the Lord that I was just getting to know before the summer started. I want prayer to become second nature for me, but not in the sense that it becomes a mindless habit, but that it would become my natural response to any situation. I want to pray so often—and I don't mean quick, ten-second prayers, but real, passionate, earnest prayer—that when my schedule starts to wear me out, stress and fatigue would not crowd prayer out of my life, but prayer would be so ingrained into my being that it would leave no room for stress or fatigue in my life. Just as Jesus did, when life starts getting too busy, I want to learn to make even more time for prayer than in the easy, relaxed times.
At this point, my plan is to go back to work at Camp Highland again next summer. So now that I know the effect the busy schedule has on my prayer life, I pray that God will help me to devote myself to praying with my whole being so frequently that no amount of stress of weariness or discouragement would be able to uproot prayer from my life, but that prayer would so completely consume the soil of my life that there would be no room for the seeds of stress, weariness, and discouragement to even be planted in me. I pray that I will always be ready to pray, and that seeking the Lord would always be my first response, not my last resort. "Whatever else I do, I must pray."
"This is what the Lord says: 'Cursed is the one who trusts in man, who depends on flesh for his strength and whose heart turns away from the Lord. He will be like a bush in the wastelands; he will not see prosperity when it comes. He will dwell in the parched places of the desert, in a salt land where no one lives. But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him. He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit." ~ Jeremiah 17:5-8
Saturday, August 4, 2012
Thursday, August 2, 2012
Taking Root
I decided to go for a walk through my neighborhood today, and the Lord seemed to be drawing my attention to all the trees around me. After walking and thinking for a while, I didn't seem to hear anything from God, so I took a different approach. I keep catching myself trying to figure out interpretations of images on my own, and I know that isn't what the Lord wants me to do. So when I caught myself trying to conjure up some deep insight as to the significance of trees, I allowed my single train of thought to become a two-way conversation with God instead. I immediately found the Lord asking me questions, just as Jesus did to His disciples and, interestingly, the same way I did with the kids at camp this summer. Actually, He only asked me one question: I had been thinking about roots, so He asked me, "What are roots for?"
A tree's roots dig into the soil the tree is planted in and absorbs water and nutrients to feed the tree. They also serve to anchor the tree in the ground for stability. However, contrary to the cliché, roots don't actually dig all that deep—they grow outward rather than downward. But I'm getting ahead of myself. First off, when I started answering God's question, I noticed something about soil and dirt that led me to think of the song Beautiful Things, by Gungor. When a tree is planted, it isn't planted in a bed of flowers, where everything is nice and pretty. In order for a tree to grow properly, it has to be planted in fertile soil, plain old dirt. There's nothing special about it. It's just dirt that has been prepared so that the tree can be planted in it. In the same way, our lives aren't founded on big, exciting moments. Those things come and go and can even draw our attention away from God, just like flowers can use up the nutrients a tree needs. Our lives are founded on the continuous stream of everyday living: the ordinary dirt of life. We find joy and hope in the simple things because we see God in them, and our ability to find joy in the dirt of life enhances our ability to see God in the bigger, flowery moments of life. But we don't find our satisfaction in the simple things; we find our satisfaction in the goodness of God that is revealed in them. Yet we hope for the dirt of life because we know that it will result in the growth of our relationship with Christ.
If a tree's roots grew straight down into the ground, the tree probably wouldn't be very stable. Plus, it wouldn't get the nutrients it needs because most of the necessary nutrients lie close to the surface. Likewise, if we dig deep into a particular aspect of life, we become hindered from gaining the spiritual nourishment available in all of God's creation. We focus on that one thing too much and become so attached to it that, if it were eliminated from our lives, we would go down with it. Instead, we need to learn to not dig our roots deep but to spread our roots wide. A healthy tree will have roots that span two to four times the diameter of its crown, the distance covered by the visible part of the tree above ground. For visual reference, the crown of a tree is the size of the shadow created under it at noon, when the sun is directly overhead. The roots of a healthy tree will spread two to four times that distance, beyond where the shadow reaches. So a healthy spiritual life is one that can find God in such a wide range of simple things that the person's outward life cannot demonstrate even half of what he is taking in from the Lord. A healthy spiritual man does not dig his roots deep into one simple thing of life so that he loses his ability to be nourished by it, but rather he spreads his roots wide to gain the most growth from all sources of nourishment. A man who digs his roots deep shows insecurity and a need to be comfortable. But a man who spreads his roots wide shows a willingness to step out of his comfort zone and seek the Lord in ways he has never known before so that he can gain the most out of life. He knows that God is found in all of the simple things of life, not just in what he is comfortable with, so he seeks to find as much of Him as possible. That way if a single aspect of his life is removed, he is not shaken because he still has plenty of other sources of strength in Christ.
But it doesn't stop there. A tree does not take root only for its own growth. If we could examine the thoughts of an animate tree, I believe it would have other living creatures in mind. A strong, healthy tree is not only stable and immovable, but it also provides shelter, produces fruit, and spreads seeds. In the same way, a person whose roots are spread wide, not being so attached to one particular thing but finding joy in all things and being content with whatever he is given—this person will not stop at his own spiritual growth but will be determined to do for others what the Lord has done for him. His strong roots in the Lord will allow him to be an unshakable source of shelter for those in need of hope and comfort. The growth he finds in prayer and in his study of the Word will give him a foundation from which to bear fruit, actions that demonstrate God's character, which will draw to people to enjoy the sweetness of the fruit and to seek more. And the joy he finds in the Lord will cause him to desire to see the same results in the lives of others, so he will spread of the seed of God's Word and His love, specifically by bearing fruit. The seeds of a fruit tree are carried by the fruit it bears, and the seed will not come if fruit is not produced. Similarly, we must bear fruit in order to effectively spread the seed of the gospel. And we can find encouragement in this: even if our fruit goes unnoticed by those we intend to reach by our good deeds, the fruit we bear still carries seeds to plant new trees. So even if our actions may not seem to have had an effect on someone, we can know that somewhere down the road someone will have a lasting impact on that person's life, and the Holy Spirit will take root inside of him.
So let's grow to be strong trees—oaks of righteousness (Isaiah 61:3) planted by streams of water (Psalm 1:3), abiding in Christ and bearing much fruit (John 15:5) to leave a lasting impact (John 15:16) so that all may see and know that we serve the Living God (John 15:8) and that they might see His glory and power and desire to serve and worship Him as well (Isaiah 6:1-8). Rather than digging our roots deep, let's spread our roots wide so that we can be firmly anchored in Christ and well nourished by His Spirit, allowing us to serve others effectively and adequately give God glory. And let's seek to grow our roots in the dirt of life rather than in the flowerbeds, because we know that Jesus makes beautiful things out of dust. The greatest things in life are not those that are very clearly outwardly glorious but rather those that the Lord makes glorious, no matter how unlikely and apparently useless and irredeemable it may seem. Worship God in the dull, everyday moments, not just in the big, emotional moments, because the majority of life is made of the simple things. As long as the big moments are the only times we give glory to God, Jesus has no hold on our lives. But if we learn to devote our everyday life to Him, then our whole being will truly be committed to Him.
A tree's roots dig into the soil the tree is planted in and absorbs water and nutrients to feed the tree. They also serve to anchor the tree in the ground for stability. However, contrary to the cliché, roots don't actually dig all that deep—they grow outward rather than downward. But I'm getting ahead of myself. First off, when I started answering God's question, I noticed something about soil and dirt that led me to think of the song Beautiful Things, by Gungor. When a tree is planted, it isn't planted in a bed of flowers, where everything is nice and pretty. In order for a tree to grow properly, it has to be planted in fertile soil, plain old dirt. There's nothing special about it. It's just dirt that has been prepared so that the tree can be planted in it. In the same way, our lives aren't founded on big, exciting moments. Those things come and go and can even draw our attention away from God, just like flowers can use up the nutrients a tree needs. Our lives are founded on the continuous stream of everyday living: the ordinary dirt of life. We find joy and hope in the simple things because we see God in them, and our ability to find joy in the dirt of life enhances our ability to see God in the bigger, flowery moments of life. But we don't find our satisfaction in the simple things; we find our satisfaction in the goodness of God that is revealed in them. Yet we hope for the dirt of life because we know that it will result in the growth of our relationship with Christ.
If a tree's roots grew straight down into the ground, the tree probably wouldn't be very stable. Plus, it wouldn't get the nutrients it needs because most of the necessary nutrients lie close to the surface. Likewise, if we dig deep into a particular aspect of life, we become hindered from gaining the spiritual nourishment available in all of God's creation. We focus on that one thing too much and become so attached to it that, if it were eliminated from our lives, we would go down with it. Instead, we need to learn to not dig our roots deep but to spread our roots wide. A healthy tree will have roots that span two to four times the diameter of its crown, the distance covered by the visible part of the tree above ground. For visual reference, the crown of a tree is the size of the shadow created under it at noon, when the sun is directly overhead. The roots of a healthy tree will spread two to four times that distance, beyond where the shadow reaches. So a healthy spiritual life is one that can find God in such a wide range of simple things that the person's outward life cannot demonstrate even half of what he is taking in from the Lord. A healthy spiritual man does not dig his roots deep into one simple thing of life so that he loses his ability to be nourished by it, but rather he spreads his roots wide to gain the most growth from all sources of nourishment. A man who digs his roots deep shows insecurity and a need to be comfortable. But a man who spreads his roots wide shows a willingness to step out of his comfort zone and seek the Lord in ways he has never known before so that he can gain the most out of life. He knows that God is found in all of the simple things of life, not just in what he is comfortable with, so he seeks to find as much of Him as possible. That way if a single aspect of his life is removed, he is not shaken because he still has plenty of other sources of strength in Christ.
But it doesn't stop there. A tree does not take root only for its own growth. If we could examine the thoughts of an animate tree, I believe it would have other living creatures in mind. A strong, healthy tree is not only stable and immovable, but it also provides shelter, produces fruit, and spreads seeds. In the same way, a person whose roots are spread wide, not being so attached to one particular thing but finding joy in all things and being content with whatever he is given—this person will not stop at his own spiritual growth but will be determined to do for others what the Lord has done for him. His strong roots in the Lord will allow him to be an unshakable source of shelter for those in need of hope and comfort. The growth he finds in prayer and in his study of the Word will give him a foundation from which to bear fruit, actions that demonstrate God's character, which will draw to people to enjoy the sweetness of the fruit and to seek more. And the joy he finds in the Lord will cause him to desire to see the same results in the lives of others, so he will spread of the seed of God's Word and His love, specifically by bearing fruit. The seeds of a fruit tree are carried by the fruit it bears, and the seed will not come if fruit is not produced. Similarly, we must bear fruit in order to effectively spread the seed of the gospel. And we can find encouragement in this: even if our fruit goes unnoticed by those we intend to reach by our good deeds, the fruit we bear still carries seeds to plant new trees. So even if our actions may not seem to have had an effect on someone, we can know that somewhere down the road someone will have a lasting impact on that person's life, and the Holy Spirit will take root inside of him.
So let's grow to be strong trees—oaks of righteousness (Isaiah 61:3) planted by streams of water (Psalm 1:3), abiding in Christ and bearing much fruit (John 15:5) to leave a lasting impact (John 15:16) so that all may see and know that we serve the Living God (John 15:8) and that they might see His glory and power and desire to serve and worship Him as well (Isaiah 6:1-8). Rather than digging our roots deep, let's spread our roots wide so that we can be firmly anchored in Christ and well nourished by His Spirit, allowing us to serve others effectively and adequately give God glory. And let's seek to grow our roots in the dirt of life rather than in the flowerbeds, because we know that Jesus makes beautiful things out of dust. The greatest things in life are not those that are very clearly outwardly glorious but rather those that the Lord makes glorious, no matter how unlikely and apparently useless and irredeemable it may seem. Worship God in the dull, everyday moments, not just in the big, emotional moments, because the majority of life is made of the simple things. As long as the big moments are the only times we give glory to God, Jesus has no hold on our lives. But if we learn to devote our everyday life to Him, then our whole being will truly be committed to Him.
Wednesday, July 4, 2012
With all your heart
For the last six weeks I have been in Ellijay, GA, working at Camp Highland as a counselor. Camp Highland is a camp whose mission is to lead children (fourth grade to high school senior) into a growing relationship with Christ through high adventure. So that's what I've been doing for six weeks. Well, four weeks, to be more accurate, because the first two weeks were for staff training without campers. It's been an amazing experience and a lot of fun, but also very challenging and revealing as it has been exposing areas of my life that I need to work on, specifically regarding my interaction with kids and people in general. The Lord has been putting a huge spotlight on my impatience during these last four weeks, an aspect of my life that may not be obvious in public situations but that I know to exist in my home life, and I've been seeing it come out a lot especially during these last two weeks of camp.
The most important thing God has been revealing to me, though, wasn't fully revealed until tonight at Upper Room, my high school youth group's student-led summer ministry. This week is our break for summer staff, and the revelation that God showed me tonight was that I grow dissatisfied and discontent when I don't commit all my ways to the Lord. When I know that I should be spending time with God but I don't do it, I feel empty and I begin to doubt Him. This shows my desperate need for Him, my urgent need to spend quality time with Him on a daily basis. When I start to lose my desire for Him, I start to doubt Him, and when I begin to doubt Him, I lose my desire for Him. Thankfully, though, He caught my attention while these thoughts were running through my mind tonight, and He brought me back to Himself. He showed me just how much I need to spend time with Him, even when I don't think I want to, because He knows that deep down I really do want to spend time with Him because I need to. If I begin to lose interest in Him when I neglect Him, then the opposite must also be true: that my desire to know Him more will increase as I spend more time with Him. So even if I don't think I want to spend time with the Lord at the moment, if I do it anyway, He will be faithful to increase my desire for Him.
During the last few weeks at camp, I began to notice that I wasn't making the kind of time I needed to spend with the Lord. As a result, I started feeling spiritually drained. Fortunately, God blessed me by continually pouring into me so that I could pour into the campers even though I wasn't actively seeking to be filled in my own personal quiet time. And now that I'm at home, my neglect of my TAG time (Time Alone with God) is exaggerated. Don't get me wrong: I still had a block set apart for TAG time at camp, but it was always spent facilitating discussion with the campers rather than studying on my own because my campers have all been eighth graders or younger, so my co-counselors and I have had to keep them focused. (This was a blessing though, because the fourth, fifth, and sixth graders I had the first two weeks really dug deep into what we talked about during our TAG times, and I learned a lot from them and from God speaking things through me that I never would have thought of on my own.) Anyway, in response to my complacency, God gave me a wake-up call tonight by showing me that, if I will devote myself to seeking Him wholeheartedly, He will satisfy my desire for Him even as He increases my desire. In fact, He has to increase my desire for Him because my current desire to know Him cannot match the measure of His glory that He wants to reveal to me. So if I will seek to know Him more, He will satisfy me and continually fill me with more of Himself. But if I grow complacent, He will continue to show His glory, but there will be no room in my heart to contain my understanding of His goodness because I will have no desire to receive such knowledge. So I will have no desire for Him, and as I see His glory all around me and have no room to contain it in my heart, I will begin to feel empty because I do not have what the Lord is offering me. Therefore, I must seek Him every day with all my heart and devote my whole being to Him.
A main theme at Camp Highland that comes from our many high adventure elements is "Always stay connected." The point we try to make to the kids through this image of staying connected by way of harnesses is that we always have to be connected to God, through prayer, worship, Bible study, and fellowship with other believers. But one lesson in particular that stuck out to me during week 4 (or as we've been calling it, week 1.4) was when one camper, a rising high school junior, said that we can stay connected through love and obedience. It may seem like common sense, but it hit me hard when I first heard it: prayer and Bible study is not the only way that we can come to know God more; if knowing God means becoming more like Him, then it makes sense that becoming more like Him can also help us get to know Him better. So if we love as Jesus loved, we can grow closer to Him just as effectively as we could through studying His life on earth and reading about how He lived. Love and obedience are just as much a part of godly living as wisdom, if not more so.
So as I seek to commit myself wholly to the Lord every day, I pray that I would not only seek Him in His Word and in prayer and worship, but also through joyful obedience to my parents and to those in authority over me and also through unconditional love and humble, faithful stewardship of the gifts and talents God has given me. I pray that there would be no aspect of my life that might raise questions about my complete devotion to the Lord, but that Jesus Christ would be the Lord of my entire lifestyle. "If Christ is anything, He must be everything." ~ Charles Spurgeon
"Let it not be said of me that I held back anything from You."
The most important thing God has been revealing to me, though, wasn't fully revealed until tonight at Upper Room, my high school youth group's student-led summer ministry. This week is our break for summer staff, and the revelation that God showed me tonight was that I grow dissatisfied and discontent when I don't commit all my ways to the Lord. When I know that I should be spending time with God but I don't do it, I feel empty and I begin to doubt Him. This shows my desperate need for Him, my urgent need to spend quality time with Him on a daily basis. When I start to lose my desire for Him, I start to doubt Him, and when I begin to doubt Him, I lose my desire for Him. Thankfully, though, He caught my attention while these thoughts were running through my mind tonight, and He brought me back to Himself. He showed me just how much I need to spend time with Him, even when I don't think I want to, because He knows that deep down I really do want to spend time with Him because I need to. If I begin to lose interest in Him when I neglect Him, then the opposite must also be true: that my desire to know Him more will increase as I spend more time with Him. So even if I don't think I want to spend time with the Lord at the moment, if I do it anyway, He will be faithful to increase my desire for Him.
During the last few weeks at camp, I began to notice that I wasn't making the kind of time I needed to spend with the Lord. As a result, I started feeling spiritually drained. Fortunately, God blessed me by continually pouring into me so that I could pour into the campers even though I wasn't actively seeking to be filled in my own personal quiet time. And now that I'm at home, my neglect of my TAG time (Time Alone with God) is exaggerated. Don't get me wrong: I still had a block set apart for TAG time at camp, but it was always spent facilitating discussion with the campers rather than studying on my own because my campers have all been eighth graders or younger, so my co-counselors and I have had to keep them focused. (This was a blessing though, because the fourth, fifth, and sixth graders I had the first two weeks really dug deep into what we talked about during our TAG times, and I learned a lot from them and from God speaking things through me that I never would have thought of on my own.) Anyway, in response to my complacency, God gave me a wake-up call tonight by showing me that, if I will devote myself to seeking Him wholeheartedly, He will satisfy my desire for Him even as He increases my desire. In fact, He has to increase my desire for Him because my current desire to know Him cannot match the measure of His glory that He wants to reveal to me. So if I will seek to know Him more, He will satisfy me and continually fill me with more of Himself. But if I grow complacent, He will continue to show His glory, but there will be no room in my heart to contain my understanding of His goodness because I will have no desire to receive such knowledge. So I will have no desire for Him, and as I see His glory all around me and have no room to contain it in my heart, I will begin to feel empty because I do not have what the Lord is offering me. Therefore, I must seek Him every day with all my heart and devote my whole being to Him.
A main theme at Camp Highland that comes from our many high adventure elements is "Always stay connected." The point we try to make to the kids through this image of staying connected by way of harnesses is that we always have to be connected to God, through prayer, worship, Bible study, and fellowship with other believers. But one lesson in particular that stuck out to me during week 4 (or as we've been calling it, week 1.4) was when one camper, a rising high school junior, said that we can stay connected through love and obedience. It may seem like common sense, but it hit me hard when I first heard it: prayer and Bible study is not the only way that we can come to know God more; if knowing God means becoming more like Him, then it makes sense that becoming more like Him can also help us get to know Him better. So if we love as Jesus loved, we can grow closer to Him just as effectively as we could through studying His life on earth and reading about how He lived. Love and obedience are just as much a part of godly living as wisdom, if not more so.
So as I seek to commit myself wholly to the Lord every day, I pray that I would not only seek Him in His Word and in prayer and worship, but also through joyful obedience to my parents and to those in authority over me and also through unconditional love and humble, faithful stewardship of the gifts and talents God has given me. I pray that there would be no aspect of my life that might raise questions about my complete devotion to the Lord, but that Jesus Christ would be the Lord of my entire lifestyle. "If Christ is anything, He must be everything." ~ Charles Spurgeon
"Let it not be said of me that I held back anything from You."
Monday, May 14, 2012
Jamaica 2012: Reflections and Revelations, Visions and Visuals
Sorry it took so long for me to finish this post. There was a lot for me recount, and with school drawing to a close, it was hard to find enough time to sit down and write everything out at once. But now that finals are done and I'm back at home, I finally have time to finish my thoughts and to process everything that happened in Jamaica.
Once again, thank you to everyone who supported me in my mission trip to Jamaica over spring break. It would not have been possible without you, and I was very blessed to be able to go because of you. So thank you!
If you read my previous post about Jamaica, congratulations on surviving the whole thing. Even if you didn't make it through the whole thing, you know that God worked in some amazing ways over the course of the week in Port Maria and even up to this point. He's taught me so much since that Saturday when we boarded the plane headed to Jamaica, so I'm going to try my best to keep this as organized as possible. I'm sorry if it gets scattered. And I apologize to anyone who managed to get through my last Jamaica post because there's still much more to read. This post will probably be longer than the last one.
Up until this trip, I had never really had any visions to speak of. Instead, God typically spoke to me through what I like to call "visuals": scenarios or pictures of things I have seen before, or sometimes even something I am seeing right at that moment, into which the Lord speaks meaning. He then interprets those scenarios or pictures to me and applies them to real-life situations. (Maybe that's the same thing as a vision, or at least along those lines, but I have a certain idea of what visions are, and I hadn't had very many of them up to this point.) That's how the trip started out: with a particularly detailed visual. As I sat on the plane looking out the window at the wing below me, I saw heat being emitted from the engine beneath the wing. I saw this as the plane pulled onto the runway and seemingly went in circles. The anticipation of takeoff was almost suffocating. We were finally on our way to Jamaica! At least, we would be once the plane got in the air. The plane seemed to drift slowly around the runway. This whole time, the heat waves coming from the engine were wildly rushing toward the tail of the plane. Finally, the plane started rumble as it picked up speed, but it turned out that we were just moving from the waiting area to the actual runway. When the runway was finally clear and we were good to go, the plane lurched forward, speeding down the runway, and in seconds we were in the air. This whole time, God was speaking to me through all that I was seeing and experiencing. That night I shared the visual and its interpretation to my small group. As the plane rolled slowly toward the runway, I felt slightly impatient, anxious to get in the air, to hurry up and get to Jamaica, but we seemed to be going nowhere. Yet below us, the heat waves were moving just as quickly as ever all the time. At that point in time, I felt like there were people on the trip who may have been feeling like they were not growing in Christ at the same pace as everyone else around them. I didn't know who those people would be; I was just interpreting the visual—or more accurately, God was interpreting it for me. To those people, it seemed like everyone around them was always on fire, always walking closely with the Lord and always ready to act when they hear His voice. But they felt like they kept picking up momentum only to lose it moments later. In response to this interpretation, God gave me some encouragement for anyone feeling that way (if this is you, listen up): You may feel like you're moving slowly and getting nowhere compared to everyone around you, but in reality, you are moving toward the runway for takeoff. Everything you are doing serves as another step toward the ultimate goal the Lord has set before you. Be happy for the people around you who are on fire for Christ! Be happy that they are growing, because they are the ones who will help you grow. Then when the plane finally gets in the air, it is by no effort of the passengers, but by the skill of the pilot and the physics of the plane and the air around it. When you finally reach a point of noticeable growth, be humble. You have no right to take pride in getting yourself to that place of growth because it is only by the capable hand of the Lord, our Pilot, that you were able to get there. And He is the One who is keeping you there. And when you touch back down on land, be ready to exit the plane and do what you came to do. Don't forget that you would not be at your destination if it hadn't been for the plane and its pilot. God teaches us in our spiritual highs and times of growth, and He uses these times to draw us closer to Him. But as the spiritual high fades, we must not forgot what we have learned. We are coming off of the spiritual high for a reason: to share and put into action what we learned in that time of growth. Don't be disappointed to get off of the plane, but don't be too excited to stay in your destination for too long. Temptation and trials often come with spiritual lows, so be on your guard. But don't forget to serve others with what you learned in your spiritual highs.
So... yeah. That's the wisdom God shared with us to start off the week. After small group/family time, Daniel, one of the Wesley directors, gave a message on service. He presented three main qualities of good, God-pleasing service: authenticity, consideracy, and excellence. True, humble, loving service must be authentic, coming from a heartfelt desire to serve. It has to be considerate, putting others before oneself in every way possible, considering not just others' outward needs but also their thoughts. (Some people may not want assistance with some things because it might make them feel inferior or useless.) And we must strive for excellence in all that we do, never doing things halfway. After the message, along with a time for prayer and worship, Josh pulled a few people aside to have a Bible study, which was awesome! He was hungry for more of what God had for us, so he put himself, and several others, in a position to be ready to receive it. While Daniel was speaking, God reminded me of an image someone had shared with me before: humility is not just the act of putting others above oneself but also the act of lowering oneself below others, like several people on a ladder, each trying to get lower to lift the others higher. The lower we make ourselves, the higher the Lord appears to us. So during our group discussion, God made this challenge to us: Compete with one another to be the lowest of all slaves—humble yourselves below those around you, and if everyone does the same, John 3:30 ("He must increase, but I must decrease") will become a reality. This challenge came from Romans 12:10: "Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor." (I just remembered that I heard this challenge at one of the meetings for the Montenegro mission trip that I will not be going on anymore. So even though I'm not able to go, there was a reason I was part of the team, even if only temporarily.) The topic of service brought up the matter of our weaknesses that hinder us from serving to our fullest potential, which eventually turned into our general weaknesses, doubts, and fears. It was a very productive conversation because exposing these weaknesses allowed the whole group to pray against those things. And we were all encouraged too, either by knowing that we are not the only ones who suffer from our weaknesses, or by shedding light on how to deal with those weaknesses, or simply by knowing that our brothers and sisters in Christ were praying for us.
All of that was day one, and not even the first full day. The first full day came with all new surprises from God. As expected, seeing the Jamaicans dance at church and getting to dance with them filled everyone with a lot of joy. But not only did I get to see the joy that the Jamaicans so obviously demonstrated, but I also got to experience some of their hospitality that morning when one of the women saw that I didn't have a program and shared hers with me throughout the service as needed. They made all of us feel very welcome, as if we were regular attenders at the church. Toward the beginning of the service, they recognized everyone who had birthdays or anniversaries coming up that week and prayed for families that were in need or experiencing difficult times. They even sang for one of the girls on our team whose birthday was that day. They made the church body feel like a real family, sharing simple everyday blessings and hardships, showing themselves to be a community that genuinely cares about its members.
Later we had our first night of identity prayer, a lot more people were interested in it than I expected. The idea behind identity prayer is that God will give us new names in heaven based on who He has made us to be and His plans for us. This name is grounded in our identity in Christ. Some biblical background for identity prayer can be found in Isaiah 62:2:
I had actually heard about spiritual names and identity prayer before the Jamaica trip, but I decided to sit in on the meeting and maybe get some confirmation from God that the name I believed I had received really was my name. I'm still looking into it because my name situation is a little weird. Senior year of high school, I was reading the Bible, just jumping around to different passages, and I came across an interesting name. I completely forgot about it until last year. Last spring I was talking with some friends about spiritual names, but I didn't really consider asking God for my own name. Maybe I did ask, but I don't remember. Either way, I didn't receive my name then. But then over the summer, for some reason I was thinking about names. Not spiritual names. Just names. I don't remember why. I was either thinking about names for kids or, for whatever reason, names that I would like to have if I ever decided to change mine. As I was thinking of these names, a set of syllables formed themselves in my mind: Hanani. It sounded like a name I had heard before, so I looked it up, and it was then that I remembered seeing the name senior year. I looked up the definition, and Hanani means "God is gracious." But God wasn't done yet. He told me that He hears me and that that would be part of my name. I knew there was a name that meant "the Lord hears," so I thought about it for a minute and remembered the story of Hagar and Ishmael: Hagar named her son Ishmael because God heard her request for a child, and Ishmael means "the Lord hears." So together, Hanani Ishmael means "by His grace, the Lord hears and responds." That definitely stood out to me because of the way that God called me to follow Him when my grandpa died. (If you haven't heard the story, this is it in a nutshell: My grandpa was a pastor, so when he passed away I prayed 2 Kings 2:9, asking God for a double portion of the Spirit He had given my grandpa; just a few months later, He answered my prayer by changing my life at my youth group's winter retreat and making me realize that I had been missing something my whole life even though I had always gone to church. I didn't deserve to be heard because I had been calling myself a Christian even though I wasn't actively living it out, but He answered me anyway.) But He still wasn't done yet. He was done for the time being, but He added more this year in Jamaica. The first night of identity prayer, I asked God if the name I thought I had received was the right one for me. Then out of nowhere the name Lemuel popped into my head. I was a little hesitant to accept it as my name, or even a part of it, and I still kind of am because Lemuel doesn't sound like that great of a name. Besides, I didn't have a computer with me, so I couldn't look up the definition of the name. But I decided to look into it anyway. I went to Proverbs 31 to see if I could figure out some meaning for the name by looking at it in context. Then I became a lot more willing to accept it as part of my name. Lemuel was a king, a son who listens to authority, one who abstains from earthly pleasures in favor of righteousness, and one who speaks for those who have no voice. I pieced all that information together and came to the conclusion that Lemuel was an intercessor, someone who effectively prays on someone else's behalf. I didn't realize it until just the other day, but this was confirmed last year when Michael, my Freshley small group leader, called me a prayer warrior, and again this year in Jamaica when Josh prayed for me Thursday night and shared a vision of an army with me on the frontlines. Then shortly after arriving back in Athens, I read a devotion out of Oswald Chamber's My Utmost for His Highest that said that God doesn't make promises just to show us that He keeps them but also to show us that He has ownership of us. In other words, if you hear and receive a promise from the Lord, He is saying, "You are Mine, and because you are Mine I will keep my promise, and you will know that you are Mine." A few days later, I remembered that I still had no idea what Lemuel actually means, so I looked it up, and it means "belonging to God." I don't know if that means anything to anyone, but for reasons I can't seem to put into words, it meant something to me. So anyway, now my name is Lemuel Hanani Ishmael: an intercessor belonging to God whose voice is heard and graciously answered on behalf of myself and on the behalf of those I pray for. So that's how the first night of identity prayer went for me. And throughout the week, I became more and more aware of the reality of my identity, and I am still coming to fully understand who God has called me to be and how to live in that identity. I have been learning a lot about my identity these last few weeks. For example, God has been giving me a lot of advice and encouragement for other people, and I realized that because my identity is in Christ and Ishmael means "the Lord hears," I also hear the Lord because His Spirit is in me, and the Spirit hears; so I have been hearing from God on behalf of those who needed to hear from Him. I have the characteristics of Jesus because Christ lives in me. I've been seeing Lemuel in me a lot too, as God has been answering a lot of my prayers in very noticeable ways. I'm still relatively new to the idea of fervent, ceaseless, effective prayer, so it's been cool to see the Lord answer my prayers in very specific ways that I can actually see and know that God answered me. He also confirmed to me that Lemuel is the right name for me when He led me to Proverbs 21:1 ("The king's heart is a stream of water in the hand of the Lord; He turns it wherever He will") after we had some prophetic encouragement time a few weeks after Jamaica, and my friend Tenaya said that she saw me as a river going wherever the path of the river turned, showing that I go wherever the Lord directs me without trying to rebel and keep going in the direction I was already headed. Anyway, I hope all that I learned that night puts into perspective just how much the rest of the team received throughout the week.
The next day was the first workday. My small group was assigned to make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for all the groups to take to their work sites for lunch, so we got up early that morning and got to work. After breakfast, we packed up our lunches and gear and boarded the buses to go to our work sites. I was on the farm that day, and what a first workday it was! We spent the day getting rid of the weeds on the side of a mountain where McGuiver, the man who owns the farm, grows a wide variety of fruits and vegetables. The girls pulled up the smaller weeds while the guys chopped down the bigger weeds with machetes. After our lunch break, we got back to work, but the breeze caught my attention, causing me to stop and listen. I felt like God was very present at that moment, not in the way people like to say a lot at worship services when everyone is feeling emotional and drawn into the music, but in a way that it actually felt like God was about to speak audibly. He didn't, but it was close enough. As I listened, I asked God to speak, and I started praying. As I prayed, words flowed through my mind, and at some point my thoughts seemed to transform from my own thoughts into the Lord's voice. He said, "I will show you My glory." Just to make sure we're clear, I didn't hear Him say this audibly. The words ran through my mind as a thought and seemed to be coming from God. When I "heard" this, I excitedly asked Him how He would show me His glory and where to look. He answered, "Seek My face in the trees," so I looked around at the trees surrounding us in the jungle we were working in. I saw bright red flowers on the treetops all around us. His glory and His presence was surrounding us, uniting us as one body of Christ by closing us in together. When I saw that, I doubted that I had seen the Lord's glory in the way He wanted to show it to me yet, because I felt like there was an interpretation for what I saw that I hadn't received yet, but then He said in the process of saying something else, "I have shown you My glory." It turned out that He was showing me the way He was going to show His glory throughout the week: through the unity of the team and the way He speaks to individuals in the body of Christ in order for whole communities to hear Him, and how things that one individual hears may be connected to what another person hears.
Then He told me to wander. We were back to chopping and pulling weeds, and McGuiver was clearing a pathway off to the side, so I was led to go in the direction he had gone. I didn't go very far, though, so God made this convicting, piercing comment: "Show Me your glory." I have been placing my glory in my reputation, not in Jesus Christ, which was why I couldn't find the boldness and humility to follow McGuiver. I didn't want to do something that might put my reputation at risk, whatever it may be.
As we finished hacking away at the bigger weeds and proceeded to pull the smaller weeds out by hand, God revealed a reflection to me of Jamaican versus American faith. We don't have weeds in America like the giant ones we had to cut down in Jamaica, but we have more of the smaller weeds everywhere. The Jamaican church focuses a lot on "being good," as one of the small group leaders mentioned during our leadership meeting Sunday night, while the focus of the growing American church is a lot more on prayer and visions and encouragement, etc. The Jamaican church has a lot of surface issues to deal with in their society—and of course America does too—but the American church looks at the inner spiritual needs that are harder to handle. The larger weeds we hacked at with machetes, easily cutting them down, while we had to get down on our knees to pull out the smaller weeds by hand. Too often we leave those smaller weeds untended, and they grow to become those larger weeds. We in America look at pride, anger, and envy, and we don't do anything about it, but those are the most dangerous weeds: the ones we ignore. We need to get down on our knees in prayer to uproot even the tiniest of weeds before they can grow into bigger weeds that suffocate the crops we want to grow. I found out later that the whole metaphor about pulling up weeds by the roots applied to the life of a fellow small group leader, but not necessarily with weeds representing sin. Her "weeds" were the things in her life that she was holding on to that she needed to let go of. As she began uprooting her weeds, God took her to Isaiah 61:3, calling her an oak of righteousness, "the planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified." This image of weeds and oaks of righteousness has been coming up over and over again in the last two months. Ironically, the mural we were painting at the infirmary was of a tree, and Isaiah 61:3 was painted next to the tree as a caption when the mural was finished. A few weeks ago I had a vision (an actual vision this time, not a visual) of a tree being uprooted from a garden full of weeds and replanted in a rock—the Rock. Before the Jamaica trip, I went to the "Prophetic Rooms" at Wesley, where the interns give prophetic encouragement, and one of the things they said to encourage me was that they saw a large rock representing stability, and they saw that I was firmly rooted in Christ. I don't think it's coincidence that the words "rock" and "rooted" went together both in the Prophetic Rooms and in my vision. Anyway, God showed me a lot of unity in His work through this one revelation about roots, trees, and weeds.
What God taught me Wednesday and Thursday kind of blended together. Wednesday at the work site I saw a lot of unity, both within the team and between the team and some of the students at the school we were working at. Some of the kids helped us clean up when were done working for the day, and some of us got to play soccer, dance, and sing with them. As we finished laying the last of the cinderblocks to complete the wall, I got to talk with a student named Douwarne. He reminded me a lot of myself. He was quiet and reserved, but he seemed curious and wanted to make conversation, so he found things to ask me about America. We talked about school, my lack of a girlfriend (haha), and my abstinence from alcohol, which he seemed surprised about. After only being exposed to American college students who come to Jamaica to party and drink, seeing a group of Americans who don't drink seemed to be new to him. It's sad that that has become the image we Americans have made for ourselves in the world. Anyway, it was cool getting to talk to Douwarne and hopefully being a positive influence and a light for Christ to him.
As God spoke to us more and more about identity throughout the week, it all seemed to reach a culminating point around this time in the week. I've realized that I have a lot of expectations of myself, and I project a lot of my expectations on other people—not that I expect the same things of other people that I expect of myself, but I believe that they have the same expectations of me that I have of myself. And that often defines who I am and what I do. I don't want to do anything that would draw unnecessary attention to myself by doing something that nobody would expect of me, something that might change their perception of who I am. And as the Lord revealed this to me, I realized the reason for spiritual names, at least in my case: God defines us and shows us where He wants to lead us by giving us names with a calling. It's easier for me to do something if I know that it's expected of me, so having a name with a calling helps me to know what I'm expected to do. For example, to me Lemuel means intercessor, so because God and most of the Port Maria team, as well as the Montenegro team and a few other people, expect me to pray, it makes it easier to pray. Knowing that there are people depending on me to pray serves as a reminder to me that I need to pray. I found this to be true when I was talking to my friend Alex on the Montenegro team and I said that I'd be praying for the team, and she said, "You know, I actually believe you. A lot of people just say that, but I really believe you will pray for us." That was really encouraging to me, and I hope she knows just how encouraging it was. A couple days later, I found myself thinking about what she said, and I immediately started praying for the Montenegro team and their trip, which starts tomorrow, May 15th. Speaking of which, please pray for them as they finish getting everything together for the trip, and pray that God would go with them and protect them and establish their work in His name, and that He would be glorified in everything they do.
Okay, now back to Jamaica. I would say that Thursday was my favorite day, but there was so much awesome stuff that happened throughout the week that it's hard to say if I actually had a single favorite day at all. But I'll go ahead and say that Thursday was my favorite day. Why? Well, after our extra half hour of sleep and after eating breakfast, we headed to Trevor's church to spend time praying and worshiping the God who allowed us to spend such an amazing week in Jamaica. It was incredible seeing so many people gathered in one room passionately praying, especially the freshmen. Andrew led worship as we prayed, and Bob, the director of Wesley, interjected prayer topics to direct our focus, because united prayer has a special place in God's eyes, as Jesus said in Matthew 18:19-20: "Again I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by My Father in heave. For where two or three are gathered in My name, there am I among them." Toward the end of our time there (I always forget how long we were there; it felt like an hour or less, but I'm pretty sure it was longer than that, I'm just not sure how much longer), Bob opened the floor to anyone who wanted to pray for anything specific. The idea was not to give any explanation, but to just take stage and pray out loud so that everyone else could agree with the prayers. Seeing so many of the freshmen and leaders go up front and pray for the Jamaicans and for Athens and for our team with such complete surrender, giving everything to God, was amazing.
But the blessings of the day didn't stop there. After that we went to Galina Primary to play with the kids, who were having field day. I didn't really know what to do for most of the time we were there because I'm not very outgoing, and I'm not great at playing with kids. But when Ashley, who was carrying a little girl in her arms, said that the girl wanted to get on someone's shoulders, that was something I could do. I don't even know the little girl's name, but she seemed to enjoy it, and I loved it. I never really thought about it until now, but that's how God wants us to come to Him: He wants us to seek Him, and He wants to carry us on His shoulders—He wants us to be completely dependent on Him, unable and unwilling to do anything apart from Him—and He wants us to take joy in knowing that He is completely in control, because He loves it when we depend on Him and ask Him to serve us in the ways He wants to serve us.
We didn't stay at Galina Primary for long. We left in two groups at different times because we only had one bus. The other two were either at Kermit's church or at the infirmary, where the groups were finishing up the roofing of the church and the mural at the infirmary, in addition to whatever was left to paint on the overhang at the infirmary. Back at the Casa Maria, we just hung out until dinner, then we went to our team meeting. It still gives me chills to think about that night. All week I had been wanting to pray for each person in my small group family individually, and I had already gotten the opportunity to pray for Josh and Jack, so when Jasmine, one of the interns, said what we would be doing that night, I got really excited because God was showing me even more unity in the desires He had given us. Each of the leaders went to the interns and directors to receive prayer for an outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and then we went to our freshmen and prayed for them. I have to admit, even though God has called me Lemuel, an intercessor, I feel like I don't know what to pray a lot of times, so praying for the freshmen was really revealing to me because I felt like I was just praying what I knew to pray instead of letting the Spirit pray for me. But I know the Lord answered anyway and will continue to answer. And it was cool praying for each of the freshmen with Rebekah because one of the jokes about Wesley style/Korean style prayer/the "holy roar" (although it's not really a joke) is that if you don't know what to pray for, you can just listen to the person next to you and steal their ideas, and it seemed like Rebekah definitely knew what to pray for because the Spirit was praying for her. And it was awesome getting to pour out into the freshmen individually, with specific prayers for each one of them. It made it feel like we really are a family, every single one of us.
After we prayed for the freshmen and Josh prayed for me and Rebekah, we went to our small groups, where we basically debriefed on the entire week, since we didn't have much time left there. Josh and I walked in late, so they caught us up, and then I shared a vision I had had the day before. I saw a map of Jamaica, like on an iPhone GPS, with the blue dot marking where we were in Port Maria, and circles radiating out from the dot. Then I saw the dot move back to Athens, GA, as were returned to the States. But as the dot moved, a copy of the dot was left in Port Maria, with waves still radiating from the city. And as we arrived back in Athens, the dot start giving off waves in Athens while the other dot continued to emit waves from Jamaica. This was meant to show that the impact we had in Jamaica would have a lasting effect, even after we were gone. The Holy Spirit would still remain in Jamaica, working with what we did and working in the places we were unable to reach in our short time there. And at the same time, the Spirit would also go with us back to Athens to work in us and through us at home. What came next blew us all away: Jack said that he had heard pretty much that exact same vision last summer at a conference in Chicago. The speaker had a map up on the wall, and she put a pin on Chicago and drew circles out from the city, and she did the same thing with Atlanta. Eventually the circles overlapped each other, symbolizing the way that the Spirit's work becomes known all over the world, and His work in one place serves as encouragement to His disciples in another place, which spurs them on to even greater things in Jesus' name, which then encourages more people until the whole world is one big dot emanating waves of the Holy Spirit. And this is being proven even now. While I was in Athens, I heard about a lot of stuff that was going on at home in Woodstock and Kennesaw, GA, there's been revival among a lot of my friends in State College, Pennsylvania, and I've been hearing about all that's been going on at Bethel Church in California for a while now. In fact, this past semester, Bethel chose to target Athens as a center for ministry because they believe that God is going to move powerfully in and through this city. So as Bethel sent teams on mission trips throughout the world, they sent a team to Athens to encourage the body of believers here. They went to Africa, eastern Europe, southeast Asia, South America, and of all places, Athens, Georgia. In addition to these "dots" on the map, Wesley also sent teams to Peru and New York over spring break, and they are sending teams to Brazil, Cambodia, and Montenegro in the next few weeks. Again, if you could be praying for the Brazil and Cambodia teams along with Montenegro, I'd really appreciate it. I also have friends going to Israel and back to Peru, another friend who is going to North Africa with Café 1040 (he actually left today), a friend from Puerto Rico, and a friend from Japan who came to UGA as an exchange student who came to know Jesus Christ while he was here and will now be taking Him back to Japan with him! And there's so much more going on in the Kingdom, as we head out to work at camps this summer. My friend Meg is working with Lifeworks in Colorado; Bryan is working at a camp in Montana; Taylor, John, Katie, and Anna are working at a camp in Maine; Amanda is working at Snowbird in North Carolina; and I'm working with Lauren and Devin at Camp Highland in Elijay, GA, starting next Monday. I can't wait to see all that the Lord has planned for this summer!
Anyway, back on track with Jamaica, Friday came around all too soon. But we got to enjoy some time together and with the other Jamaica teams, which was a lot of fun. And that evening all of the small groups sat together at dinner, which surprisingly hadn't happened until then. And then we had the talent show, Jessica and Jasmine gave the leaders encouraging notes, and I think we had the last night of identity prayer that night. The last one might have been Thursday night. I don't remember. Either way, identity had become a huge part of the trip, and I later found out that identity was a big part of all of the Jamaica trips, which showed even more unity, which is really cool. God was staying true to His word in my visual at the beginning of the week, when He showed me the "fire in the forest" flowers and told me that He would show me unity.
Even though the trip was just about over, God wasn't done speaking to me about the trip. As the plane took off the next day, I looked out the window back at Jamaica, and I saw clouds covering the whole island. There were no clouds over the water. Just over the island. The iPhone GPS vision came back to me, and the Lord connected that vision to what I was seeing at that moment: the Spirit of God was hovering over the entire island of Jamaica, ready to rain down and fall upon the Jamaicans and bring revival throughout the island. Our work was done there for the time being, but the Lord promised that He will never stop working there. He will always be working to bring the Jamaicans to know Him fully, and He is preparing the land, even now, for next year's Freshley team so that we can know Him more.
Remember that airplane visual I mentioned all the way at the beginning of this post? Well, I originally thought that it was about our work that we would be doing in Jamaica, but it turned out that it was actually about our return to the States. Obviously, the whole Jamaica trip was a huge spiritual high, but for a lot of us it was a gradual high, if that makes sense. Instead of being a kind of spiritual high that can never be reached outside of a mission trip or some intense spiritual experience, the kind that of spiritual high feeling that can easily be lost in an instant after returning from the trip, this was a lasting kind of spiritual high, the kind that leaves an impact on our way of life. The Lord brought us to Jamaica for a reason, and we were only able to be there by His grace. He brought us to the point of take-off, and Jamaica was that point where the plane was stable in the air in a constant state of growth and forward motion. But the plane has to land eventually, and so did our spring break mission trip, so we had to come back to America. Now we have to remember all that the Lord taught us while we were Jamaica and use it to glorify Him in all that we do.
One of the things that Josh emphasized throughout the week was one of the main themes of Freshley this entire semester: the time is now. We also seem to look ahead to the future, looking forward to what's next, or look back at the past, dwelling on things that could have or should have been, and we never focus on the here and now. Now that the plane has landed and we are back in our true mission field, we have to focus on the task at hand. We can remember all that God did in Jamaica and thank Him for it, but we are here now, not in Jamaica. Even if you didn't go to Jamaica, whether you supported me or prayed for me and the team, or if you're just reading this because you were curious about what happened while we were there, ask yourself this: What is the task at hand? What does God have planned for you right now? Who has He called you to be, and what does He want you to do right now? Whatever your task may be, do it well. All for the glory of God.
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http://www.facebook.com/v/10150763695974880
If you read my last Jamaica post, this is the same video I posted before. Even if you've already seen it, it's worth watching again.
This is a video my friend Andrew made to sum up the whole trip and the mark it left on us. Even if all that I wrote doesn't give you a clear idea of just how much the Lord did for us, in us, and through us while we were there, I hope this video does it justice for you.
Once again, thank you to everyone who supported me in my mission trip to Jamaica over spring break. It would not have been possible without you, and I was very blessed to be able to go because of you. So thank you!
If you read my previous post about Jamaica, congratulations on surviving the whole thing. Even if you didn't make it through the whole thing, you know that God worked in some amazing ways over the course of the week in Port Maria and even up to this point. He's taught me so much since that Saturday when we boarded the plane headed to Jamaica, so I'm going to try my best to keep this as organized as possible. I'm sorry if it gets scattered. And I apologize to anyone who managed to get through my last Jamaica post because there's still much more to read. This post will probably be longer than the last one.
Up until this trip, I had never really had any visions to speak of. Instead, God typically spoke to me through what I like to call "visuals": scenarios or pictures of things I have seen before, or sometimes even something I am seeing right at that moment, into which the Lord speaks meaning. He then interprets those scenarios or pictures to me and applies them to real-life situations. (Maybe that's the same thing as a vision, or at least along those lines, but I have a certain idea of what visions are, and I hadn't had very many of them up to this point.) That's how the trip started out: with a particularly detailed visual. As I sat on the plane looking out the window at the wing below me, I saw heat being emitted from the engine beneath the wing. I saw this as the plane pulled onto the runway and seemingly went in circles. The anticipation of takeoff was almost suffocating. We were finally on our way to Jamaica! At least, we would be once the plane got in the air. The plane seemed to drift slowly around the runway. This whole time, the heat waves coming from the engine were wildly rushing toward the tail of the plane. Finally, the plane started rumble as it picked up speed, but it turned out that we were just moving from the waiting area to the actual runway. When the runway was finally clear and we were good to go, the plane lurched forward, speeding down the runway, and in seconds we were in the air. This whole time, God was speaking to me through all that I was seeing and experiencing. That night I shared the visual and its interpretation to my small group. As the plane rolled slowly toward the runway, I felt slightly impatient, anxious to get in the air, to hurry up and get to Jamaica, but we seemed to be going nowhere. Yet below us, the heat waves were moving just as quickly as ever all the time. At that point in time, I felt like there were people on the trip who may have been feeling like they were not growing in Christ at the same pace as everyone else around them. I didn't know who those people would be; I was just interpreting the visual—or more accurately, God was interpreting it for me. To those people, it seemed like everyone around them was always on fire, always walking closely with the Lord and always ready to act when they hear His voice. But they felt like they kept picking up momentum only to lose it moments later. In response to this interpretation, God gave me some encouragement for anyone feeling that way (if this is you, listen up): You may feel like you're moving slowly and getting nowhere compared to everyone around you, but in reality, you are moving toward the runway for takeoff. Everything you are doing serves as another step toward the ultimate goal the Lord has set before you. Be happy for the people around you who are on fire for Christ! Be happy that they are growing, because they are the ones who will help you grow. Then when the plane finally gets in the air, it is by no effort of the passengers, but by the skill of the pilot and the physics of the plane and the air around it. When you finally reach a point of noticeable growth, be humble. You have no right to take pride in getting yourself to that place of growth because it is only by the capable hand of the Lord, our Pilot, that you were able to get there. And He is the One who is keeping you there. And when you touch back down on land, be ready to exit the plane and do what you came to do. Don't forget that you would not be at your destination if it hadn't been for the plane and its pilot. God teaches us in our spiritual highs and times of growth, and He uses these times to draw us closer to Him. But as the spiritual high fades, we must not forgot what we have learned. We are coming off of the spiritual high for a reason: to share and put into action what we learned in that time of growth. Don't be disappointed to get off of the plane, but don't be too excited to stay in your destination for too long. Temptation and trials often come with spiritual lows, so be on your guard. But don't forget to serve others with what you learned in your spiritual highs.
So... yeah. That's the wisdom God shared with us to start off the week. After small group/family time, Daniel, one of the Wesley directors, gave a message on service. He presented three main qualities of good, God-pleasing service: authenticity, consideracy, and excellence. True, humble, loving service must be authentic, coming from a heartfelt desire to serve. It has to be considerate, putting others before oneself in every way possible, considering not just others' outward needs but also their thoughts. (Some people may not want assistance with some things because it might make them feel inferior or useless.) And we must strive for excellence in all that we do, never doing things halfway. After the message, along with a time for prayer and worship, Josh pulled a few people aside to have a Bible study, which was awesome! He was hungry for more of what God had for us, so he put himself, and several others, in a position to be ready to receive it. While Daniel was speaking, God reminded me of an image someone had shared with me before: humility is not just the act of putting others above oneself but also the act of lowering oneself below others, like several people on a ladder, each trying to get lower to lift the others higher. The lower we make ourselves, the higher the Lord appears to us. So during our group discussion, God made this challenge to us: Compete with one another to be the lowest of all slaves—humble yourselves below those around you, and if everyone does the same, John 3:30 ("He must increase, but I must decrease") will become a reality. This challenge came from Romans 12:10: "Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor." (I just remembered that I heard this challenge at one of the meetings for the Montenegro mission trip that I will not be going on anymore. So even though I'm not able to go, there was a reason I was part of the team, even if only temporarily.) The topic of service brought up the matter of our weaknesses that hinder us from serving to our fullest potential, which eventually turned into our general weaknesses, doubts, and fears. It was a very productive conversation because exposing these weaknesses allowed the whole group to pray against those things. And we were all encouraged too, either by knowing that we are not the only ones who suffer from our weaknesses, or by shedding light on how to deal with those weaknesses, or simply by knowing that our brothers and sisters in Christ were praying for us.
All of that was day one, and not even the first full day. The first full day came with all new surprises from God. As expected, seeing the Jamaicans dance at church and getting to dance with them filled everyone with a lot of joy. But not only did I get to see the joy that the Jamaicans so obviously demonstrated, but I also got to experience some of their hospitality that morning when one of the women saw that I didn't have a program and shared hers with me throughout the service as needed. They made all of us feel very welcome, as if we were regular attenders at the church. Toward the beginning of the service, they recognized everyone who had birthdays or anniversaries coming up that week and prayed for families that were in need or experiencing difficult times. They even sang for one of the girls on our team whose birthday was that day. They made the church body feel like a real family, sharing simple everyday blessings and hardships, showing themselves to be a community that genuinely cares about its members.
Later we had our first night of identity prayer, a lot more people were interested in it than I expected. The idea behind identity prayer is that God will give us new names in heaven based on who He has made us to be and His plans for us. This name is grounded in our identity in Christ. Some biblical background for identity prayer can be found in Isaiah 62:2:
"The nations shall see your righteousness, and all the kings your glory, and you shall be called by a new name that the mouth of the Lord will give."So what identity prayer is is asking God to reveal to us the name that He plans to give us in heaven. This can be an actual name, like Michael or Hanani (I'll explain my name in a little bit), which will have a specific meaning behind it, or it can be a title or a spiritual "occupation" like Peacemaker or Giver of Life. These names are meant to be encouraging, because they show us how the Lord sees us, and they are to lead us to strive to live up to the name, because they show us God's plan for our lives. We had some really cool and inspiring names come up throughout the week. In addition to actual names, we also talked a little bit about why we choose to make our names known or to keep it private. Spiritual names are meant to be between God and the person He gives the name to. It's a personal thing. But at the same time, I know that sharing my name helps me believe the name belongs to me, which enables me to live it out better.
I had actually heard about spiritual names and identity prayer before the Jamaica trip, but I decided to sit in on the meeting and maybe get some confirmation from God that the name I believed I had received really was my name. I'm still looking into it because my name situation is a little weird. Senior year of high school, I was reading the Bible, just jumping around to different passages, and I came across an interesting name. I completely forgot about it until last year. Last spring I was talking with some friends about spiritual names, but I didn't really consider asking God for my own name. Maybe I did ask, but I don't remember. Either way, I didn't receive my name then. But then over the summer, for some reason I was thinking about names. Not spiritual names. Just names. I don't remember why. I was either thinking about names for kids or, for whatever reason, names that I would like to have if I ever decided to change mine. As I was thinking of these names, a set of syllables formed themselves in my mind: Hanani. It sounded like a name I had heard before, so I looked it up, and it was then that I remembered seeing the name senior year. I looked up the definition, and Hanani means "God is gracious." But God wasn't done yet. He told me that He hears me and that that would be part of my name. I knew there was a name that meant "the Lord hears," so I thought about it for a minute and remembered the story of Hagar and Ishmael: Hagar named her son Ishmael because God heard her request for a child, and Ishmael means "the Lord hears." So together, Hanani Ishmael means "by His grace, the Lord hears and responds." That definitely stood out to me because of the way that God called me to follow Him when my grandpa died. (If you haven't heard the story, this is it in a nutshell: My grandpa was a pastor, so when he passed away I prayed 2 Kings 2:9, asking God for a double portion of the Spirit He had given my grandpa; just a few months later, He answered my prayer by changing my life at my youth group's winter retreat and making me realize that I had been missing something my whole life even though I had always gone to church. I didn't deserve to be heard because I had been calling myself a Christian even though I wasn't actively living it out, but He answered me anyway.) But He still wasn't done yet. He was done for the time being, but He added more this year in Jamaica. The first night of identity prayer, I asked God if the name I thought I had received was the right one for me. Then out of nowhere the name Lemuel popped into my head. I was a little hesitant to accept it as my name, or even a part of it, and I still kind of am because Lemuel doesn't sound like that great of a name. Besides, I didn't have a computer with me, so I couldn't look up the definition of the name. But I decided to look into it anyway. I went to Proverbs 31 to see if I could figure out some meaning for the name by looking at it in context. Then I became a lot more willing to accept it as part of my name. Lemuel was a king, a son who listens to authority, one who abstains from earthly pleasures in favor of righteousness, and one who speaks for those who have no voice. I pieced all that information together and came to the conclusion that Lemuel was an intercessor, someone who effectively prays on someone else's behalf. I didn't realize it until just the other day, but this was confirmed last year when Michael, my Freshley small group leader, called me a prayer warrior, and again this year in Jamaica when Josh prayed for me Thursday night and shared a vision of an army with me on the frontlines. Then shortly after arriving back in Athens, I read a devotion out of Oswald Chamber's My Utmost for His Highest that said that God doesn't make promises just to show us that He keeps them but also to show us that He has ownership of us. In other words, if you hear and receive a promise from the Lord, He is saying, "You are Mine, and because you are Mine I will keep my promise, and you will know that you are Mine." A few days later, I remembered that I still had no idea what Lemuel actually means, so I looked it up, and it means "belonging to God." I don't know if that means anything to anyone, but for reasons I can't seem to put into words, it meant something to me. So anyway, now my name is Lemuel Hanani Ishmael: an intercessor belonging to God whose voice is heard and graciously answered on behalf of myself and on the behalf of those I pray for. So that's how the first night of identity prayer went for me. And throughout the week, I became more and more aware of the reality of my identity, and I am still coming to fully understand who God has called me to be and how to live in that identity. I have been learning a lot about my identity these last few weeks. For example, God has been giving me a lot of advice and encouragement for other people, and I realized that because my identity is in Christ and Ishmael means "the Lord hears," I also hear the Lord because His Spirit is in me, and the Spirit hears; so I have been hearing from God on behalf of those who needed to hear from Him. I have the characteristics of Jesus because Christ lives in me. I've been seeing Lemuel in me a lot too, as God has been answering a lot of my prayers in very noticeable ways. I'm still relatively new to the idea of fervent, ceaseless, effective prayer, so it's been cool to see the Lord answer my prayers in very specific ways that I can actually see and know that God answered me. He also confirmed to me that Lemuel is the right name for me when He led me to Proverbs 21:1 ("The king's heart is a stream of water in the hand of the Lord; He turns it wherever He will") after we had some prophetic encouragement time a few weeks after Jamaica, and my friend Tenaya said that she saw me as a river going wherever the path of the river turned, showing that I go wherever the Lord directs me without trying to rebel and keep going in the direction I was already headed. Anyway, I hope all that I learned that night puts into perspective just how much the rest of the team received throughout the week.
The next day was the first workday. My small group was assigned to make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for all the groups to take to their work sites for lunch, so we got up early that morning and got to work. After breakfast, we packed up our lunches and gear and boarded the buses to go to our work sites. I was on the farm that day, and what a first workday it was! We spent the day getting rid of the weeds on the side of a mountain where McGuiver, the man who owns the farm, grows a wide variety of fruits and vegetables. The girls pulled up the smaller weeds while the guys chopped down the bigger weeds with machetes. After our lunch break, we got back to work, but the breeze caught my attention, causing me to stop and listen. I felt like God was very present at that moment, not in the way people like to say a lot at worship services when everyone is feeling emotional and drawn into the music, but in a way that it actually felt like God was about to speak audibly. He didn't, but it was close enough. As I listened, I asked God to speak, and I started praying. As I prayed, words flowed through my mind, and at some point my thoughts seemed to transform from my own thoughts into the Lord's voice. He said, "I will show you My glory." Just to make sure we're clear, I didn't hear Him say this audibly. The words ran through my mind as a thought and seemed to be coming from God. When I "heard" this, I excitedly asked Him how He would show me His glory and where to look. He answered, "Seek My face in the trees," so I looked around at the trees surrounding us in the jungle we were working in. I saw bright red flowers on the treetops all around us. His glory and His presence was surrounding us, uniting us as one body of Christ by closing us in together. When I saw that, I doubted that I had seen the Lord's glory in the way He wanted to show it to me yet, because I felt like there was an interpretation for what I saw that I hadn't received yet, but then He said in the process of saying something else, "I have shown you My glory." It turned out that He was showing me the way He was going to show His glory throughout the week: through the unity of the team and the way He speaks to individuals in the body of Christ in order for whole communities to hear Him, and how things that one individual hears may be connected to what another person hears.
Then He told me to wander. We were back to chopping and pulling weeds, and McGuiver was clearing a pathway off to the side, so I was led to go in the direction he had gone. I didn't go very far, though, so God made this convicting, piercing comment: "Show Me your glory." I have been placing my glory in my reputation, not in Jesus Christ, which was why I couldn't find the boldness and humility to follow McGuiver. I didn't want to do something that might put my reputation at risk, whatever it may be.
As we finished hacking away at the bigger weeds and proceeded to pull the smaller weeds out by hand, God revealed a reflection to me of Jamaican versus American faith. We don't have weeds in America like the giant ones we had to cut down in Jamaica, but we have more of the smaller weeds everywhere. The Jamaican church focuses a lot on "being good," as one of the small group leaders mentioned during our leadership meeting Sunday night, while the focus of the growing American church is a lot more on prayer and visions and encouragement, etc. The Jamaican church has a lot of surface issues to deal with in their society—and of course America does too—but the American church looks at the inner spiritual needs that are harder to handle. The larger weeds we hacked at with machetes, easily cutting them down, while we had to get down on our knees to pull out the smaller weeds by hand. Too often we leave those smaller weeds untended, and they grow to become those larger weeds. We in America look at pride, anger, and envy, and we don't do anything about it, but those are the most dangerous weeds: the ones we ignore. We need to get down on our knees in prayer to uproot even the tiniest of weeds before they can grow into bigger weeds that suffocate the crops we want to grow. I found out later that the whole metaphor about pulling up weeds by the roots applied to the life of a fellow small group leader, but not necessarily with weeds representing sin. Her "weeds" were the things in her life that she was holding on to that she needed to let go of. As she began uprooting her weeds, God took her to Isaiah 61:3, calling her an oak of righteousness, "the planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified." This image of weeds and oaks of righteousness has been coming up over and over again in the last two months. Ironically, the mural we were painting at the infirmary was of a tree, and Isaiah 61:3 was painted next to the tree as a caption when the mural was finished. A few weeks ago I had a vision (an actual vision this time, not a visual) of a tree being uprooted from a garden full of weeds and replanted in a rock—the Rock. Before the Jamaica trip, I went to the "Prophetic Rooms" at Wesley, where the interns give prophetic encouragement, and one of the things they said to encourage me was that they saw a large rock representing stability, and they saw that I was firmly rooted in Christ. I don't think it's coincidence that the words "rock" and "rooted" went together both in the Prophetic Rooms and in my vision. Anyway, God showed me a lot of unity in His work through this one revelation about roots, trees, and weeds.
What God taught me Wednesday and Thursday kind of blended together. Wednesday at the work site I saw a lot of unity, both within the team and between the team and some of the students at the school we were working at. Some of the kids helped us clean up when were done working for the day, and some of us got to play soccer, dance, and sing with them. As we finished laying the last of the cinderblocks to complete the wall, I got to talk with a student named Douwarne. He reminded me a lot of myself. He was quiet and reserved, but he seemed curious and wanted to make conversation, so he found things to ask me about America. We talked about school, my lack of a girlfriend (haha), and my abstinence from alcohol, which he seemed surprised about. After only being exposed to American college students who come to Jamaica to party and drink, seeing a group of Americans who don't drink seemed to be new to him. It's sad that that has become the image we Americans have made for ourselves in the world. Anyway, it was cool getting to talk to Douwarne and hopefully being a positive influence and a light for Christ to him.
As God spoke to us more and more about identity throughout the week, it all seemed to reach a culminating point around this time in the week. I've realized that I have a lot of expectations of myself, and I project a lot of my expectations on other people—not that I expect the same things of other people that I expect of myself, but I believe that they have the same expectations of me that I have of myself. And that often defines who I am and what I do. I don't want to do anything that would draw unnecessary attention to myself by doing something that nobody would expect of me, something that might change their perception of who I am. And as the Lord revealed this to me, I realized the reason for spiritual names, at least in my case: God defines us and shows us where He wants to lead us by giving us names with a calling. It's easier for me to do something if I know that it's expected of me, so having a name with a calling helps me to know what I'm expected to do. For example, to me Lemuel means intercessor, so because God and most of the Port Maria team, as well as the Montenegro team and a few other people, expect me to pray, it makes it easier to pray. Knowing that there are people depending on me to pray serves as a reminder to me that I need to pray. I found this to be true when I was talking to my friend Alex on the Montenegro team and I said that I'd be praying for the team, and she said, "You know, I actually believe you. A lot of people just say that, but I really believe you will pray for us." That was really encouraging to me, and I hope she knows just how encouraging it was. A couple days later, I found myself thinking about what she said, and I immediately started praying for the Montenegro team and their trip, which starts tomorrow, May 15th. Speaking of which, please pray for them as they finish getting everything together for the trip, and pray that God would go with them and protect them and establish their work in His name, and that He would be glorified in everything they do.
Okay, now back to Jamaica. I would say that Thursday was my favorite day, but there was so much awesome stuff that happened throughout the week that it's hard to say if I actually had a single favorite day at all. But I'll go ahead and say that Thursday was my favorite day. Why? Well, after our extra half hour of sleep and after eating breakfast, we headed to Trevor's church to spend time praying and worshiping the God who allowed us to spend such an amazing week in Jamaica. It was incredible seeing so many people gathered in one room passionately praying, especially the freshmen. Andrew led worship as we prayed, and Bob, the director of Wesley, interjected prayer topics to direct our focus, because united prayer has a special place in God's eyes, as Jesus said in Matthew 18:19-20: "Again I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by My Father in heave. For where two or three are gathered in My name, there am I among them." Toward the end of our time there (I always forget how long we were there; it felt like an hour or less, but I'm pretty sure it was longer than that, I'm just not sure how much longer), Bob opened the floor to anyone who wanted to pray for anything specific. The idea was not to give any explanation, but to just take stage and pray out loud so that everyone else could agree with the prayers. Seeing so many of the freshmen and leaders go up front and pray for the Jamaicans and for Athens and for our team with such complete surrender, giving everything to God, was amazing.
But the blessings of the day didn't stop there. After that we went to Galina Primary to play with the kids, who were having field day. I didn't really know what to do for most of the time we were there because I'm not very outgoing, and I'm not great at playing with kids. But when Ashley, who was carrying a little girl in her arms, said that the girl wanted to get on someone's shoulders, that was something I could do. I don't even know the little girl's name, but she seemed to enjoy it, and I loved it. I never really thought about it until now, but that's how God wants us to come to Him: He wants us to seek Him, and He wants to carry us on His shoulders—He wants us to be completely dependent on Him, unable and unwilling to do anything apart from Him—and He wants us to take joy in knowing that He is completely in control, because He loves it when we depend on Him and ask Him to serve us in the ways He wants to serve us.
We didn't stay at Galina Primary for long. We left in two groups at different times because we only had one bus. The other two were either at Kermit's church or at the infirmary, where the groups were finishing up the roofing of the church and the mural at the infirmary, in addition to whatever was left to paint on the overhang at the infirmary. Back at the Casa Maria, we just hung out until dinner, then we went to our team meeting. It still gives me chills to think about that night. All week I had been wanting to pray for each person in my small group family individually, and I had already gotten the opportunity to pray for Josh and Jack, so when Jasmine, one of the interns, said what we would be doing that night, I got really excited because God was showing me even more unity in the desires He had given us. Each of the leaders went to the interns and directors to receive prayer for an outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and then we went to our freshmen and prayed for them. I have to admit, even though God has called me Lemuel, an intercessor, I feel like I don't know what to pray a lot of times, so praying for the freshmen was really revealing to me because I felt like I was just praying what I knew to pray instead of letting the Spirit pray for me. But I know the Lord answered anyway and will continue to answer. And it was cool praying for each of the freshmen with Rebekah because one of the jokes about Wesley style/Korean style prayer/the "holy roar" (although it's not really a joke) is that if you don't know what to pray for, you can just listen to the person next to you and steal their ideas, and it seemed like Rebekah definitely knew what to pray for because the Spirit was praying for her. And it was awesome getting to pour out into the freshmen individually, with specific prayers for each one of them. It made it feel like we really are a family, every single one of us.
After we prayed for the freshmen and Josh prayed for me and Rebekah, we went to our small groups, where we basically debriefed on the entire week, since we didn't have much time left there. Josh and I walked in late, so they caught us up, and then I shared a vision I had had the day before. I saw a map of Jamaica, like on an iPhone GPS, with the blue dot marking where we were in Port Maria, and circles radiating out from the dot. Then I saw the dot move back to Athens, GA, as were returned to the States. But as the dot moved, a copy of the dot was left in Port Maria, with waves still radiating from the city. And as we arrived back in Athens, the dot start giving off waves in Athens while the other dot continued to emit waves from Jamaica. This was meant to show that the impact we had in Jamaica would have a lasting effect, even after we were gone. The Holy Spirit would still remain in Jamaica, working with what we did and working in the places we were unable to reach in our short time there. And at the same time, the Spirit would also go with us back to Athens to work in us and through us at home. What came next blew us all away: Jack said that he had heard pretty much that exact same vision last summer at a conference in Chicago. The speaker had a map up on the wall, and she put a pin on Chicago and drew circles out from the city, and she did the same thing with Atlanta. Eventually the circles overlapped each other, symbolizing the way that the Spirit's work becomes known all over the world, and His work in one place serves as encouragement to His disciples in another place, which spurs them on to even greater things in Jesus' name, which then encourages more people until the whole world is one big dot emanating waves of the Holy Spirit. And this is being proven even now. While I was in Athens, I heard about a lot of stuff that was going on at home in Woodstock and Kennesaw, GA, there's been revival among a lot of my friends in State College, Pennsylvania, and I've been hearing about all that's been going on at Bethel Church in California for a while now. In fact, this past semester, Bethel chose to target Athens as a center for ministry because they believe that God is going to move powerfully in and through this city. So as Bethel sent teams on mission trips throughout the world, they sent a team to Athens to encourage the body of believers here. They went to Africa, eastern Europe, southeast Asia, South America, and of all places, Athens, Georgia. In addition to these "dots" on the map, Wesley also sent teams to Peru and New York over spring break, and they are sending teams to Brazil, Cambodia, and Montenegro in the next few weeks. Again, if you could be praying for the Brazil and Cambodia teams along with Montenegro, I'd really appreciate it. I also have friends going to Israel and back to Peru, another friend who is going to North Africa with Café 1040 (he actually left today), a friend from Puerto Rico, and a friend from Japan who came to UGA as an exchange student who came to know Jesus Christ while he was here and will now be taking Him back to Japan with him! And there's so much more going on in the Kingdom, as we head out to work at camps this summer. My friend Meg is working with Lifeworks in Colorado; Bryan is working at a camp in Montana; Taylor, John, Katie, and Anna are working at a camp in Maine; Amanda is working at Snowbird in North Carolina; and I'm working with Lauren and Devin at Camp Highland in Elijay, GA, starting next Monday. I can't wait to see all that the Lord has planned for this summer!
Anyway, back on track with Jamaica, Friday came around all too soon. But we got to enjoy some time together and with the other Jamaica teams, which was a lot of fun. And that evening all of the small groups sat together at dinner, which surprisingly hadn't happened until then. And then we had the talent show, Jessica and Jasmine gave the leaders encouraging notes, and I think we had the last night of identity prayer that night. The last one might have been Thursday night. I don't remember. Either way, identity had become a huge part of the trip, and I later found out that identity was a big part of all of the Jamaica trips, which showed even more unity, which is really cool. God was staying true to His word in my visual at the beginning of the week, when He showed me the "fire in the forest" flowers and told me that He would show me unity.
Even though the trip was just about over, God wasn't done speaking to me about the trip. As the plane took off the next day, I looked out the window back at Jamaica, and I saw clouds covering the whole island. There were no clouds over the water. Just over the island. The iPhone GPS vision came back to me, and the Lord connected that vision to what I was seeing at that moment: the Spirit of God was hovering over the entire island of Jamaica, ready to rain down and fall upon the Jamaicans and bring revival throughout the island. Our work was done there for the time being, but the Lord promised that He will never stop working there. He will always be working to bring the Jamaicans to know Him fully, and He is preparing the land, even now, for next year's Freshley team so that we can know Him more.
Remember that airplane visual I mentioned all the way at the beginning of this post? Well, I originally thought that it was about our work that we would be doing in Jamaica, but it turned out that it was actually about our return to the States. Obviously, the whole Jamaica trip was a huge spiritual high, but for a lot of us it was a gradual high, if that makes sense. Instead of being a kind of spiritual high that can never be reached outside of a mission trip or some intense spiritual experience, the kind that of spiritual high feeling that can easily be lost in an instant after returning from the trip, this was a lasting kind of spiritual high, the kind that leaves an impact on our way of life. The Lord brought us to Jamaica for a reason, and we were only able to be there by His grace. He brought us to the point of take-off, and Jamaica was that point where the plane was stable in the air in a constant state of growth and forward motion. But the plane has to land eventually, and so did our spring break mission trip, so we had to come back to America. Now we have to remember all that the Lord taught us while we were Jamaica and use it to glorify Him in all that we do.
One of the things that Josh emphasized throughout the week was one of the main themes of Freshley this entire semester: the time is now. We also seem to look ahead to the future, looking forward to what's next, or look back at the past, dwelling on things that could have or should have been, and we never focus on the here and now. Now that the plane has landed and we are back in our true mission field, we have to focus on the task at hand. We can remember all that God did in Jamaica and thank Him for it, but we are here now, not in Jamaica. Even if you didn't go to Jamaica, whether you supported me or prayed for me and the team, or if you're just reading this because you were curious about what happened while we were there, ask yourself this: What is the task at hand? What does God have planned for you right now? Who has He called you to be, and what does He want you to do right now? Whatever your task may be, do it well. All for the glory of God.
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http://www.facebook.com/v/10150763695974880
If you read my last Jamaica post, this is the same video I posted before. Even if you've already seen it, it's worth watching again.
This is a video my friend Andrew made to sum up the whole trip and the mark it left on us. Even if all that I wrote doesn't give you a clear idea of just how much the Lord did for us, in us, and through us while we were there, I hope this video does it justice for you.
Sunday, May 6, 2012
Questions for a Growing Life with Christ
During church at Watkinsville First Baptist today, Pastor Carlos asked a question that took me back to Christmas break freshman year of college. I had gone with my mom to visit Pastor Fletcher, her childhood pastor, and we started talking about missions. As he probed into my life to try to determine if my heart was in the right place for missions, he asked the exact same question Pastor Carlos asked today: How is your prayer life? That question got me thinking the first time I heard it, and it got me thinking again today. It's a tough question to answer. You can say "My prayer life is good" or "It's bad," but it's not the kind of question that can be satisfied with that kind of answer. You have to go into detail, but even when you go into detail, no matter how good your prayer life is, there's always room for improvement, and no matter how "bad" your prayer life is, there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ. And it's hard to determine what constitutes a good prayer life.
Anyway, when Pastor Carlos asked that question, this time instead of making me search my mind for a way to answer it, it made me ask more questions. Questions like "How is your prayer life?" are great for monitoring one's personal spiritual growth and should therefore be asked regularly. God asked me several more questions throughout the course of the service today, and I thought I'd share them.
Anyway, when Pastor Carlos asked that question, this time instead of making me search my mind for a way to answer it, it made me ask more questions. Questions like "How is your prayer life?" are great for monitoring one's personal spiritual growth and should therefore be asked regularly. God asked me several more questions throughout the course of the service today, and I thought I'd share them.
- How is your prayer life?
- What has the Lord been teaching you lately?
- What is the Lord teaching you right now?
- Where has God brought you, and where has He brought you from?
- Who is God to you?
- Are you making anyone or anything your god besides the Lord?
- How do you see and relate to the Lord?
- Who are you to God?
- Who/what defines you?
- What are you passionate about?
- What is God passionate about? Do your passions line up with His?
- Who/what do you identify yourself with?
- Who/what do you represent?
- Are you representing well?
- Who/what represents you?
Friday, May 4, 2012
"A man's steps are from the Lord; how then can man understand his way?" ~ Proverbs 20:24
I never noticed this before, but Proverbs 20:24 isn’t a rhetorical question. It actually has an answer. It’s a trick question: “A man’s steps are from the Lord; how then can man understand his way?” By knowing the Lord and His ways. Maybe that’s obvious, but I thought it was cool.
Wednesday, May 2, 2012
The Armor of God vs. The Progression of Temptation
So I'm sitting here in Snelling, struggling to study for a test I have tomorrow morning, which I've been trying to study for all day, and I've been realizing more and more that I have pretty much no hope on this test. My only hope is God. So I decided to take a break and spend some time with Him, since I've been trying to study by my own useless wisdom for too long. I pulled out my journal and decided to read some of what I've written in the past, and I came across one of my very first entries from early last summer. I'm just going to copy it here.
Matthew 4:1-11
Satan tempts us by attacking out identity. "If you are a child of God..."
What is tempting to one person may not be tempting to another. Satan pokes and prods at the points that are most tempting to you individually. The progression of temptation that he used against Jesus is the same progression he uses against us: physical needs, our power and identity in Christ, and finally our spiritual loyalties. If he can make us idolize our possessions and physical needs over God, then he has no need to tempt us any further; he has done his job. But if we resist, he then attacks our faith in the authority God has given us. If we don't believe that God has given us power to conquer sin and perform miracles, if we don't believe that God has given us His power and authority, then Satan is overpowering us with his lies. God has given us authority as His sons and daughters; don't let the enemy convince you otherwise. But if he can't get through to us by that method, he has one more tactic: attack our loyalty to God Himself. He will try to draw our worship away from God. He will offer us things that seem better than what God has for us, and he will try to convince us that his ways are better than God's ways. If we begin to follow the world and get distracted from God, Satan is winning us over. Don't let him win! Fight back!
Ephesians 6:10-18
We have this armor as our defense and our strength against the enemy.
- The belt of truth holds everything together; without truth, our armor will fall apart.
- Readiness from the gospel of peace. Always be prepared to fight with peace; the Christian who is at peace is a fearsome warrior for the gospel, so always have peace on hand.
- The shield of faith. The stronger the shield, the better the defense you have against the enemy, so let your faith increase to thwart the enemy's plans and beat down his lies.
- The helmet of salvation. A helmet protects the mind, and in the same way the salvation God has granted us protects our minds and gives us peace and confidence. Our salvation is the symbol of who we are; it distinguishes us from everyone else. And if we remember our salvation, nothing can ever shake us.
- The Word, the sword of the Spirit. Take up your sword! Be in the Word, and be prepared to fight!
Something about this was encouraging to me in my struggle to study, so I hope it's encouraging to someone else too, whether it has to do with finals or not.
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