I was listening to the song Healing Rain and the lyrics "healing rain is falling down I'm not afraid" and the "not afraid" part really stood out to me. We don't heal, because we are afraid of the hurt. Any type of healing requires us to walk through pain before we can be totally free and healed. In a physical ailment, we all know things get worse before they get better. Let's use the example of a simple cut. We all know that itchy sensation that comes as part of our body's natural healing process. It's painful, it's irritating, and necessary.
The same is true for our emotional healing. We can't expect a band-aid to work when what we need is full blown open-heart surgery. Our band-aids vary. Some of use use alcohol. Some use approval and acceptance of others. For some of us it's our jobs or our careers. They are all just band-aids. We don't open our hurts to the pain of looking at the root problems. What is it that is driving us? Are we more concerned on our career or what we DO? What is it that is defining us?
Answering these questions might require some pain. It takes pain to think back on what happened when we were 5, 15, or 25 that rocked our worlds. It may be an abusive situation. It may be that person who told you one time or a hundred times that you would never amount to anything. We have sat on those words and either have replayed them in our minds as we lay in our drunken stupor thinking "well, they always told me I would never be anything and they were right." Or we may take the opposite path and we work 70 hours a week at the cost of our loved ones, but we can say "I sure proved them wrong because I AM something now!" But are you really?
Finding out who God made you to be can be painful. It most often means be willing to give up OUR plans for His. God uses the most unlikely of people to show His power because the world notices when a hopeless, helpless, lowest of the low person completely changes their life. It is by no power of their own that it is done. I know it's painful to make change. It's painful to forgive the one who hurt you. It's painful to acknowledge where we have failed. But remember, it's only though pain that we can truly begin to heal.
It's raining healing. Leave the umbrella at home and go play in the rain.
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Saturday, April 17, 2010
"Missionaries"
Like most people probably did, I grew up with a picture of what a missionary is supposed to be. A missionary is some super-human person who loves Jesus just a little too much. We would always do the Lottie Moon Missionary offering at church and put our change in our little coconuts that we would leave at the altar. To me, a missionary was someone "out there." A missionary was almost like a mythical creature to me. I don't think I ever personally knew one growing up. I think I even had this picture of a missionary as someone just a bit too radical and extreme to be in a "real" church.
Last night, I had the extreme honor and privilege to have fellowship with two missionary couples. One are from Kenya and the other from Thailand. The differences in these two couples are unbelievable, yet their similarities are amazing. One has been given the gift of preaching and teaching. He can speak to a group of 20 or a stadium of tens of thousands (and he has!). The other readily admits he can't quote scripture, he is not an eloquent speaker, but he can hold, and touch, and love those that nobody else has ever held, touched or loved before. One has attended bible college, one has attended the school of life and every hard "knock" you could imagine. Yet, both sold or gave away every earthly possession they had to travel to the other side of the world to share the love of Christ. Both heard God's voice and LISTENED.
I read the following in a book this morning: "You guys are all into that born again thing, which is great. We do need to be born again, since Jesus said that to a guy named Nicodemus. But if you tell me I have to be born again to enter the kingdom of God, I can tell you that you have to sell everything you have and give it to the poor, because Jesus said that to a guy too.....But I guess that's why God invented highlighters, so we can highlight the parts we like and ignore the rest."
See, missionaries aren't some strange, mythical group of people. Missionaries are simply TRUE Christ followers. They have read the gospel and seen it for what it truly is. They haven't picked out all the happy, feel good parts of the Bible and left the rest on the cutting room floor. I am so extremely honored to call these people not just friends, but my brothers and sisters. I'm thankful for the opportunity to spend time with them and learn more about how to take those steps of faith.
I love how just when I think I have this whole God thing figure out, he sends people into my life to totally rock my world. I am constantly reminded of how HUGE God is and how there is no way I could ever even BEGIN to comprehend Him! I pray that when I sing "my whole life is yours, I give it all surrendered to your name" that I will truly mean it. I pray for the strength to do all He has laid out for me. Arms open wide to you Lord and all that you want.....just as these amazing couples before me have done.
Last night, I had the extreme honor and privilege to have fellowship with two missionary couples. One are from Kenya and the other from Thailand. The differences in these two couples are unbelievable, yet their similarities are amazing. One has been given the gift of preaching and teaching. He can speak to a group of 20 or a stadium of tens of thousands (and he has!). The other readily admits he can't quote scripture, he is not an eloquent speaker, but he can hold, and touch, and love those that nobody else has ever held, touched or loved before. One has attended bible college, one has attended the school of life and every hard "knock" you could imagine. Yet, both sold or gave away every earthly possession they had to travel to the other side of the world to share the love of Christ. Both heard God's voice and LISTENED.
I read the following in a book this morning: "You guys are all into that born again thing, which is great. We do need to be born again, since Jesus said that to a guy named Nicodemus. But if you tell me I have to be born again to enter the kingdom of God, I can tell you that you have to sell everything you have and give it to the poor, because Jesus said that to a guy too.....But I guess that's why God invented highlighters, so we can highlight the parts we like and ignore the rest."
See, missionaries aren't some strange, mythical group of people. Missionaries are simply TRUE Christ followers. They have read the gospel and seen it for what it truly is. They haven't picked out all the happy, feel good parts of the Bible and left the rest on the cutting room floor. I am so extremely honored to call these people not just friends, but my brothers and sisters. I'm thankful for the opportunity to spend time with them and learn more about how to take those steps of faith.
I love how just when I think I have this whole God thing figure out, he sends people into my life to totally rock my world. I am constantly reminded of how HUGE God is and how there is no way I could ever even BEGIN to comprehend Him! I pray that when I sing "my whole life is yours, I give it all surrendered to your name" that I will truly mean it. I pray for the strength to do all He has laid out for me. Arms open wide to you Lord and all that you want.....just as these amazing couples before me have done.
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