How do I say thanks to every person I
have had the pleasure of sharing moments in time with this last year?
Wife, mamma to two little women, nurse
and missionary working in one of the greatest culturally diverse,
secular cities in the Americas can lead to the schedule that got away
and so I must say a good steep in God’s presence is a rare occasion
these days! But amidst life’s busy craze, God has graced me with
His much needed presence! It has been here in God’s presence where
I have marveled at how He has taken care of myself and my family,
carrying us through a tough year and leaving our cup fuller than it
was before we started. I am struck by the wholeness of Gods’ plan
for everything. I see a great creator and inventor God who
effortlessly formulated and now sustains each end of the natural
world from the galaxies right down to the microscopic atom. These far
from understood realities blow my mind of course but I would have to
admit this is not what draws me to him most – I am utterly and
reverently drawn to God because not only did He choose to play his
hand at creator and sustainer of everything physical but He
purposefully and intentionally chose to give me a heart and soul for
the purpose of relationship - with Him and the world.
However you like to define the essence
of the human, be it the word “spirit”, or “heart”, or “inner
being”, God cares immensely for this part of us – He cares so
much about it in fact that He fabricated this part of us to be
eternal, with the hopes we would choose to be in relationship with
Him forever –(as a side note I would like to state my mere mention
here regarding “eternal soul” fails miserably to pay credit to
this monumental part of God’s design – I apologize but I vow to
stick to the point)! So back to how God purposefully planned to care
for our hearts (the word I will choose); there are four means
obvious to me by which I know God cares for our hearts; 1. the
timeless truths of His written word, 2. through His very own presence
of the Holy Spirit, 3. through the world He created for us to live in
(ie. Nature, animals, technology etc) – and 4. (which I find most
interesting) through relationship with Him and with people – the
people namely being His “body” or group of individuals whose
lives have been transformed by the death and resurrection of Jesus
Christ. This group 4 was not an afterthought, it was very well
thought out in fact, and His word – the bible - clearly
demonstrates on a big picture scale God’s attempts throughout
history to have relationship with us and for us to have relationship
with each other.
It is through number 4, this group of
individuals, this body of believers that God has been taking great
care of my heart as of late. As I’ve not be able to deny the work
of His hands through the vessel of His people, my heart overflows an
intense and reverent appreciation for God and how He loves – He is
so good and I am so thankful! This summer we have had the gift of
passing through the lives and hearts of so many people, from all
walks of life it seems – all possessing individual journeys of
different joys and hardships.
A college and career pastor once gave
me some words of advice which I hope never leave the fibers of my
bone marrow, “never stop learning”. And so I have been lead to
step back and ask God what is all this about, what would you have for
me as I pass in and out of the lives of a good number of people, what
would you have me learn? When God speaks it’s often in a still
small voice that whispers softly; and I hear Him say, “search for
me and I will be there, look for me in the heart and soul of this
person and I will reveal myself. You will find me in the way this
person loves their child, or in the way this person serves their
husband, or here in the way this person generously gives of his time,
her money, their possesses, opens her home, or in the way this friend
or family listens or prays ceaselessly or in the way this person you
just met offers encouragement or there in the covering you feel when
you walk into the church you’ve long missed, or over here through
the hidden note you find tucked away for later, maybe in the hug ,
hand shake or affirming look that speaks a million words of ‘we’re
with you and for you’. Search for me and find me in the vulnerable,
sincere conversation found with the least expected, see me there in
the smiling eyes of the hello’s and good-byes, look for me and I
will be there, hunt through what the world calls a mess and you will
capture what it is I’m up to and what I can teach you through the
moments of someone else’s life”. And it all seems that this
spinning world stops just long enough for me to realize in the vapors
of this life that pass me by, here in these precious moments spent
with people, I find God, and I cannot stop being thankful for how He
loves me.
The search has been so intriguing and
further simply encouraging. “As iron sharpens iron” so the lovers
of Christ sharpen me. Where do I even begin other than to say God’s
people – the people in my life whose path I have crossed in a Godly
and Christ centered way have all influenced me to keep on keeping on
– to seek God and grow deeper, and love more, and give my time, and
serve well, and practice generosity and to take heart and find
courage and to show grace and more grace to those I daily love and to
be a good friend and to spend my time wisely. The list goes on
people, but this is it, this is what I’ve been given this last year
and I have to share it because this is GOD, this is how he loves. He
puts people in our lives to sharpen us to make us stronger to push us
on, to lift our weary heads, to bring hope to the hopeless and
healing for the broken hearted! God does this, He cares for the heart's of His people. And it will be through his people that others will know His
love - He will be made known by US!
So I have been reminded why we do not
do life alone, because this was never God’s design. This was never
God’s intention. No matter how messy someone’s life is now, no
matter how different someone’s life may look, with God at work,
there is love to be shared between each other, there is grace to be
given and there is a world to make known the love of CHRIST.
Jenny
