Gua-te-la-mal-a '07

As many of you know, I spent my Spring Break in Guatemala on a mission trip. This was my third jaunt to the land of volcanoes and it always amazes me how God does something new in and through me each time. Here are some highlights and lessons from my trip.

1) Victor, Ingrid, Jose and Maenor are students at Escuela Integrada with whom I got to share Christ. We had gone to one of the many ruins in Antigua to eat pizza and play with the students when suddenly, the groundskeeper comes out yelling at the kids telling them if they didn't respect the place they would never be allowed back. Come to find out, someone had written on a wall with a black marker. There was a private school there too and the principal of Escuela Integrada was highly upset that the guy assumed it was her kids because they were from the "poor school." Turns out, it was one of her kids, but that's beside the point. On the way back from the school, Victor was asking why the man was so mad. Somehow James (one of our group members) turned the question to the gospel...this is where I came in. I was able to tag team with James and share the gospel with Victor. When we got back to the school, several kids were really upset because their friend was in trouble for writing on the wall and was claiming she did it because she was possessed by demons. This gave me another opportunity to pray with the whole group of them and to share the Truth with a few who asked if I believed in spirits. That was a powerful time!

2) This Christmas, my cousin's fiance taught me the steps to solving the Rubik's Cube. I was passing on my new-found skill when it hit me that the first step is to make a cross. Then, as you do the second step, you have to continually go back to the cross and make sure you don't lose it. What an illustration! I took that and developed it a little further to make a gospel presentation as I solved the Cube (ask me sometime and I'll show you). Our first day in Guatemala, I was able to use the Cube to witness to a whole table full of teenagers at the mall. We followed it up with tracts and then prayed with them. What a crazy thing! Who knows what God's gonna' use!?!

3) Short term, long-term, career. These are the types of missionaries out there and I have up until now, only been the first, but this week while I was in Guatemala, God confirmed to me (again, because I've felt this call since Junior High) that He wants me to step it up and go long. So, I put in my application with the International Mission Board (IMB)...now to wait and see what God has next. My new friend Paula, who was part of our team, is in the same boat and we even talked about becoming roommates when we both get there...to Antigua, that is.

4) Use what you have. This was the devotional I read from "At His Feet" to our group on our last day. The passage was when Christ fed the 5,000 but the devotional had a different take from what I've heard before. It focused on the role of the disciples who only had 5 loaves and 2 fish that they'd bummed off some kid in the crowd. They offered what they had and Christ used it to feed a multitude. The author of the devotional was telling us that it's ok to pray for God to touch the nations and save the lost, but never to discount our role in that. What Jesus told the disciples when they urged Him to send the folks away to go buy food was "you give them something to eat." I'm sure their thought was, "Are you kidding me?" Obviously, He was not. It doesn't matter how small your offering to the Savior, He will multiply and use whatever you have to give.

Well, Those are some highlights and lessons from Guatemala '07. There is so much more that I could share, but for the sake of those who don't like to read lengthy blogs, I'll refrain. Follow the link below to see photos of our trip. There are a lot there, so I won't feel bad if you skim through them, but make sure you get to the part with Lake Atitlan. What a gorgeous bit of God's creation!

http://good-times.webshots.com/slideshow/558280195XYzMCN

And thanks a million to those who prayed and gave so I could go!

It's Not About Me

It really would be nice if I could remember that. There would be no posts like the previous one in which I confess discontent and distorted views of God.

Comfortingly, we can see most of the Bible characters learn this same lesson. Great men of the faith have also been here, done this. However taking comfort from being in good company isn't really where I was going with this.

I just want to assure the blogworld out there that I do know that life's not about me. God's not here to make me happy, but He does intend to glorify Himself through me. If that means through my blessings or through my struggles, to God be the Glory. John Piper says (adapting from his reading of C.S. Lewis) that "God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him." Not in the stuff He gives us, but IN HIM. I pray for all of us, you, me and my friends who neither blog nor lurk, that we will discover what that means to be satisfied in God and thus to glorify Him with our lives.

What's the Catch?

During another enlightening Starbuck's experience (in which I also discovered that although caramel and chocolate are both yummy, the "Grande Caramel Mocha" is just ok), I was confronted with a not so pretty understanding of how I view God.

I think I've been approaching my Father with an attitude of resentment because I feel like He's been holding out on me and I'm not getting all the good stuff He intends for me to have because there's something I still have to do. In the back of my mind, I come to Him in prayer with the mindset that He doesn't intend to really answer me on the things that I most especially want because somewhere along the way I failed to hit the right button (or perhaps I somehow hit the wrong button) and He's still punishing me for it. I keep thinking that the promises He gives us in Scripture come with a secret catch, some condition I haven't met and for that reason, I'm unworthy of His fulfilling them in my life.

Oh, deep down I know better, but that doesn't transfer over into the way I pray. I still pray assuming God's not going to answer me...not because He can't, but because He simply doesn't want to. Attributing that kind of cruelty and capriciousness to God is dangerous, foolhearty and downright dumb. I know God is GOOD and His desires for me are more than I can ask or imagine. The problem comes with my human impatience. Because God isn't answering in my time frame, I assume He doesn't care and isn't interested in my affairs. Because I've been asking for the same thing for 13 years, I've got it in my head that I've already got my answer and that answer is "no." Because I think God has said "no" to my request, I guess I feel like He's denying me something good. I feel He's chosen against me. And so insues the petulant fit, much like that of a child who asks for candy in the grocery store checkout and is denied her request. Forget that the parent has good reason for denying the request for candy...I want it and I want it NOW! Ok, sorry.

If God is like the parent in the grocery store, the petulant fit doesn't make Him want to hurry and honor my request, but to keep withholding until I grow up a little and am mature enough to handle what He has for me. But, in the meantime, He has already blessed me with so much. When I stop and take stock of my blessings, I find that I'm blessed beyond measure and way beyond what I deserve. I must remind myself often and regularly that I am so blessed that I can't even begin to count the ways.

Does anyone else share this struggle?

Covenant

To go on a mission trip with Houston's First Baptist, you have to sign a covenant saying you will pay for the full cost of the trip, you won't abandon the group or do anything inappropriate or disrespectful, you will be accountable to the leader of the group and respect his/her decisions, etc, etc.

And then came #6. "I will be faithful to daily prayer and devotions in preparation for this trip, as well as faithfully attending the Church I represent. If I struggle with these spiritual disciplines, I will seek help immediately."

I think God is trying to push me past my sentiments in the previous blog and show me the need for a more disciplined daily time with Him. I have already sought help with this from the commenter of the previous blog, but now I am beginning to realize that it's a legitimate need in my life.

I've been depending on those growth spurts to keep me going and leaned on previous times of intimacy rather than seeking daily intimacy through devotional bible reading and prayer. I've also depended too much on the previous "knowledge about God and His Word" gleaned from years of theological education, rather than seeking to really KNOW Him and truly cherish His Word. This is going to call for a change in daily time management and habits. If you're out there reading this...pray for me. Thanks!