I am a sojourner on the earth; hide not your commandments from me! (Psalm 119:19)
We are on our way to Ghana, West Africa tomorrow. There are so many things we need to remember: passport, malaria meds (and other vaccinations), and a hundred other little things that we will need during our trip.
Our team, mostly students, will rely on translators to communicate with the people. We will be in a foreign world, and our differences will be blatantly obvious: a large group of mostly white people in places where we may not see any other pale faces. Without translators, bus drives who know the cities, and cooks who protect our weak stomachs from unusual food that would wreak havoc, about all we could hope to do is survive. And even that would be very difficult.
This two week trip will give us condensed picture of what the psalmist describes as the whole earthly experience for the child of God.
Friday, June 03, 2005
Thursday, June 02, 2005
Experiencing the Incarnation
Last weekend we had a retreat for our mission team that will be leaving for two weeks of service in Ghana. On Friday night, we were sitting in the round and Ken said that we should speak words of encouragement to each other. And he showed us what he meant by speaking to my wife, who was in tears before he finished a complete sentence.
As someone else in the group began encouraging someone, I found this narcissistic desire welling up in me to hear words of affirmation from someone in the group (which is a little unusual b/c the first thing I usually worry about in that kind of setting is "What will I say?"). Would anyone have anything nice to say about me?
There is one girl in the group who is somewhat of an outsider, not familiar with most of the other students in the group. But I know her pretty well, so I decided to encourage her.
The atmosphere in the room that night was, how do I say it, mysterious. It was as if Jesus was in the room loving us. Someone would speak up, "The thing I love about Grant is ..." The mystery of the incarnation is still all around us.
We sang a song with a verse from Psalm 139:17 that says, "How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them!" It blew me away that He chose to live in us and express Himself through us. We were experiencing Him, hearing Him and feeling His presence as we spoke to each other. How awesome is just one of His thoughts.
That was a week ago. And only this morning did it hit me. The affirmation I longed for came as I spoke encouragement into someone else. After we were done, that young girl gave me a hug, not just a hug but an embrace. And my wife said, "Thank you for saying that to her. I was going to speak to her, but I think it meant more coming from you." I had received more by giving than I would have by quietly waiting and hoping someone would speak to me.
As someone else in the group began encouraging someone, I found this narcissistic desire welling up in me to hear words of affirmation from someone in the group (which is a little unusual b/c the first thing I usually worry about in that kind of setting is "What will I say?"). Would anyone have anything nice to say about me?
There is one girl in the group who is somewhat of an outsider, not familiar with most of the other students in the group. But I know her pretty well, so I decided to encourage her.
The atmosphere in the room that night was, how do I say it, mysterious. It was as if Jesus was in the room loving us. Someone would speak up, "The thing I love about Grant is ..." The mystery of the incarnation is still all around us.
We sang a song with a verse from Psalm 139:17 that says, "How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them!" It blew me away that He chose to live in us and express Himself through us. We were experiencing Him, hearing Him and feeling His presence as we spoke to each other. How awesome is just one of His thoughts.
That was a week ago. And only this morning did it hit me. The affirmation I longed for came as I spoke encouragement into someone else. After we were done, that young girl gave me a hug, not just a hug but an embrace. And my wife said, "Thank you for saying that to her. I was going to speak to her, but I think it meant more coming from you." I had received more by giving than I would have by quietly waiting and hoping someone would speak to me.
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