This August 2013, I feel in love.
I feel in love with not just one person but many.
A country, even.
More so, I feel in deeper love with my God. I saw His majesty and glory 36,000 feet up in the night sky. I've never seen a more beautiful sight. I've never felt so close to the cosmos.
A tingling in the back of my neck woke me up from my sleep on the airplane.
That night, I had a front row seat to the most beautiful lighting storm and meteor shower.
I felt like I was that much closer to the dwelling of God.
I was part of the medical team in Haiti. I went there expecting help and heal.
In return, I was the one that was healed.
This mission was deeper than fulfilling The Great Commission. It had a greater purpose, for me, than helping the people of God and feeding our brothers and sisters.
Usually, when people sign up for mission trips, they're excited and pumped and just totally ready to go.
I signed up with vulnerability, fear and anxiety pumping fiercely though my veins. The loud, menacing voice of anxiety sang its familiar tune of lies.
I walked straight across the flaming coals, not looking back, to the left or right. I headed forth strong.
It was weeks before our departure. The money for room and board and airfare were due soon.
Now, mind you, I went into this blindly, not looking back, not considering if I'm financially OK to go (which I sure wasn't.)
God put it on someone-who-shall-remain-unidentifed's heart to write me a check to cover my room & board expenses. All of it. Not some of it. All of it.
A few days later, I receive a text saying that my airfare had been covered. God's providence had truly shone!
I believe God hand-picked me to go. He knew my heart and life needed healing.
I came back bandaged (spiritually) and in the process of mending wounds from an ongoing war since March.
I came home with a new found strength. A new, stronger faith.
And the enemy did not like this.
After coming back from Haiti, I was sad to have to settle back into my own reality again. I missed Haiti. I missed my missionary family. I missed the freedom I felt while there.
I forgot what anxiety felt like in Haiti. And I forgot how it felt like when I came home.
The experience in Haiti and the volumes at which I heard God had been a salve to my gaping wound.
The enemy started to do anything in his weak, pathetic, sleazeball power to crush this healing and strength.
He tried. He attacked. He whispered lies into my mind and heart. He tried to take away what God had done in me.
To be transparent in the name of Jesus with the cyber world, the enemy attacked me with fear that was just crippling. One that I had never felt before. I prayed so hard, SO hard. I tried to read the Bible. The more I read it, the more scared I got (what the heck!)
It was like a storm of the century. Winds of lies whirling in my mind. Earthquakes of fear and uncertainty trembled through my heart. The enemy, stomping his supposed victory dance on my life.
Amidst the lies and blows, I heard a familiar, comforting voice.
The still, small voice.
That one, I can always trust.
He told me to text a good friend of mine that had gone through similar life experience. I did.
They fought alongside me in prayer. Despite the distance, I literally felt the warmth of their prayers.
And then they sent me this:
|"God, you are my God.
I search for you.
I thirst for you like someone in a dry, empty land
where there is no water.
I have seen you the Temple
and have seen your strength and glory.
Because your love is better than life,
I will praise you.
I will praise you as long as I live.
I will lift up my hands in prayer to your name.
I will be content as if I had eaten the best foods,
My lips will sing, and my mouth will praise you,
I remember you while I'm lying in bed;
I think about you through the night.
You are my help.
Because of your protection, I sing.
I stay close to you;
you support me with your right hand."|
--Psalm 63v1-8--
I was told that David wrote this Psalm while he was in a desert.
How sweet it is to know that The Lord's love truly is better than life itself.
How timely God intervenes in our darkest, ugliest moments with the most loving, comforting reply.
That's it. That's life! "I will praise you as long as I live."
His love and grace is sufficient.
The enemy did not like the healing and strength that was poured over me in Haiti. So much so that he took a swing at me.
Blessed as I am, I have an army of prayer warriors to fight him off.
Fight on.
