So here we are…flying back over the Atlantic. According the screen that is in front of me, we are about half way between Atlanta and Paris. I think just about everyone knows by now that this trip has not gone as planned. Let me clarify that… not as we planned. According to our timetable we should have been back in France over a week ago. We were suppose to have all our luggage. Most of all we were still suppose to be eagerly awaiting the birth of our third child. God’s plan was clearly a lot different than ours. His plan included staying in Georgia until the 14th of January, leaving with one of our big suitcases still at large, and taking our third child home to be with Him.
One of the things Amanda and I realized we did not bring enough of when we first got to France was books. For Christmas I asked Amanda to buy me several new books. One of those books was Welch’s new book Running Scared. The book takes a biblical look at fear, something that language study and living in a new country has clearly brought to the surface of my life. I have a long way to go before I am done with the book; however what I have read has been very insightful.
I am finding that dealing with fear and dealing with testing have a lot in common. One of the big things they have in common is faith. In one of the chapters I recently finished Welch makes this statement: “Faith is not seeing less, faith is seeing more.” Those words hit me hard and made me stop and think.
I would be lying if I told you I was totally excited about going back to France, or that I was really stoked about starting back at language training. The truth is that is has been a real test of my faith. No shocker, but I am not really good at French. Another understatement is that living in another country is hard. Having spent the past ever weeks back in the USA it only reinforces what I already know. France is not America. When you add in all the emotions of what has happened with the loss of our third child, it becomes the perfect setting for doubt. I find myself wondering if my family and I are really supposed to do this mission thing.
These are the thoughts that fill my head when I look only by sight and not by faith. When I look by faith, then I can see much more. Instead of only seeing all the hard things my family and I have faced over this past trip, I also see the hand of God lovingly caring and providing for us every step of the way. When I look by faith, I see beyond my language ability to a God who is not fazed or limited by my own inability. Like Welch says, “Faith is not seeing less, faith is seeing more.” Faith does not forget the hard circumstances that we are facing, but that also sees God’s faithful provision in the past and His rich promises for the future.
3 comments:
Thanks for the encouraging word. It reminded me of the below passage--not the same situation, but the same take away. Glad to hear you all made it back safely; rest up and we'll be praying for you as you start school again.
"But recall the former days when, after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings, sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction, and sometimes being partners with those so treated. For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one. Therefore do not throw away your confidence, which has great reward. For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised. For,
'Yet a little while, and the coming one will come and will not delay; but my righteous one shall live by faith, and if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him.'
But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls." (Hebrews 10:32-39)
I love you guys. I understand what he means by the quote, "Faith is not seeing less, its seeing more." The more we know him, the greater our faith. I am thankful that God allows us to see more...he's not trying to get us "more ignorant" in life in order to serve him with more ferver. Nevertheless, there is that humbling aspect of knowing more and feeling like you know less because of it. What a time to grow. I love you. I will continue to pray for you.
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