Lessons

There have been a few lessons I have been contemplating recently.  While I process I wanted to write them down.


Someone recently told me to think about what the Bible is saying about God over what the Bible is saying to me.  This really stuck me because truthfully, I regularly read the Bible looking for what I need to hear or do.  It's all about me.  Similarly, the SEW speakers challenged us to think about what we love about God.  He explained that we often love that God loves us.  God's plan was to save us, but not for ourselves, for His glory.  This change in perspective is something admittedly struggle with, but it has challenged me to see the Bible for what it tells me about God's character and to glorify Him for who He first.  It's easy to write, but I know I am still a long way off from actually doing this well.


Secondly, as you may remember, I had a really dark spiritual experience while in Mada.  Satan was lying to me from all angles and at the same time I was frightened by my neighborhood, and confused by what was expected of me in living with a native family.  I know these were all distractions that Satan used to make me confused and afraid.  Now, several months away from that experience I still often wonder why God allowed it.  I know He is much stronger than Satan and that Satan is not allowed to stay when God is present, so I wondered why Satan was able to lie to me and me such distress.  The same chapel speaker shared that Him and his wife went through a period of spiritual attach.  They would wake up in the middle of the night and feel an attach in their house.  Night after night this would happen and night after night they would pray sending the attach away in Jesus Name.  Although, in some ways such attacks still baffle me, in other ways it makes sense that Satan would want to distract us when we are working to grow God's kingdom.  I was recently comforted by something God reminded me of, in the midst of this paradox; Jesus too was "attacked" by Satan while in the desert.  If Jesus can be lied to by Satan, than it is no wonder that I have been.  I am stuck by the fact that just as I was gearing up to start ministry in Mada, Satan attacked, just as he did with Jesus when He was in the dessert before starting His earthly ministry.  As much as I don't want to go through such an experience again, I hope that if I do, I will have learned from it and stand through it the next time.

Finally, I was been challenged again by the importance of working with others in community.  It's easy as a teacher to work on my lesson plans and then present them to the students without involving others in the process.  You may think this is normal for a teacher, but I know it's because I struggle with not wanting to be told I'm not doing something right.  This also may seem like no big deal, but I know it's a cover for pride.  I think, that since I'm trying that should be good enough, but involving others can make things even better.  God challenged me to involve others more often a few days ago and reminded me that it was Him speaking to me in this idea by giving me another verse today...