Quiet Time On The Plane

May 22, 2012

Uganda trip

For some reason or other, I have felt off about this trip. The primary reason is, of course, the fear of performing medical practices in hospitals when I have yet to have received any training in such areas. Yet I could swear that that isn’t the only reason. But now,  with only five hours left until our plane arrives in Entebbe, Uganda, I have finally gathered that feeling, that drive, that something that pushes me onward. It goes beyond my issues with my dad being unable to see missions work as good use of my time (if I don’t make money, it isn’t worth doing, though he won’t say it in so many words and would likely deny it if put to the question).

I love the challenge of having to rely on sheer force of will and my outgoing personality. To throw myself into the work that others avoid, to leap into it with a willingness that I have only managed to muster by learning about the servanthood that defines leadership, and the examples (primarily that of my youth pastor) of such. To be asked to perform a task, even something that is entirely out of your comfort zone, and to leap into it immediately to the farthest extent of your abilities, rather than to hesitate and process the idea or wonder if there could possibly be another person or another way to accomplish the task.

And the chance to do something that’s purely good. I mean, what is more inherently good, religion at its purest, than going to visit a need and work to fulfill it (the book of James talks about that). When at school or work or play, or whatever endeavors I undertake, all is open to criticism. Not so with missions work. This, this is a faultless pursuit. It is the essence of selflessness, and because of the ministry involved, it is also the most trying. No more are you able to compartmentalize things, separate your public life and your private life, your work from your leisure. Every moment is a ministry opportunity, a test to make sure that you and Jesus are on good terms, and that you are sensitive to His Spirit. And if you are at first unprepared, distant with God, you are thrown into a learning curve, and must either live miserably in your emotions, spirit, and mind, or embrace the Christian faith and set about showing that faith through works. Even if that faith is shaken at first, works have a way of strengthening, like tying a stick to a plant to help it grow straight, despite the fact that its growth comes from the inside.

And then there are the bonuses. Exposed as your skillsets and lack thereof become, you begin to catch sight of precisely what it means to be depraved, and at the same time, the overpowering grace of our Lord who constantly offers to work within you to raise you to embrace the state we are meant to remain in, that of being coheirs with Christ. And when we can catch that, when we can recognize what He desires to do in us, and when we can, through His grace, manage to surrender the fears and the worries that so plague us, we enter into something new entirely.

Because God doesn’t need a perfect Christian. He desires a willing vessel, which is a much more difficult state to reach. Instead of being busy and trying and striving and working hard, it takes a balance of surrender that is surrounded by uncomfortable uncertainty that the world around us cannot accept. It takes clinging to the hope He promises us and a decided “no” to the hope we can perceive from what we see around us.

Abraham, the father of the Christian and Jewish faiths, was the first to find this careful balance. He began as most of us tend to, hearing God’s promise to make him the father of many nations, and believing, but then being persuaded by his wife and friends that such an idea was ridiculous. Because it was, with him being so old and yet having no son to be his heir.

In his doubt, he agreed with his wife who recommended that he have a child with his servant Hagar. Abraham wasn’t punished for this. Because of his actions done in disbelief (though not in disobedience), his servant Hagar and her/Abraham’s son were sent away, taking her from the provision of his household. In the big picture, Islam was created through Abraham’s son, Ishmael. Thus we have the Muslim and Christian faiths in conflict with one another today. When you have a difficult time believing God’s words and promises to you, and you act upon that unbelief, it may not seem to hurt anyone as far as you can see, but rest assured, acting in unbelief will have consequences, even if you don’t know/see it.

God later fulfilled His promise to Abraham and he bore his son Isaac, because His promise was not dependent upon Abraham’s actions; Christ is faithful regardless of whether we are. However, after God did this, he tested Abraham’s obedience.

In commanding Abraham to offer his son as a sacrifice, God was asking him to be willing to trust the Lord even when it would ruin everything the God had promised to do. (It should be noted that God didn’t tell Abraham to sacrifice his son. God told Abraham to offer his son as a sacrifice.)
Then Abraham did as God commanded and was about to slay his own son when God stopped Him. And his reward for being obedient to God’s will was that God not only reiterated His earlier promises of many nations coming from Abraham, but He also added that through him, all nations on earth would be blessed. This, as some New Testament passages point out, would be through the birth of Jesus.

Because of Abraham’s obedience, God allowed him to have one of his descendents be the Son of God. These rewards are real.