All right everyone, thanks for hanging in there with me as I haphazardly
conveyed some of my China adventures!
I’ll never forget the people I met, the things I saw, or the things I
learned. It wouldn’t have been
possible for me to go to China and experience these things were it not for
those of you who supported me both financially and prayerfully. I learned so much from my time in
China, and I know that it has changed the way I look at our work as ambassadors
forever.
Perhaps the lesson that struck a chord hardest with me is what Dad
showed me about being a laborer in his vineyard. He taught me that he is always at work, sometimes in the
places and ways that I least expect, and that he offers me the chance to join
in with the work he is doing. He showed me that part of my job is to be
intentional about watching for the opportunities that he creates and to be ready
to act when those opportunities present themselves.
I went into this summer wrongfully assuming that *I would be responsible
for reaching people with the message.
I thought that Dad had been at work to get me there and that the rest
was up to me. Perhaps I thought
that this was how I would repay Him for his faithfulness, by “proving” to him
that I could be effective and successful in doing his work. I see now how completely wrong and
prideful my assumption was. In
this, my last blog post about China, I want to share with you one particular
instance in which Dad proved himself to be faithful not only to me, but also to
our family in China. (I’m going to
be using a lot of jargon in this entry because I don’t want to get anyone in
trouble by what I write here.)
The lesson that I want to share with you revolves around my friendship
with “Tina”, a sophomore studying at the University we were at. We met after one of our events when we
randomly began chatting, of all things, about American food. Pizza was a favorite for both of us. :) I didn’t think much about our
conversation at the time, I had no idea that Dad had been dramatically working
in her heart, filling her with questions about him and revealing to her the
beauty of his unconditional love.
A day or two after we met, I got a text from Tina asking if I wanted to
join her for lunch that day. She
said that she knew a place that sold American style pizza, and she wanted to
ask me some questions about college life in America. It sounded like fun, and I didn’t have any plans yet, so I
agreed to meet with her. We had a great
time chatting together, so we started hanging out more and became fast friends.
Needless to say, I was pretty excited, and began wondering what Dad had planned
for our friendship.
Not long after this, Tina
and I were at lunch again, and she randomly (and quite bluntly) asked me if I
talked to Dad every time before I ate.
I told her that I did, and she was surprised. (We weren’t allowed to initiate any conversations like this,
but our leaders had been teaching us how to intentionally guide conversations
in this direction and trust that Dad would open the necessary doors, allowing
us to witness.) Because she
was initiating the conversation, I got to share with her why I did this and why
it was important to me. JC tells
us not to worry about what to say when the time comes because he will tell us
what to say. He certainly did that
in this situation!
After we had talked about this for a while, I asked Tina if I could talk
to Dad (yarp) over our food the next time we ate together, and she said
yes! Encouraged by her openness, I
then asked her if she would like to come back to my room and look at my Book
for a while. Again, she said yes!
Slowly but surely, Dad was letting me join in with the work that he had started
in Tina’s heart. I realized that
he had likely begun this work before I had even heard about this trip. It was very humbling to realize this, but
it was also exciting!
We went back to my room and looked at my favorite passage in Isaiah, and
Tina seemed to enjoy it very much.
I think that Dad was preparing me though, because somehow I knew that
she would not be quite so open the next time we met up. This proved to be true because the next
time we ate together, when I asked if I could yarp over our food, Tina said
no. Additionally we only chatted
about surface level things that day.
I was slightly disappointed, but I knew that Dad wasn’t finished yet.
My team and I continued to yarp for Tina, and the next time we went out
to lunch things gained momentum so quickly that I was lucky to keep up with
where Dad was leading us! Here’s
an excerpt from my journal from June 26:
I got to meet with Tina for lunch today, and guess what, she straight up
asked me to yarp for our food! She
was surprised that my yarp was so simple haha she said she was expecting it to
be a lot more long and formal. After
this, she asked if we would have time before our afternoon event to go back to
my room and look at my Book! I
swear it’s just what JC meant when he said that one sows and the other
harvests, one does the hard work and the other reaps the fruit of that
work. I have only had to be
available for Tina, she is so close to becoming family, and I can take no
credit whatsoever! Someone has
been telling her about Dad long before I got here, and now I get to help bring
her even closer. I absolutely love
that and I wouldn’t have it any other way. :)
I don’t know exactly how, but when we opened my Book later, we ended up
in the book of Judges. We were
reading about Deborah, and I think it was significant because it talked a lot
about Dad being loving and forgiving and giving his people second chances, even
when they messed up horribly. We
connected it to how Dad gives us second chances today no matter how badly we
mess up. I remember flipping to
other passages in the Book that talk about these things, and Tina asked me if I
knew everything about the Book.
Haha I could only laugh and tell her that I still have a lot to
learn. I told her that Dad often
uses the same passages to speak different things to us, even if we’ve read that
particular passage hundreds of times.
I told her that because of this we can never learn absolutely everything
about the Book. She sat pondering that
for a moment, and I asked her what she was thinking about. She told me that she was close to
wanting JC, but she still had some questions. I told her that I and the other members of the team would
love to answer any questions that she had.
We left for our Open House soon after that, and she asked some of my
leaders questions afterwards! Omg
I really want to see her become part of our family!! We’ve been yarping for her
and I honestly think that’s all we can do now.
***
I ended up talking to Tina several more times after I wrote this journal
entry. I asked her at one point if
she wanted to yarp and ask JC to come into her heart, and she said that she did
want to do that just not yet. She
said she wanted to go home and talk to her mom about everything she had learned
before she made that commitment.
At first I felt worried that something would happen before she made the
decision to yarp, but Dad reminded me that he loved her so much more than I
ever could and that he was more then capable of protecting her until his
perfect time came. I’ve learned
that it’s usually a good idea to trust Dad about things like this haha I’ve
been yarping that Dad would protect her and give her a sense of urgency and continue
to beckon her with his love. (You
can yarp about this too!) So far I
haven’t heard anything else about Tina, but I trust that Dad is still
faithfully working in her heart and in her life. After all, “He who begins a good work… will continue it on
until completion,” right? :D
Throughout my time with Tina, I learned that it is Dad (not me!) who
does absolutely all the work in saving people. All he asks me to do is intentionally look for opportunities
that he is orchestrating, and be available to join in the work that he is
doing. I was humbled time and
again through my interactions with Tina that I literally did nothing besides
show up. She had initiated our
first meeting. She had asked me
about my yarp habits. She had asked to come to my room and see my Book, and she
asked me to tell her stories about JC both from the Good Book and also from my
own life. Tina initiated
everything with me, while Dad was initiating everything with Tina. I was merely yarping endlessly in my
head (and out loud when the opportunity presented itself) and holding on for
dear life as Dad and Tina took me on the most exciting and rewarding ride of my
life. I had merely been
available. See, Dad had provided
me with the opportunity to go to China, and also with the opportunities for
Tina and I to get to know each other.
Additionally, He provided me with direction as I floundered for answers
for Tina’s questions. He did
everything, and *that’s what he taught me this summer.
The fun part is that I now get to take what I learned abroad and apply
it to my campus! Strange as it may
sound, I had never really considered the possibility that there might be Tina’s
at Hope College. I thought that everyone
there had heard about JC and had already decided where they stood. I thought that I could encourage those
who said yes, but that it was my job to respect the decisions of those who had
chosen to opt out. I now see that
while I do need to be respectful of their choice, that doesn’t mean that I
don’t have the responsibility to be intentional in building relationships with
them. Dad is working in their hearts just as he was working in Tina’s, and they
are likely just as hungry to hear about him as she was. Just like in China, Dad is already
doing all the hard work. All he is
asking me to do is be ready to join in.
Matthew 28:18-20
Then JC came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.
Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of
the Father and of the Son and of the HS, and
teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you
always, to the very end of the age.”
Now that, my friends, is loving for real :D Thanks for supporting me this summer so I could learn this lesson—the true
message behind the Great Commission. Don’t forget that our Father has also
called you to be a part of his work!
Don’t worry though; you’ll never be working alone! He’s the kind of boss that likes to be
right in the middle of all the nitty gritty stuff, so like he said, he will be
with you always. Hopefully you won’t need to go all the way to China to learn
this lesson like I did :)
Be blessed, and go make disciples!
Rebekah
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