Trust.

 
     I leave the compound I have been staying at for the past 2 months tomorrow morning. Today will be spent packing for debrief in Granada, saying goodbye to Vision Nicaragua and the workers here, and saying goodbye to the people I have grown so close to in the local community Bethel. I have only ever been to South and Central America for missions work before which makes this whole time especially hard. From the age of 17 I have grown to know and love the culture here. I love the way everyone is always late, the long church services, the offbeat clapping to worship, the way we always get asked to sing in front of the church, the rice and beans, the welcoming nature of the people, the language, the kids, and so much more that would take me days to write out.
     Now I am faced with leaving. Not just Blanca the young mother of two who I have grown to call a friend and Felix the terminally ill man whose house we were able to repair, but so many other people in the community I have come to call my friends. More than that, we discovered our teams will be changing in a few short days. That means that my team of girls (aka JVM) will not be together anymore. I am not even going to try to hide my frustration with that. I have spent the last 2 months growing so close to those girls, sharing our trials together, encouraging each other, and helping one another through the tough things going on here and at home. The thought of being with any combination of other people literally breaks my heart. On top of all of that I am about to be catapulted into an all new place, culture, people, and ministry. Even more I have a five hour layover in LAX which is sure to be just short of unbearable.
      Through all of this comes a time when I need to TRUST. Trust God because he is always looking out for me. Trust him because I have no control over anything. No control over who is on my team for the next 6 months, over the people in Bethel, or the things going on at home. It is a daily struggle to trust in the Lord fully. To fully give him all the things that consume my mind and cause me stress and worry. Those things are not mine to carry though, they are his and he wants to take them from me. I feel like I have been learning the lesson of fully trusting the Lord for the past year now and I am continuing to learn it. Apparently I haven’t got it down yet but hey, I am a work in progress. Let me turn this around on you now.
     How often do you wholeheartedly TRUST the Lord? Do you trust that where he is calling you is where you need to be, that what is happening is part of his plan, and that he already holds everything in his hands? I like to use the analogy of a rope. The rope symbolizes all of your problems, struggles, worries, and thoughts that keep you from trusting God. It could be future plans for school, relationships, friendships, a marriage, your kids, or a whole multitude of other things. You hold on to the rope (your problems) tightly and don’t like to let it go. You are so focused on holding the rope that sometimes you don’t even notice you’re doing it. It slowly just becomes a part of your life to worry about everything, over think, analyze, and try to control everything that comes your way. Because you are holding the rope with both hands you cannot also hold onto Gods hand. There comes a time when you have to let go of your death grip on the rope, turn around, and walk toward Christ who has his hand held out for you to grab. That rope can make you oh so exhausted and stressed out. He holds the whole universe in his hands including all of your little problems that seem enormous. He will not fail you like people in your past have. He will not let go of your hand. He will not all of the sudden decide he does not want to deal with your life anymore. He loves you because you are a precious child to him.
     When I go home I do not want to return to worrying about everything in the future I cannot control. I do not and will not go back to that way of living this life. This life really is not mine to live and I do not want to spend it worrying about tomorrow or any other day in the future.
     Every time I feel myself not trusting the Lord I need to stop, pray, and dwell on some of the scriptures below along will all the times I have seen him be faithful in my life in the past.