Good news for my team mates in Nicaragua. While the property for $60,000 was bought up the day after they heard about it, one of the Nicaraguans in the church plant found a piece of property for only $28,000!!! They think the land is big enough to put a building large enough to seat 150 people (Latin American seating – so think packed in ;-). Praying God brings in the money for this land so they can get it debt free.
In the classes at ABWE, once again I enjoyed meeting people from all over. Some of the attendees were people like me who were getting ready to go overseas, others were people who have already been overseas and are back in the US for a short time, and others were individuals from around the country who decided to take the Bible training classes.
I met a group of 6 courageous teenagers who attend a public high school in a tough section of Wichita, KS that lead a Bible group in their school during lunch break on Fridays. I also met their awesome chaperone/science teacher, Hannah, who raised the funds for these teens to come. Many of these teens came from difficult backgrounds but they have now found Jesus and they boldly stand for Him. Their Bible group was averaging 50 teens this past semester!
It was also awesome getting to talk and hang out with other cross-cultural workers during meals and in the evenings to hear their stories of support-raising as well as what God has been doing through them in the countries. We laugh together, prayed together, played games, and sometimes even cried together.
We had fantastic instructors from all over the globe that utilized a very interactive teaching style with lots of audience participation which really helped me to internalize what we were learning. If a stranger had walked into the room they never would have guessed this hilarious bunch of people running around was a group of believers studying both halves of the Bible (The Old Testament and the New Testament.)
The courses emphasized going chronologically through the events in the Bible and looking with fresh eyes as if we had never heard the Bible at all before. We dove into the details and historical context as well as stepped back and looked at the large reoccurring themes (God’s judgment, His Love, His record of keeping promises, His power). This was a great exercise since many of us will encounter people with no Bible background.
MY “AHA” MOMENT: One of the things that really stood out to me was reading about the thief who was crucified the same time as Jesus and how God promised the thief would get into heaven. This story often bothers people. As I was joting down a heading for this event, I started to write “Criminal Gains Heaven.” Then it hit me, this is what bugs us: why at the last minute of a wicked life, would God let this guy gain a spot in heaven?! He had no more time left to live for God or make an impact on the world. And this is where our perspective is wrong. This guy didn’t gain heaven, because God’s forgiveness and heaven cannot be earned or gained. This can only be received! Rather this guy had to go through the same process every one of us must go through. He “fear[ed] God” (recognized that God is the Holy One). He admitted his own guilt “we indeed are suffering justly, for we are receiving what we deserve for our deeds”. He believed Jesus was sinless and was God come down to earth to die for our sins “but this man has done nothing wrong.’ And he was saying, ‘Jesus, remember me when You come in Your kingdom!’”; He made a simple faith-request to Jesus thus evidencing belief Jesus could forgive him. Jesus responded to this guy’s request with a powerful promise “today you will be with me in Paradise.”
Forgiveness and heaven are a gift that God bestows, based on His love & justice (Jesus was sentenced for us). We don’t “gain” it because of any of the good things we do before. And we don’t “gain” it because of good things we might do after. We can’t march up to God and demand entrance, we can only come humbly telling of our sin and asking God for His mercy.
WHAT IS ALSO AMAZING is that Jesus would bother to speak with this guy, in the middle of Jesus going through the excruciating agony of being crucified and also having all of God’s wrath poured out on Jesus.
One simple event in the Bible packed with so much truth!!!
One of the teachers said: “It is not what you know, it is what you have become because of what you know that is important.” We learned a lot of Bible concepts and teaching tips. But unless I allow God to change me based on what we learned and have the courage to live it and share with others, than would be a waste of time.
On June 15th, Elisabeth Elliot Gren passed away. Some of you may be familiar with her. She authored “Through Gates of Splendor,” a book sharing the story of her husband Jim Elliot and 4 other men who were killed in Ecuador back in the 1950s when they went in as missionaries to a tribe on the Amazon River. Her life and writings had a big impact on me in my teens and early 20s. Did you know that she went back to that same brutal tribe, after her husband’s death, as a single mom and helped turn their language into a written form so the Bible could be translated into their language?! You see, she had experienced God forgiving her, and she chose to forgive those who had so deeply hurt her. She had experienced God’s love, and she chose to pass it on. She knew that every person is in danger of judgment for sin, and that the penalty of sin is something you would not wish on your worst enemy. So since she had been rescued from that penalty, she chose to pass on the good news of how they could also be rescued.
A couple of her quotes that I really love are:
“Faith does not eliminate questions. But faith knows where to take them.”
“Choices will continually be necessary and -- let us not forget -- possible. Obedience to God is always possible. It is a deadly error to fall into the notion that when feelings are extremely strong we can do nothing but act on them.”
“Leave it all in the Hands that were wounded for you.”