Waking Up...

I feel like I’m on the brink of something huge… of letting God do something huge in my heart. I’ve been so dry. I’m in China, away from the solid support system I have always been surrounded by. Most of the time I’m around nobody that is like-minded—that has the same heart or the same faith. I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve been to church since living here for the past four months. It’s as if I’ve been gradually drained of my passion, the fire that used to burn so brightly. Last week my friend from America stopped in Beijing on his way to Korea, and I was awakened to just how dry and discouraged I was. It hadn’t seemed bad until I was around someone ‘alive’ again. When he tried to talk to me about truth, I resisted. When he noted the lostness of the people surrounding us, I avoided it… because I *know* all too well that burden, and it feels too heavy to carry. What can I do about the utter despair of the people surrounding me in China? I can’t even speak to most of them… and I am so ‘alone’ on this journey. Or am I? I talked to my brother the other night, and he reminded me of the spiritual war that is raging. We are literally fighting an all-out war, and we can’t even see our opponents. My brother reminded me the importance of fasting and praying. The conversation was somewhat discouraging still, as I felt I had nothing left in me to give to what he was saying. But then he spoke some interesting words… he told me he had just prayed that I would be sent two extra angels. One angel alone, he noted, was pretty incredible to have; but he had requested that I have two extra to fight for me. It was touching to hear him talk like that. But more than touching, I woke up the next day feeling like someone extra was fighting for me. I felt like a different person. I felt like my eyes were re-opened to what we’re living for. Second Corinthians 4:18 resounded in my mind: “So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” The reality of that verse is so much more clear living in China. If I fix my eyes on what I can see here, I will be drained of my meaning and purpose in life, because I can’t see any of what I could see so clearly when I was surrounded by the truth back home. Oh but if I look to the unseen all around me; if I remember the battle we are in and the lives we are fighting for; if I set my hope on the unseen One that is always carrying me, even though I feel so utterly alone on this quest; if I do all of that, then will I be living for what is eternal again.

Renewed. That is how I felt… and yet I know that the enemy is still warring to keep me complacent and to drain me of any fight that’s trying to come back to me. My dreams last night were discouraging—I struggled with sin and failed to be the woman God has called me to be. I felt almost defeated when I woke up, knowing that I could so easily fall back into that life. But even as I was hit by that twinge of beginning defeat, I also felt something else. I felt my heart trying to come alive even more. Memories of the things God has taught me over this past crazy year started fighting their way into my mind… they were broken bits and pieces of memories… but I felt desperate to grasp them and pull them up to continue this awakening process in my heart. I prayed for clarity of mind—that God would fully reveal to me what He was trying to remind me of. I can almost feel the spiritual battle happening in my own room this morning. It makes sense. I was about to ‘fall asleep’ into complacency and waste this year in China, where I have been called for some unknown purpose… but God is trying to wake me up. It’s happening in little steps, but it’s happening. I prayed last night that, just as He did the spring of 2010, God would help me really fall in love with Him again. When I so weakly and desperately prayed that prayer almost two years ago, He answered me in a way more real than I ever could have imagined. So I made the same request last night, with more hope and expectation than before, and I really want to believe him for just as real an answer in 2012.

So I’m here typing away this morning, trying to grasp what is slowly happening in my heart, before it fades away. I want to capture the memories that started trying to push their way into my fighting mind this morning… so I’m just going to start typing and see what comes out…

•   I remember being awakened with Carmen last year to the meaninglessness in which we so often live. We had a conversation with some friends about how we need to be more than just a different version of the world. The world might go and get plastered to have a good time, blatantly living a meaningless existence. But are Christians any better? Christians get together and play board games, spending their time together ‘innocently,’ while there is so much serving, loving, sacrificing, sharing, giving, and encouraging to be done. No, board games are not inherently evil. But if we let them consume our time together… what are they? These verses in Ephesians 15 seem so clear: “¹⁵Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, ¹⁶ making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. ¹⁷ Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is. ¹⁸ Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit, ¹⁹ speaking to one another with psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit. Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord, ²⁰ always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.” So even the time with other believers—should it not be spent worshiping, thanking, praying, interceding, encouraging, and uplifting each other? So wait, wait, wait… is this all a little bit extreme? Yes. And I believe we are called to extreme lives. Anybody remember the disciples and the Acts church? I am not trying to be some crazy legalistic person and say that we can never have fun. But I am trying to say that it makes sense... we wonder why God doesn't move in the big ways we saw Him move in the New Testament church... maybe it's because we are not spending the time asking Him to move the way they did... or spending our time letting Him do those big things through us that He wants to... Do we ask for big things and believe Him for big things? Or do we stay at home and watch movies, hoping that something big will happen at church on Sunday?

• Stepping out and serving… Carmen and I knew we needed to do something. What is this Christian life really supposed to look like? We do a lot of talking and not so much doing. How are we supposed to practically live out what we believe and talk so much about? So we started stepping out. We started trying to find places where we could serve, where we could be, so we could just be a light there. Door after door closed on us. The enemy tried to discourage us. But we kept going to the next door, the next door, the next door, until one swung wide open. God opens doors when we keep stepping out. Do we have to know what we’re doing? No, because He knows. One of the things Carmen and I always said to each other was, “figure it out as we go”… which really involved just going… and letting God figure it out for us. Not a bad way to live?

• Radical. Live radically. Many in the Christian community have settled for normal lives, not looking much different from all of the unbelievers around us. We are called to live radically, to die daily to ourselves, to pick up our crosses, to be the new creations that we are. What are we waiting for?

Memories… so much He has taught me… but what do I do with all of this? What does this look like in China, without my partner in crime/ministry I had in America? What does this look like in a place I can barely speak to people because of the language barrier? What does this look like when I have no other believers to speak to ‘with psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit’? I’m not quite sure yet. I’m still figuring all of that out. So if you have any thoughts, send them my way. But more than anything, please keep praying. I feel like I’m tottering back and forth in between falling headlong one way or the other—either into a coma for the rest of the year, because I am so weak and drained and unsure of what all of this looks like in China; or into a passionate pursuit of knowing God in a whole new way and allowing Him to be my strength and use me this year in this place in ways I cannot even begin to imagine. I’m trying to learn to set my eyes and put my hope on the Unseen in China. The battle is real… it is raging… and I know I have only just seen the beginning. But I also know that I am the winning side.

Thank you for your prayers. Keep fighting this battle!