Inexplicable Me

For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face.

"The only thing that keeps me from panic is the simple thought that we seem to get exactly what we need. I can't say that I know how this happens, or that I have evidence that it will continue. It's just that we seem to get what we need... right when we need it."

We found ourselves tonight like we have found ourselves every night as of late. Standing in the dark and looking through the windows out over the city. Again we shared stories that expressed the unbelievable nature of our days. 

We have been sharing our vision to anyone who would listen for the past 2 years. It was far-reaching... and it even sounded crazy to us. But it was a faith thing. We did our best to verbalize a plan, but we knew that we have no real blueprint. We simply had a deep belief that we had to go.

And so now we find ourselves here... inexplicably prepared for what we never anticipated. We just keep saying "yes" as provision comes our way, and the steps get bigger. I can't explain it. It is a mystery. It is God.

I find myself the pastor of a church... with no building of our own, with no solid resources, with no real assets, with people who speak multiple languages and come from unbelievably varied backgrounds and parts of the globe. And somehow... God is blessing it. Growth is happening. Volunteers are coming from seemingly no-where. Resources come in to cover exactly the costs.

Our family is living in the very same house that we could see from a distance our first trip to Guatemala. We discussed how incredible it would be to live in this house. But it was not possible. And yet... the impossible is now our reality. It wasn't available. It wasn't affordable. We had no way of getting here. And yet... each night we stand in the dark with our feet on the floor of this acquired impossibility.

Kellie took classes several years ago that qualified her to teach english as a second language. She only did so because the state offered a scholarship and she qualified. But her job required her to teach only to English speaking students. And now... she finds herself in an English speaking school in a Spanish speaking country, teaching English to a student body that is nearly 50% Korean.

While in university during the early 90's, Kellie and I used to take long walks in the evening, kicking through the fallen leaves of an Indiana autumn, discussing what life would look like if we could live out our greatest desires. We dreamed about running a home for abandoned and orphaned children. 

But we forgot about that dream... it was snuffed out by the *busy-ness of life (*yes, this is my word).

And yet... this past week we launched a capital campaign to begin raising funds to do exactly that. Casa de la Abuelita will be our home that cares for and loves babies who now will have hope in life, and receive the blessing of forever families.

I am pastoring, building, networking, fundraising, vision-casting, founding an orphanage, digging through garbage with my bare hands, bringing church groups down to change lives... and I can only say to you that it is inexplicable at best.

God uses the unlikely to show His love. To show His power. To show His grace. To show his Mercy. To show simply that He is the one that makes it all happen.

My only part... was a "yes." A surrender to to His plan. An abandonment of my own. A complete all-in embrace of the life that He prepared me to live.

I can not explain it. I can only live it with eyes wide open. We see how God pieces together the previously unexplained bits of life that led us here. We are daily in awe as we feel the texture of this reality.

We daily find ourselves in this place... this path... this will of God, that we can only barely comprehend.

I listened to a sermon of James Massey online today and he said that God is a mystery. He said that mysteries aren't meant to be solved or explained. They are simply to be experienced.

Inexplicable.