As I sit hear reading a list of prayer requests from my home church family, my heart is heavy. There is so much sickness among our group and many difficult things with families. I experienced both hard and glorious things on my recent trip to the Caribbean and what I realize today is that life is full of hard things, no matter where we live or what our present circumstances. Some among us know financial difficulty and need jobs, many know of sickness and struggles to get healthy, others have children and parents that are struggling physically, relationally or emotionally. We love our children, we love our parents and family relatives and our hearts are burdened whether we live under the different circumstances of another country or here in the United States. Lots of things are the same. Pain and struggle is pain and struggle no matter the boundaries of a country.
As I lift up my new "family" in the Caribbean today for their specific needs, I also lift up the requests of my "family" here in the US. God is a God over all of us - here and there in the Caribbean. I live believing that God hears and He answers in His timing as to how it will most glorify Him and grow each of us. That growth process isn't always pleasant.
Having the opportunity once again to share the harm stories and then the redemption stories God has written through me with my Caribbean friends reminds me that God has my days planned and promises to walk with me through them, both the difficult ones and the glorious ones. I am trying to live with the belief that God has chosen my exact circumstances for today (uncomfortable or warm and fuzzy) because that is how I will grow to be the person He wants to use for His glory. My story framed with God's story invites others to dream and to hope and sometimes to move closer to God. I saw it happen again on my recent trip.
I hope for each of you today that God will seem close, that He will right the wrongs that are swirling around you with needs for jobs, physical healing, safety and protection and emotional healing. And if He chooses to ask you to wait or He answers in a way different that you have requested of Him, that you can feel His hands warm upon you as He comforts and asks you to trust Him.
