I won't lie... at the beginning of this week 10 days away from home seemed like a long time. Especially when I wasn't going with anyone I really knew that well. In the past, any trip I've taken has been with either friends or family. With that said, I've grown close to the people I've been with this past week. I made some great friends in Venezuela and among the WMEI team. Relationships are so important. We learn so much from them, and a way I truly believe we receive the grace of God. So I'm thankful for the people I've met this week, and I hope many of them can continue as long lasting friendships.
One of the guys on this trip was talking about what he's learned this week in our small group. His response to this was that he didn't really know what he's learned until he gets back to see what sticks. I think that will be true in a way for me as well. I'm excited to see what God does with this week for me as I head home. Thankfully I'm working in a church next year, and so I'll have a local context to see what God is saying to me. Having been on many trips like this before I'm aware that the emotion of such a week wears away quickly. My prayer is that what God has done in me continues to work on me. Faith based solely on emotion is like a foundation of sand. It so easily dissolves. So a part of me is trying to look past the simple emotion of the week.
Faith is trust, and I trust that God has done great things over the past week. God is ALIVE in Venezuela, and God is ALIVE in USA. His Spirit has moved the church forward for 2000 years and the Spirit is still moving. God is not dead, and I am trusting that what he has begun in me, in my peers on the trip, and in the Venezuelan people is life changing and powerful. He is bringing something new and ancient to our church: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. I have faith in the God that transform, renews, and redeems through his grace, power, and love. The word amen means, may it be so. So to all this I say: amen and amen.
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