Oh, ye of little faith......

Sometimes I wonder if God is really listening to me, or paying attention. Or if He is just up in heaven laughing at my confusion.....
I know better, I do. Yet sometimes I just need to see the evidence, Thomas that I am. This past week I was sitting on my bed thinking. It was in the evening, and I was just going through some events of the past several months in my mind. I remembered how excited I was when I got my passport. Several months ago. I've never had one - silly as that may seem. And I remember when I got it thinking - wow, now I can go anywhere I want - do what I want. And I remember thinking how at that moment what I wanted to do more than anything was go to hurting people and serve them and God. Doing whatever was needed. I was so excited, and so passionate. It was all I could think about for days. Shortly after this I had a health scare. A pretty significant one. I remember in the middle of it saying to a friend - I just don't get it. I am finally getting my act together, I am willing and ready to serve God. My passion is being missional. I want to be used, and now I may never get to do this. Why would God put this so definitely on my heart just to take it away? I got past the health scare, and busy, and I kinda set the vision aside. And I had to work through some other pretty significant stuff - including church. That was hard, and disorienting. I was overwhelmed by life.
Things have kind of started working themselves out now, and in the past couple weeks I felt moved to revisit the serving issue. And that's when I started once again thinking I had a passport, and I wanted to go. And as I thought about it Monday night I realized it was not an option currently. I wasn't connected in a place where this would be a possibility. I had left my old church, my new church didn't have the resources and the only other place I might possibly connect to this kind of ministry was a strange church filled with unknown people. Talk about anxiety. I could go with people I didn't know, to a country I didn't know and do something I might not know how to do. And as I began to consider this a deep sadness came over me, and my eyes filled with tears and began to overflow. I was not crying, or sobbing, or distraught. It was like a leaky faucet I couldn't turn off. Tears overflowing from the depths of my soul. I just felt it was like God had held something out to me, and when I finally had come to a point where I could commit he had snatched it away. I shared my broken heart with my friend and she helped me see it was probably just not God's timing. Just to trust His direction. It took a couple days, but I made my peace with it. It wasn't God's time, and I would just have to trust Him. He gave me the passion, He would provide the outlet.
Saturday night I went to church. We are very small. Basically like a small group at this point. But the church has great vision. And one area is loving and meeting the needs of others. Working side by side with the needy, being Jesus to them. And in the course of defining our vision Mike spoke about our church - all 15 of us, adopting a village in Haiti, coming along side them, helping them, serving them, working on health, education, basic needs - loving them. Yes, US. I about fell off my chair. Where five days before I had been so discouraged by a passion denied, I was now marveling at the goodness of God and His impeccable timing. It was like he reached down and said - "Now". It was almost like it had been a test to see if I meant what I said. If I was truly committed. If I really desired to serve God, or it was a passing thing. And after my heart broke, He stepped in and said OK - now I can use you. I'm still amazed today. It was like yet another God message. I am here, I am in control, I am real, all you need to do is trust me.
Wow. I tried to explain it to my friend today. Once again I found myself with tears in my eyes. I could barely speak. My heart is so full. God continues to surprise and amaze me.