October 2021 — Jill S.
a letter from Liz —
Hello Ladies,
As I pray over you this week, I am praying for the Lord to refresh your soul and give you grace for this season. I pray you will be strengthened and helped in your time of need. I pray for wisdom as you make decisions, plan ministry, and navigate your personal life. May you truly be led of the Spirit and experience His presence today.
Over the past few weeks we have been busy and travels have picked up immensely. During Candidate Orientation, Asia Pacific appointed six new career units and four new MA units. It is exciting for our returning MAs to move to career appointments, and we are so proud of them. Despite their terms ending during a pandemic, they are still committed to long-term ministry. Despite lockdowns, the MAs on the field have learned language and shared the gospel. Despite even a military coup, MAs still want to return. I could go on about the challenges these MAs faced, and yet their going back speaks a lot to their call.
That’s one thing I love about Candidate Orientation: hearing the stories of how God is calling people to serve in hard places with extreme adversities.
In closing, if you are an MA serving on the field, I hope you know how incredibly important you are to the team. We appreciate you and believe God is using you and called you to be right where you are. If you have MAs on your team, make sure you tell them how much you appreciate them. Communicate with each other, and spend time playing and praying together as a team. Both are important.
Our devotional today is from Jill S. serving in a sensitive area. I hope you enjoy her sincere exhortation and grow in your faith as you apply the lessons and word she shares. Jill, and her family are a huge blessing to the team, and we appreciate them and their leadership.
Never Alone,
Liz
from Jill S. — Embrace the Chicken
Living in Laos has always been challenging. Whether it’s the remote location with no grocery store or medical care or the tough spiritual ground of this never-reached area, the day-to-day difficulties can feel overwhelming at times. My human reaction to obstacles is always to look for the way out or the way around: deliverance! I’m of the “let’s Jericho march this problem and watch it crumble” persuasion. Yet what I’ve seen repeatedly during our ten years here is that deliverance from a situation often stunts my spiritual maturity. I hit the eject button before considering what the Father might actually be doing or pruning in me. Here’s a quick example.
One humid morning an ugly, half-feathered chicken wandered into our yard and created chaos. Our dogs lost their minds barking and chased that bird-flu fowl right into my house. I was upstairs when the commotion started. Immediately I was frustrated at the noise and interruption. I flew downstairs to see what happened. As I made it to the bottom of the stairs, my friend was chasing this sickly chicken all around my living room! The house was filled with flying feathers, chicken chasing, dogs barking, and oh yeah—the chicken was pooping everywhere, diarrhea-style! Clearly, this was an outright attack of the enemy!
As she chased the chicken, she asked me, “What do you want to do with the chicken?” I quickly responded, “Out! I want it out!”
She looked confused. “Out? You want the chicken out?”
“Yes! Out! I want it out!” I’m thinking to myself, “In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, get that thing out of my house!” She reluctantly agreed as she finally grabbed the chicken.
As I turned to go back upstairs, she said, “But God sent you a free chicken, a free dinner for tonight. Why don’t you want the blessing of God?”
My heart sank to the depths of my stomach. I had totally missed it. My sweet Lao friend saw a blessing from God when all I could see was a skinny, bird-flu looking, half-feathered, sad excuse for a chicken that was stealing my peace and, more importantly, interrupting my plan for the day.
Why didn’t I slow down? Why didn’t I ask what she thought I should do with the chicken? I missed so many cultural and language opportunities that were sent literally right into my house! I was too focused on my agenda. I wanted deliverance when, I truly believe, the Father wanted me to learn about my host country and, for sure, more about my dear friend.
Now when my day or schedule is invaded, I really try to pause and ask, “Is this from You, Lord? Is there something You want me to learn from this? Where are You working in this situation?” When an overwhelming situation comes crashing in, I try to focus on how I might grow through the situation instead of only waiting on deliverance from the situation.
If I just pause long enough, I hear the Father say, “Embrace the chicken! I’m at work here. I’ll walk you through it!”
James makes it clear that we are to let perseverance do its work in our lives. “Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything” (James 1:2–4, NIV). (Please read in the MSG, AMP, and NLT as well.)
This passage makes it clear that we can stop the work of the Father in our lives. Yet when we embrace even the difficult circumstances in order to grow, we’re transformed into His likeness, for His glory, so people all around can know Him!
We must hang in there through the unknowns, the seasons of deferred hope, and even endure the difficult situations to allow the Spirit of God to finish His work in us so that we’ll be mature, completely developed, and lacking nothing.
Friends, say it with me, “Embrace the chicken!” And let perseverance do its work.