I am excited to introduce you all to my friend Sara! I met her sometime during the year we were at Bible College. It was a small school so eventually you met everyone. I was never very close with Sara, but as the year went on I saw how much she changed and grew. She became determined to live a life worthy of the gospel — no matter what the cost. I have always had a deep admiration for her.
She is the type of person who once she sets her mind to do something, she will do it with her whole heart. It truly is a gift to know her. Sara currently lives in Montevideo, Uruguay with her husband and three beautiful children. I know you will enjoy what she has to share today!
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My first year out of high school, a year after becoming a Christian, I was sitting in a mission’s conference. I learned about missionaries all over the world. When I heard that there were people groups who still didn’t have God’s word in their language, I knew God was telling me to go. It wasn’t a hard decision. Just like it wasn’t a hard decision to leave the states 5 years later with my new-ish family and head to Montevideo, Uruguay to help form a new church in the capital city. The packing and support raising and leaving were difficult, but the call was clear. And we were excited and nervous, not fearful.
The first few months in Uruguay were fun and adventurous. We were like honeymooners in our new life, learning so much and experiencing so many new things. But as we settled in and started the hard work of language learning, and actually living (not vacationing) in a culture not our own. I was surprised by the fears that arose within me. We weren’t being persecuted or even living in a dangerous country. But, before I knew it, my zeal and love for communicating the gospel, turned into fears about my ability and adequacy. My linguistic, and cultural weaknesses became a stumbling block for my faith.
Should I speak about Him if I can’t communicate His message clearly in my host language? What if I share the gospel and they don’t understand me (literally)? Does my life really reflect His love under all the stress our family is experiencing in a new country and culture? What if I mess up and offend them? What if I share a truth poorly and they misunderstand who God is and what He has done?
While many of these wonderings were legitimate concerns for wanting to respect and love the people around us. They also revealed an even greater fear that had been lying dormant in my heart for a long time. Could God really use me and all my weakness on the mission field?
The truth is, these fears have never left me. We are four years in and these same doubts are sometimes my daily battlegrounds. The fear of not being enough is not just a fear for the mission field. I know the same fear in my life as a homeschooling mother, as a friend, as a wife. It is a fear that touches the core of who I am and what I was created to do. It is the question of identity and it pervades every area of Christian life.
Thankfully God answers this question thoroughly in His word and through the very message of the Gospel. In a society where we are constantly being told that we are enough. Or, that we need to just believe we are enough, the truth of it all is that we aren’t enough. We see our own insufficiency and it bothers us. I do not speak Spanish well enough. I am not patient enough with my kids. Our family does not have it together enough. I don’t know enough theology to answer every doubt or opposition to the gospel. And, I do not have enough wisdom to be a perfect mother or missionary. I am not enough. And trying to convince myself that I am is looking only toward the flesh and not toward the Savior. The answer will and should always be no. But I don’t stop there. The gospel continues with transforming hope.
When we enter into a relationship with Christ, we receive a new identity, old things are washed away and we are made new. Our not enough on our own becomes perfectly enough in Christ. At the Cross, Jesus took our shortcomings, sins, and fears and conquered them. But He was raised and us with Him. His resurrection clothed us in His righteousness and made us new vessels to be used by Him. In Him our weakness becomes strength and all our shortcomings become purposeful. And we have the surety of His Spirit who offers wisdom and sweet companionship along the journey. And so as Christians we learn to look to Him. Is HE enough to conquer death and sin? Is He enough to take a sinner and make her new? Is He enough to work through weakness and pain and difficulty and suffering? Is He enough to use my poor language skills to shine the light in the darkness? Is He enough to use my mite to bring life to a dead heart? The answer is always, and unconditionally, a resounding yes because all things are yes in Christ.
When fears arise within us we are never asked to suck it up and pretend we have it all together. Nor fake a smile to make it look like all is well. Instead, our fears tell us that we are lacking intimacy with our Father. To embrace and abide in the message of the gospel is to have true intimacy with our Father, and in true intimacy we find safety. John 15:1-11 is a powerful reminder to us in fear. It confronts our: ‘I can do nothing,’ with the glorious hope of the gospel:
“You are already clean because of the Word which I have spoken to you. Abide in Me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, and you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit; for apart from me he can do nothing. Just as the Father has loved me, I have loved you. Abide in my love…these things I have spoken to You, that My joy may be complete.”
He abides in us! We are made clean! We are loved! And we will bear fruit! We have so much in Him. But how do we abide? We believe the gospel and walk in it. We reject lies, and we embrace the truth. We walk with Him, talk with Him, and enjoy Him. We spend time in prayer and fasting. We study His word and meditate on and memorize it. And when we do we will find that we bear much fruit, even in our weakness and inadequacy. Our hearts will fill with joy, He will be glorified in us and will use us to minister to others.
As we abide we can say with David:
“I sought the LORD, and he answered me and delivered me from all my fears. Those who look to him are radiant, and their faces shall never be ashamed…Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him! Oh, fear the LORD, you his saints, for those who fear him have no lack!” Psalm 34
So, taste and see! Abide, friend. Take refuge in Him. Seek Him. Fear Him. And watch Him take away your fears and turn your lack into overflowing fruit for His name and kingdom.
