Dancing With a Mission

As I hiked the Grand Canyon this past weekend, I was asked by a specific person, “are you praying?”  He asked me this question about 35 times (no joke) within the one weekend.  He told me my job was to be the prayer warrior for the trip.  This should have been an honor but I took it the other way, I was annoyed that he pointed me out and then, oh no, he better not make me pray in front of the entire group… so, as he would ask me, I would just laugh his comment off and try to steer clear of him.

2 Chronicles 20:12 …We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you.

From this verse, and lack of prayer time, I realized I was hiding from hearing what God wanted me to do and thought my decision making was “good” enough.  I was “slacking” on my prayer time, quiet time because I had a feeling He wanted differently.

2 Chronicles 20: 5-12

And Jehoshaphat stood in the assembly of Judah and Jerusalem, in the house of the Lord, before the new court, and said, “O Lord, God of our fathers, are you not God in heaven? You rule over all the kingdoms of the nations. In your hand are power and might, so that none is able to withstand you.  Did you not, our God, drive out the inhabitants of this land before your people Israel, and give it forever to the descendants of Abraham your friend?  And they have lived in it and have built for you in it a sanctuary for your name, saying, ‘If disaster comes upon us, the sword, judgment, or pestilence, or famine, we will stand before this house and before you—for your name is in this house—and cry out to you in our affliction, and you will hear and save.’  And now behold, the men of Ammon and Moab and Mount Seir, whom you would not let Israel invade when they came from the land of Egypt, and whom they avoided and did not destroy— behold, they reward us by coming to drive us out of your possession, which you have given us to inherit.  O our God, will you not execute judgment on them? For we are powerless against this great horde that is coming against us. We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you.”

Jehoshaphat  was a 'good' king.  But that doesn't mean he didn't make mistakes!  He made some bad decisions, which led them to face assault from their enemies.

2Chronicles 20:12 O our God, will you not execute judgment on them? For we are powerless against this great horde that is coming against us. We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you.”

He had allowed his focus to shift from the Lord and that is what got him in trouble in the first place.  In our text verse he tells God, "We're in trouble, and I have no CLUE what to do, but I am looking to You for the answer!  What a great example for us.  What I may see as a sign of weakness in myself when I do not know what to do, I have to remember it’s just the way of life, we all find ourselves without a clue at some point.  However, it’s what we do when we get to this point that shows where our heart is.

"In all thy ways acknowledge him." 

As we look to the Lord for direction, we trust Him and not ourselves!  He will give us the instruction we need to make the right choices.  We don't have to guess at what we should do, we need to trust Him.

So, what did this look like recently in my life?

As I have written before, I have an insecurity that I’m working on; I lean on my actions showing Christ love more than my words because of the fear of it coming out wrong or even worse, becoming speechless!  Even though God knows my heart, my thoughts, my fears, I held back from sharing this with Him in knowing I would have to do something about it! 

A couple nights ago, I was asked what I am most looking forward to on my trip to Zambia, I finally admitted, I am SO scared yet so excited to see God push me out of this little box that I keep myself in.  I am so scared, yet excited to be used in ways I wouldn’t normally allow myself to be used.

A couple hours later, I was swing dancing with a bunch of friends.  A random man came up and asked me to dance.  As I was being twirled around and dipped, he asked me if I was with the church group.  I said, “I am, what church do you go to?!”  He proceeded that he is a Christian but does not go to a church, so the next question that came out was “what do you believe a Christian is?” He didn’t know but said that he tries to be a good person.  From that point, he kept twirling and I kept speaking.  After we finished the dance I realized I just shared with him exactly what I have been telling myself I wont be able to share with others.  I got to tell him how all of us are not perfect, we are all sinners, wrong doers.  But THANKFULLY, God sent His Son, Jesus Christ down on Earth to pay that penalty.  He died on that cross for YOU, for ME!!!  And when He did that, our sins were wiped clean!  Now we have the opportunity to trust and believe in Jesus, to have that personal relationship with Him!

God knows exactly how to get His point across to us, exactly what we need and exactly how to use us… For me, apparently He knows I have to dance through the mission!