fire in my bones
- Bailey
- Jul 20, 2015
- 3 min read
Jesus, spark that place in my soul that’s cooled to glowing embers.
I sit across from my friend, a kindred spirit as in love with global missions as I am, and I listen to her recount her mission trip to the Amazon. She shows pictures of people she met and gives names and back stories and context to each one. She talks about men’s and women’s ministries, about kids’ VBS and medical aid. She talks about cutting hair and painting nails, about fishing and puppets and pain medication and eye glasses. About sharing the gospel and praying together and baptizing. She spoke real life.
How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation, who says to Zion, “Your God reigns.” (Isaiah 52:7)
Eyes welling, I listen to my friend tell me about a day in women’s ministry where she painted nails, cut hair, and talked through translators, and my heart burned. My friend dives in to a story about a group of American women, all ages, all walks of life, sharing biblical truth and gospel goodness with the girls from a local village. She told me about the chorus of prayers in Portuguese, echoing the life-giving truth of the translator.
Eternity’s edge.
My heart beat heavy with longing for what she experienced in that moment, and in all the moments of her trip: from the nights spent in hammocks, to the dirtiness of the Amazon, to the sorrow of the malnourished, to the joy of evangelism, all of it. I so badly want the rush of unfamiliarity and the frustration of a language barrier. I desperately desire the immersion in an exotic culture and the excitement of declaring the Gospel in spirit and truth.
And then I look around.
Already, I am on front lines. My kitchen, my neighbors, my friends, the grocery store, the kids I coach. Jesus is needed here just as much as He’s needed in the Amazon and the Congo and the Philippines. Regardless of where He’s leading me to, I can only act in the present, so the time is now. Missional living happens on the mission field and the mission field exists under the feet that bring Good News.
Holy Spirit, You are welcome here. Let us become more aware of Your Presence. Let us experience the glory of Your goodness.
I am here on purpose.
I have legs that can walk, a mouth that can testify, ears that can listen, and eyes that can read. I have a heart that can feel and pray and love. And I have a God that can save.
Family and friends act as a crazy-awesome support system that encourages me and loves me endlessly. This home-base of people is built on an immovable foundation. More than that, my heart is home to a Father who delights in loving through me and declaring freedom to His children.
Everyone to whom much was given, of him much will be required, and from him to whom they entrusted much, they will demand the more. (Luke 12:48)
I have been given much, and I am beginning to expect more and more that much will be demanded of me. Even now, I am learning that the luster and richness of my relationship with Jesus ebbs and flows with the time I spend with Him and the glory I consciously give Him and the authenticity of the display of my trust in and love for Him.
In the absence of planes and mountains and a language barrier and dancing with caramel-colored kids this summer, I’ve been graced with time alone, to stew and steep in what Jesus asks of me every day. Every day it’s, “Will you deny yourself? Will you take up your cross? Will follow me, today?” Today. Denying myself today is different than denying myself in four years, or ten. Following Jesus today, I’m discovering, is a knees-down-palms-up position of submission and attitude of joy.
I’ve been given the gift of life today and the promise of eternity. The in-between and before don’t matter, they only cover up the beauty of now.
Jesus, keep the fire burning bright and crackling loud.
If I say, “I will not mention him, or speak any more in his name,” there is in my heart as it were a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I am weary with holding it in, and I cannot. (Jeremiah 20:11)
