Ok so I know I never blog here, and I'm pretty sure that all my blogs start out that way and I'm sorry blah blah blah anyway let's get to it.
So tonight my beautiful friend Maggie and I were on the Horseshoe eno-ing (that's a word, right?) and chatting it up and all of a sudden this guy comes over and asks for our permission to snapchat his friend us hanging out in our enos. Apparently he had been living in a hole because he said something to the effect of "This is so weird, I've never seen anyone do this." So I thought he was going to snapchat his friend and then be on his merry little way, but NO. He stays and talks to us for like an hour and a half. It was so cool though because the conversation flowed like we had always known him and like he had always known us. The conversation at one point went to a similarity between a ritual they do on certain Indian reservations and Christ's death on the Cross. The whole conversation my thought process was "This is so weird. He shouldn't be talking to us. Why is he still here? Does he love Jesus? I don't think he does. I should tell him about Jesus." In that part of the conversation it would have been the perfect time to talk about Jesus and our faith and whatever, but did I do it? NO. And now, I'm sitting here with no way to ever get in touch with him again, feeling like I missed an opportunity, which I totally did. I felt God tugging at my heart to share the Gospel with him, and I didn't. I know that my sinful self cannot and will not change what God has planned, so if Austin (the guy we met) is supposed to have a relationship with Jesus, someone else will come along who is much more faithful than me and point him to Christ. So that leaves me with why I was met with this opportunity to share Christ and failed to do so. Honestly here is what I think, and please tell me if this is unbiblical:
Obviously, mine and Maggie's conversation with Austin was no mistake or accident. God doesn't play those games. Whether or not I shared Christ with him is irrelevant, because God was going to use this situation to teach me something either way. If I had talked to him about Jesus and grace he could have accepted it and began a relationship with Christ which would have been awesome. He also could have said no or gone off and thought about it more, yada yada, many things could have resulted from that conversation. But that conversation did not occur, and in this I'm being taught something. I have this guilt of not following God's lead and realizing that I missed an opportunity to be missional where I am which is something I've been working on and God's been convicting me about. From now on in coversations though, I'll remember this feeling and how being faithful would have resulted in much better things. Although I should have gave him the Good News of the Gospel, God still used that strange conversation to teach me what it looks like to take strange things like that and use them for the glory of God. I feel like in the future I'll be more aware of these things and follow God's lead. But even when I fail and don't, there is grace for me, and God loves me the same in my failure as He does in my successes. Because even though I was unfaithful tonight, He will never be unfaithful, and His plan never fails.
That was mostly be trying to figure out my feelings about tonight and see what God was trying to teach me through it. If it taught you something, awesome. If it didn't teach you anything, that's cool too. I hope it was a good story. Jesus loves you all. I love you all. And maybe one day we'll have that conversation about who Jesus is and how good His always is. Peace out home skillets.
So tonight my beautiful friend Maggie and I were on the Horseshoe eno-ing (that's a word, right?) and chatting it up and all of a sudden this guy comes over and asks for our permission to snapchat his friend us hanging out in our enos. Apparently he had been living in a hole because he said something to the effect of "This is so weird, I've never seen anyone do this." So I thought he was going to snapchat his friend and then be on his merry little way, but NO. He stays and talks to us for like an hour and a half. It was so cool though because the conversation flowed like we had always known him and like he had always known us. The conversation at one point went to a similarity between a ritual they do on certain Indian reservations and Christ's death on the Cross. The whole conversation my thought process was "This is so weird. He shouldn't be talking to us. Why is he still here? Does he love Jesus? I don't think he does. I should tell him about Jesus." In that part of the conversation it would have been the perfect time to talk about Jesus and our faith and whatever, but did I do it? NO. And now, I'm sitting here with no way to ever get in touch with him again, feeling like I missed an opportunity, which I totally did. I felt God tugging at my heart to share the Gospel with him, and I didn't. I know that my sinful self cannot and will not change what God has planned, so if Austin (the guy we met) is supposed to have a relationship with Jesus, someone else will come along who is much more faithful than me and point him to Christ. So that leaves me with why I was met with this opportunity to share Christ and failed to do so. Honestly here is what I think, and please tell me if this is unbiblical:
Obviously, mine and Maggie's conversation with Austin was no mistake or accident. God doesn't play those games. Whether or not I shared Christ with him is irrelevant, because God was going to use this situation to teach me something either way. If I had talked to him about Jesus and grace he could have accepted it and began a relationship with Christ which would have been awesome. He also could have said no or gone off and thought about it more, yada yada, many things could have resulted from that conversation. But that conversation did not occur, and in this I'm being taught something. I have this guilt of not following God's lead and realizing that I missed an opportunity to be missional where I am which is something I've been working on and God's been convicting me about. From now on in coversations though, I'll remember this feeling and how being faithful would have resulted in much better things. Although I should have gave him the Good News of the Gospel, God still used that strange conversation to teach me what it looks like to take strange things like that and use them for the glory of God. I feel like in the future I'll be more aware of these things and follow God's lead. But even when I fail and don't, there is grace for me, and God loves me the same in my failure as He does in my successes. Because even though I was unfaithful tonight, He will never be unfaithful, and His plan never fails.
That was mostly be trying to figure out my feelings about tonight and see what God was trying to teach me through it. If it taught you something, awesome. If it didn't teach you anything, that's cool too. I hope it was a good story. Jesus loves you all. I love you all. And maybe one day we'll have that conversation about who Jesus is and how good His always is. Peace out home skillets.
