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Reflections

By Kei Sullivan

As I was saying my goodbyes three weeks ago to my new but dear Ugandan friends, one of them said to me, “Oh, you know how it will be. We’ll miss each other for a week and then we’ll get back to or usual lives.” A sad thought, yet happily not entirely true. For unlike an ordinary vacation, I brought back from Uganda much more than a horde of beautiful photos and unique African crafts. Besides these I have sweet memories of hours fellowshipping with other seekers-of-truth, and a greatly enriched understanding of that truth. Both continue to inspire me to live “life as usual” in the most God-honoring way this old flesh allows.

Of the many things I now understand in a richer way, one that has given me great strength, is Philippians 4:12:

I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: every where and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need.

In times past, these words simply meant to me that poverty or wealth should be one and the same to a believer, and that poverty could be as endured with the same joy as wealth. The greater truth as I now understand concerns our ability to depend on God, i.e. the spiritual ‘art’ of remaining wholly dependent on him despite poverty … or riches.

The first time I accompanied Reverends Tim and Jay on a mission trip, I was convinced within two days of arriving that I needed to move to Kenya. I was utterly enthralled with the simple and quiet lifestyle of the Maasai women, and certain that I could more easily live a more God-honoring life if I abandoned the crazy ‘rat race’ of my present lifestyle and moved to Africa. The same emotions welled up in me within a day of arriving to Uganda. Oh, to have nothing more to do than stroll to the daily market, wash ones clothes, clean ones floor, read the Bible and fellowship with other Christians!

The Holy Spirit wasted no time chastising me by bringing some embarrassing facts to my recollection: the many times I have moaned to God how much better I could serve him ‘if only”. “If only I wasn’t married.” If only my child was whole.”  “If only I lived here.” “If only I lived there.”

I now acknowledge that God knows where each of us is, and he has placed us where we are for reasons that are his own. If I can’t learn to be wholly dependent on him in America, the Land of Plenty, I will almost certainly fail him in Kenya, Uganda, or any other place where there may be more peace and quiet, but daily bread can seem a daily struggle.

Proverbs 30:8 and 9 tell us:

Remove far from me vanity and lies: give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with food convenient for me.
Lest I be full, and deny thee, and say, Who is the Lord? or lest I be poor, and steal, and take the name of my God in vain.

In God’s eyes, poverty and riches are the same: they both offer equal opportunities to bring him honor - by trusting him to provide our daily bread, and by honoring him (and not our paychecks) as the source of that bread. Now I see that my goal is not to escape my present trial. My goal is to trust and honor God right where I am.

I told more than one Ugandan that I would trade everything America has to offer for the simple life they seem to have. If I could take back those foolish words I would. It minimizes the struggle of poverty and need, and it betrays a lack of gratitude to God that I have had in my own life.

To my Ugandan friends, I apologize. To Reverend Tim, thank you for your class, The Prosperity of His Servant. To God, thank you for patience and longsuffering!

 

 


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