Hidden Rocks

Just like that, two weeks of ministry in North Carolina, done. It’s been a bit tough to post blogs because I haven’t really been able to charge my Ipad to be able to put anything out, especially with pictures. So now that we are back in Gainesville, GA I am able to post. 

It was absolutely incredible to go out and serve consistently for two weeks after learning so much about it for the whole month prior. Some days felt like we were doing such useful and good work. Work that felt like we were tangibly helping people and churches and communities. I could see very easily the way God was using us to bless the people of Black Mountain, NC. For a couple of days we cleaned out a whole upstairs area of a church, throwing away cassettes of sermons from the 80s, faded VBS posters, and so many books. It took many hours to strip wallpaper off the walls and paint all the walls gray so that this church could use it to have their kid programs up there and usable libraries for the church to have. That work felt good, especially when you are driving away from the ministry site. But then there were days, specifically the rock day, that couldn’t have felt more pointless. Days that made me question how God could use this in any way, shape or form for his good. Let me explain the rock day. We were staying at this small college in NC and sleeping on this grassy field. One day we got home from our morning ministry and had lunch and after that we went outside and were told to pick up/out all of the rocks from the field. I’m really bad at judging areas of spaces but I could assume it was around the size of a football field. Rocks from the size of pebbles to soccer balls covered the field, some were just laying on the ground, some were embedded in the ground. So me and 8 other people sat and picked rocks out for 3 hours. We were laughing at how pointless it felt. The whole ground was rocks. We would find ourselves just chuckling at how funny it was. It was a pretty grassy area with a lot of straw over the ground and because of that you couldn’t really see any of the rocks. So I was crawling around on my hands and knees and I would feel the pain of kneeling on a rock and would find it and pull it from the ground and add it to my pile. So about an hour into this I start to reflect on my own life. How many rocks are hiding in my life? How many small things, whether that be from my past or current struggles, prevent new grass from growing, new life from coming up. And they are 100% covered to the eye, no one can see them, you could easily keep going on but then something happens. You kneel down and their presence is finally known and are causing pain. So I began to think about things in my own life. Like why is it so painful to me when someone comments on what I’m eating or the topic of suicide is brought up? Because there are rocks from my past that I have never, or just not fully, taken the time to work through and pick out that would make kneeling down on that subject much easier. I can already see the Lord start to reveal these rocks to me. Things that I had no idea were affecting me but somehow they got brought up and I can begin to see how they affect the way I treat other people or myself and I am so grateful that those are being exposed. Because now I can kneel down painless to worship the Lord with everything in me.  I’m excited to work through these things, so when I get back to life back at home I am a changed person. So, I am thankful for that “pointless” ministry afternoon because the Lord taught me so much. Now I am intentionally looking for the rocks, not just trying my hardest to ignore them. 

I was also reminded of the verse 1 Corinthians 10:31 “So whether you eat or drink (or pick rocks out of a rocky field) or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” Someone asked us to do it and we did it joyfully to glorify God. And I want to remember this all through the race and my life. And you can remember this too. How can you glorify God in everything you do in your life? I thank God for teaching me these lessons now, to be able to work on them all through the race, around people who are also striving to live a life more aligned with Christ and who he is. 

We have a few more days here at the base and leave for Cambodia on Friday, October 14. It is around five days of travel and because of the international date line we are not existent on October 16, we completely skip that day. Still haven’t totally comprehended how that works but it will still be awesome. So excited to finally be in Cambodia. I have no idea what life will be like or how much communication I will have but we’ll figure that out when we get there. Prayers that travel goes smoothly and everyone gets there safely. 

Here are a few pictures from North

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And here is beautiful Team 6, Manna. 

Thank you so much for reading and supporting me! If you have any questions or want to know how to help support my other teammates who are not fully funded you can email me [email protected] and I would love to talk. 

God Bless you all!

Love, Lauren