To recap:
Never could I have foreseen the delightful surprise
God is handing me—today, this week!—
some twenty years later.
Back then, God and I were in a monumental battle of the
wills.
He was pointing me toward Africa, but I was digging in my
heels.
In most situations I probably wouldn’t have put up such a
fight, but when it came to what was best for my kids—well, that was a different
story.
I felt no peace—none!—about leaving them. I just couldn’t
shake the belief that they needed their parents to help them transition out of
college and into adulthood.
Those were dark days: It felt like God was asking me to walk
away from my kids before I had finished the job He had given me: to raise them—and
raise them well. Everything within me cried out that it wasn’t right!
At the same time, I was not at peace about stomping my foot
and saying “No!” to God.
Somewhere deep inside I knew He was offering me a
God-designed opportunity—but I viewed it as a nightmare!
Nevertheless, I was willing for Him to change my mind and heart.
You already know the end of this story—I did go to Africa—and
looking back at the timeline of my life, I can’t imagine how I could have said yes
to God and going to Africa if (1) I had not already studied (and even taught
studies about) Abraham and been in dumbfounded awe of him, and (2) if I had not
already cherished Oswald Chambers’ perspectives about Abraham in Not Knowing
Where, and (3) if I hadn’t discovered, at just the right time, Chuck Swindoll’s
Abraham, The Friend of God.
“Sometimes people and things can become too important to
us,” writes Chuck Swindoll. “We grip them with
closed fists and white knuckles,” he writes, “and God has to pry open our
fingers to loosen our hold. Perhaps that’s how it was between Abraham and
Isaac.”
Swindoll was also describing me: I was holding the dreams and plans I had as a mother in closed fists with white knuckles, but
God was asking me to loosen my hold. Swindoll also writes that there are times
when “God seems to require something sacred in our lives that puts us to the
test.” (Abraham, The Friend of God)
It was starting to make sense: God was requiring something
sacred of me. He was putting me to the test.
Within the context of a trusting, personal relationship, God was asking
me to place my children in His hands voluntarily, as an act of worship, as a gift,
as an expression of devotion to Him.
Similar to God’s request of Abraham, God was asking me to
give Him my dearest and best so He could give me His better, but it would mean no
Thanksgivings and Christmases as a family, or Mother’s Days, or birthdays. It would
mean the end of heart-to-heart talks. It would mean that when I read my kids’
letters, half a world away, I couldn’t really know how they were doing—I
couldn’t look into their eyes or see their faces or discern their tone of
voice. It would mean years would pass before getting to hug them.
Looking back now, I see that my biggest issue was that I didn’t
trust God to care for my kids.
But God zinged me on that, too:
“The great lesson to be learned from Abraham’s faith in God
is that he was prepared to do anything for God,” wrote Oswald Chambers. “He was
there to obey God, no matter what contrary belief of his might be violated by
his obedience.… If you will remain true to God, God will lead you directly
through every barrier and right into the inner chamber of the knowledge of
himself. But you must always be willing to come to the point of giving up your
own convictions and traditional beliefs.” (Not Knowing Where, Oswald Chambers;
emphasis mine)
With those words, a light came on! In a flash I realized why
I was resisting God’s assignment to Africa: it violated my belief of what was
best for my children. God, however, was asking me to question my assumptions
about what was best and, where appropriate, to give up my own convictions and
traditional beliefs. He was asking me to see this through His eyes.
Recognizing that made a big difference. That was one of the
breakthroughs I needed.
That didn’t mean that I felt no pain in leaving my children.
The pain still seared.
That didn’t mean I was happy with leaving my children and
doing things God’s way. No, but I was willing.
Oswald Chambers wrote, “When we say, ‘Thy will be done,’ do
we say it with a sigh?” (The Complete Works of Oswald Chambers, Run Today’s
Race)
Yes, I sighed, “Thy will be done.” I wasn’t proud of my
sigh. God no doubt wished I’d had a different attitude, but at least He did
know my willingness.
God was in the process of changing the desires of my heart.
Do you remember what I said last week? God says in His Word that He’ll grant us
the desires of our heart, but sometimes, first He needs to change our heart.
(Psalm 37:4)
I certainly was no Abraham, but his example stirred me to do
what God was asking of me: to respond to Him as an act of worship, as a gift,
as an expression of devotion to Him, however humanly flawed.
I knew what I had to do. Voluntarily, one by one, I pictured
placing my children on an altar. I began with my daughter, Karen. I had to let
go, offer her up to God, walk away, and grieve for a few days. I repeated the
process with my son, Matt.
This month-long process left me emotionally spent. My heart
felt shredded and bleeding. Something inside
me had died. When a mother’s heart hurts for her children, it is like no other
pain. The wise old author of Ecclesiastes said there’s a time to mourn and a
time to dance (3:4). That was my time to mourn.
But then God seemed to whisper, “Linda, don’t you know I
love Matt and Karen even more than you do? You can trust Me with them.”
My heart melted.
I could do only two things: trust Him to manage my kids’
consequences because of their parents’ move to Africa, and then turn and take a
step of faith: a blind, screaming, sobbing leap of faith.
But what did an extreme, blind screaming, sobbing leap of
faith look like? How was I to do it?
how differently I'd have viewed what He was asking of me.
God is so delightfully, surprisingly amazing.
