I have those a lot on trips. I call them "This is My Job!" moments. Climbing a mountain, swinging on a zip-line above the rainforest, playing football on the beach with students, pouring the concrete for a handicap access ramp. All "This is My Job" moments. All reminders to me of the adventurous life. And yet, in reality, while these moments are great, they don't totally get to the heart of LeaderTreks or my own passion for reaching kids. They're all amazing and remind me of how awesome this job is, but they still lack impact in the hearts of students.
But I had a different "This is My Job" moment this summer. One I will never forget, and one that reminded me right then and there I was thankful to God for the ministry I get to participate in.
One of the students on my trip was struggling with God. Struggling with God's grace in his life, struggling with why God would allow the types of things that were happening to him to happen to anyone. And he was struggling with his anger towards God. All things I myself had gone through at one point. Seeing the need in front of me, I pulled him aside one night to bust open what was going on in his life. And bust open it did. He became vulnerable, openly sharing with me his hurts, his passions, his frustrations with Christ. He told me about his honesty within his own trip book, how he wasn't holding back from telling God what he really thought about Him, showing God his anger towards Him through his words. It was a tough conversation, but a needed one. I shared with him my own thoughts on these same issues and how no matter what, God was big enough to handle the frustrations we throw at him. Over an hour of talking, listening, praying. Then we split ways and went to bed. I had no idea how God would work.
Fast forward six days. We've all just spent four days hiking through the mountains, eating food out of small cups, rejoicing over a single Snickers bar, and going to the bathroom in the woods (well, not exactly a bath ROOM). As we neared the end of Team Time, I watched as the same boy started removing pages from his journal during a time of silence. Then, looking straight at me, tears in his eyes, he told me he didn't feel the same way about God anymore. He didn't feel the anger towards Him he had felt when he wrote the words on those pages days before. He didn't feel the hatred anymore. In fact, he felt free. And in a final act of defiance against his anger, taking the pages in both hands, he tore them in half, top to bottom.
As I watched the pieces of paper fall to the ground, his act wrecked me. Praying at the end our Team Time that night, I cried like a little baby, praising God inside my head for allowing me to be a part of this moment. First time I've ever cried in Team Time. First time I'd allowed God to work like that in me. But I know there will be more "This is My Job" moments just like this. And that's incredible.
