The Lesson of His Arms

Today we went to the slums, as we have done every day this week but today we felt as if we shouldn't be there. As we were wrestling with embarrassment of what we perceived people must be feeling or thinking, us coming there everyday; this little girl comes out of the alley with tears rolling down her cheeks. She's a skinny little thing, one of the skinniest kids I've ever seen, and her hair was orange and brittle from malnourishment. I went over to her, got down on her level and slowly extended my arms to see if she objected to being held. She showed no resistance so I picked her up and she lost it. She began crying into my shoulder, her little hands gripping my shirt. I held her as close as I could and tried to communicate that she was safe and loved through it. My mind began to conjure up all the possible scenarios of why this girl was alone crying. Then my mind went a step further and I thought, "Whatever made this girl cry now will still be there after she stops crying." but before I could slip into feeling useless and powerless, Holy Spirit redirected my thoughts. He replayed times in my own life where I was in my room alone crying and how it was in those times that I felt the arms of Jesus holding me just as I was now holding this girl. And I felt the Lord say that now I am His arms. 

I wrestled with the day in the slums for a while till the Lord really brought clarity. He hasn't called me, right now in this present stage, to fix the 'why'; He's called me to face the 'now'. In that moment He wasn't asking me to fix what made that girl cry, He was asking me to be His arms for her. My mind has been getting so wrapped up in everything that we aren't doing and that we aren't able to do that I forget to recognize the significance of what we are doing. In the world's eyes all I did today was hold a girl as she cried but in God's eyes I did what the Father sent me to do. He and I both know the power of His arms being felt and I believe that's what He sent me to do today; what a privilege! 

All we need to do is do what the Father has for us to do. We can't tackle every problem we come across, we can't fix every broken person, can't adopt every lonely child, free every slave, nor feed every hungry mouth; we can certainly try but we'll not succeed. We need only do what the Father has for us to do; to seek out what that is and strive to give Him the utmost glory in it. We can either (I say this to myself as much as an exhortation to us all) mull around what we can't do or give all we have to what we can do.
I'm thankful for the lesson that today brought. I always pray that I can be His hands and feet but when He gives me the opportunity to be them I think it's not enough, as if I know what's best. HA! God knows exactly why that girl was crying and He could have done any number of things to comfort her but God, in His infinite wisdom and love, chose to use me to carry out His will that she be cuddled and loved. Lord forgive me!



Oh and uh...PS I got accepted to staff with YWAM Auckland Central today!