A Time of Preparation

"Wait patiently for the Lord. Be brave and courageous. Yes, wait patiently for the Lord." -Psalm 27:14

       This is a large portion of what the Lord is patiently teaching me, as this summer draws near. I am so impatient to have my feet on Swedish soil, and to begin cultivating relationships with Swedes! At the same time, I am so grateful for the time the Lord has provided for the preparation of my heart and mind, before I land in Sweden. Raising support has been such an awesome process, since it has opened my eyes to my deeply-rooted self-reliance, and forced me to bow my head to the supremacy of the Lord. He alone is in control! In addition to how the Lord is using support-raising to work in my heart, He is also using it to reveal the beauty of His body, the church. I lack the words to express how encouraging it is to see so many Christians bind together to share the Gospel with others. It is so strikingly beautiful, and I am so grateful to be both a part and a witness.

A quick story:      
       On Wednesday, I was crossing through the brickyard (a central, heavily trafficked part of campus), when I spotted a table with a banner that said "Ask an Atheist". I immediately knew that the Holy Spirit wanted me to go over to the table, but instead I kept walking to my usual between-classes reading spot. I sat down, read two pages, but have no idea what either of them said, since I could not focus. After all, I am about to travel to another continent to share the Good News with people who do not believe that there is a god, what in the world was I doing avoiding the atheists right in front of me? Dumb. So, I prayed for the Holy Spirit to give me words to say, and walked up to the table. There was already a conversation going on between a "christian" guy and four atheists, and from what I could gather, it was a debate about the existence of Adam, Eve, and something about the animals on the Ark. I will be the first to tell you that I have absolutely no scientific vocabulary, or knowledge for that matter, so I had no intention of starting a scientific debate. Fortunately, one of the atheist guys asked me if I had a question, and I said yes, so he and I stepped away from the Adam-Eve discussion. I asked him how he had reached the decision that there was no god, and from there the conversation flowed from discussing family influence on an individual's religious belief to discussing death and afterlife. It was incredible to watch his wall of defensiveness crumble as I asked genuine questions and listened to his responses. I am so grateful to the Lord for enabling me to keep my mouth shut, and for bringing good questions to my mind. I was able to share the Gospel with him near the end of our conversation, and I pray that the Lord will use our conversation to open his eyes to the truth and sweetness of Christ Jesus. If this conversation was a glimpse of what is to come this summer in Sweden, then I am more eager than ever to sit down with precious Swedish students.

If anyone has any prayer requests, please do not hesitate to email me at mkhaddoc@ncsu.edu.
By His grace alone,
 Meredith