"But God"

Written 8/21/12
This week, has not been an easy week for me. My body is tired, my mind is overwhelmed, and my spirit is also exhausted. Every day is filled with probably 6 hours of physical walking, 10 hours of interactions with sickness, injustice, drug abuse, or teen pregnancy. And the rest of the time, I am in the home of a wonderful family that I met 2 1/2 weeks ago that partially speak English but are very shy. So conversations require thinking and translating and restating and while it's growing us all and getting better every day, it's still exhausting on both ends. My days hardly include downtime and when there is downtime, my teammates are there. Please don't misunderstand me, I love my teammates very much and truly treasure my friendships with each and every one of them, but being around people constantly and interacting every minute of the day has begun to take its toll. When I get tired, more and more things bother me that don't normally. The grace and patience I have for my teammates and the community grows slowly thin and to add insult to injury, I try my absolute hardest to not let my annoyances or exhaustion be visible so I try to cover every thing up on top of already feeling it. And as my eyes get heavier, I am reminded just how real and how much the devil loves me at this point. When I'm tired, my guard is down, anything can bother me, and he thrives. I have been overwhelmed the past few days with what I will do for a job when I get home, how my parents are feeling, what can I do to help my relationship, how can I show my friends I care, what will being home be like again, and the list goes on and on. None of these things are bad things, but they do cause me to miss the here and now and truly don't matter and won't matter for quite some time and even then, I trust God to perfectly ordain His next steps, but my tired flesh wants answers and a plan.

But God. Recently in my study of the Word, in so many places, the phrase "but God" is a turning point and one not only of a decision, but a divine shift or appointment in the scriptures. And the more time I spend in His presence, even when my body wants sleep more than anything else, the more "but God" moments I begin to experience in my own life.

Today, my "but God" moment came thru a boy named Justin. Justin is 12 years old and weighs 16 kilograms. For my nurse friends, figure out his med conversions, just kidding lol. Justin weighs about 35 pounds. Justin was born with severe special needs and needs complete and total care 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Justin will probably never speak, but his smile, made up of mostly missing or rotten teeth, could light up the entire night sky. His blue eyes are the most beautiful eyes I have ever seen and his little freckled face shows the joy of Jesus in a completely perfect way. Justin's soon to be step father attends the church we visited on Sunday morning here in Lambert's Bay and insisted his son needed to meet us. There unfortunately no special needs classes for Sunday school and even if their were, Justin would require too much help so his mom and future step father trade off weeks in service. Today was the only day in the week that worked for our schedule and theirs, and God knew, today was the day I needed Justin. The gym was swarming with girls after the pregnancy prevention class we taught today, but we all came out to Justin and his parents standing outside in the beautiful sun. I was held up with some of the girls so I missed the introductions, but by the time I got to Justin, his dad was comfortable enough with us to let us hold him, and I was the first one he offered to. As I held him, he reached up to touch my head and I learned he loves hair. Well, my mop of waves and curls were tied up today so as I held him in my arms, I had a team mate let my hair down. I have never seen a smile bigger than the one Justin had on his face as he touched my hair and saw it fall all around his face. As I held him. I prayed every prayer I could think of thanking God for his life, praying for healing, praying for God to move in his life some how, the list goes on and on. But as I prayed for Justin, I felt my exhaustion lift in a way I cannot describe. Holding a 35 pound boy was effortless. My annoyances began to vanish one by one. The only thing that mattered to me was Justin and Gods love for him being shown to him. I remember the girls from the class playing with my hair and pulling quite hard, but nothing mattered but Justin because God had come in the middle of my bad day and decided that a "but God" moment needed to change the entire course of the day and week. I came home to my host family, where I was supposed to be cooking dinner tonight, to find Aurielle cooking. I guess they ran out of time to go to the store so my meal had to wait, which meant I got an extra hour to just relax, but all I wanted to do was stand in the kitchen and tell Aurielle about the amazing little boy I met and the way God provided in the most perfect time. "But God" moments don't come around every day for me and if I'm not careful, I miss them sometimes. So my challenge to you is to be on the lookout for "But God" moments in your life and pray like it all depends on Him. And when moments like that happen, tell the world how great our God is and how He took whatever situation we were in and decided to exchange the period in the sentence for a comma and a "but God."