A conversation 14 years in the making

“You’re going into a dead end,” said a bystander.

 

“I know” I replied.

 

And there we were, a team of 6 led by a red-headed 17-year old named Jordan standing in an alley you would not want to be in at night.  It was tough and beat up.

 

On this day, me and my teammate Kelsey took a team of short-term missionaries through our market, allowing each of the participants to take the reigns at different times as they asked the Lord as to where to go.  On this specific occurrence, it was Jordan’s turn.

 

As we stopped to debrief, the Lord spoke something amazing.  This alley was a place that Jordan knew very well.  This alley was the condition of Jordan’s heart.  This alley, also, was the condition of my heart. 

 

Jordan was the 17-year old version of myself.

 

 

My month 6 debrief was the hardest time of my life.  One of the things the Lord pressed into me was about my parents’ divorce.  I wrote a blog about that a while back and lots of freedom came out of it. (I added a link to referenced blog in case you would like to read it)

 

What was special about this alley was it used to be a place of refuge for me.  Not the physical representation, but the spiritual.  The feeling of having to wear a mask that everything was ok, the feeling of pleasing two sides of family, trying to hold the family together however possible.  I knew all of this.

 

And that’s exactly where Jordan was as well.

 

Sometimes I ask the Lord why he allows things to happen.  And then a moment like today occurs.  Literally 14 years in the making. 

 

He allowed me to feel everything I did when I was 13 so that I could receive this daughter of his.  Who better to love on her than someone who had experienced the same things.

 

Jordan shared that her parents divorced when she was 13 and has been trying to keep it together since.  That she has been wearing a mask to please people and the same time-sharing, tightrope walk with both sides of her family.

 

 

Tears were streaming down her face.  For the first time in a long time, she was allowed to be who she is.  A vulnerable girl who needed to be held and told everything is gonna be ok.  That she did not have to carry the responsibility of holding the family together.  She was finally able to take off the “everything is alright” mask and be vulnerable.  No more walls.  No more hiding.  No more lies.  No more alleys.

 

It was in that alley that the Lord spoke to Jordan, whose very name is in the bible as the river that separated the desert/wilderness (death) and the promised land (life).  Jordan, much like the river, found herself between two destinies.

 

Deuteronomy 30 shares that before us is both life and death, and how much the Lord wants us to choose life.

 

Jordan, too, had the choice before her.  To put on the mask again and head into the wilderness, or walk in the promise of her father, the promised land.

 

Jordan looked up, with eyes welled up, and said “I think the reason the Lord brought me here to Guatemala was to meet you.”

 

Praise the Lord

 

Feel free to comment