Not Just a Hearer
Here & Now Shelby, NC Mission Experience: Ammaris Jordan
James 1: 22 KJV "But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves."
School was finally out for the winter break, but with the influx of exams and being in the process of moving out of my dorm, I never fully processed the idea that I was attending a mission trip until the day we boarded the vans and headed down the road to Shelby, NC. My mind was weighed down with the thought of all the obligations and requirements that needed to be met. Everything going through my mind prior to the trip was about me. Questions like, how I would handle life after college? What would be the next step for me? What should I do?
Then it hit me.
As I we were riding down the road toward the mission camp; after the conversation had died down, I finally found the calm and the chance to be alone with my thoughts. (This was in between all the naps that I took.) That was when I really began to listen to God and not just hearing what I wanted to hear, but hearing what was uncomfortable to me. It is always the still small voice that we pray to hear, but when it comes it disrupts all the plans that we have made for ourselves.
What I heard in those quiet moments was not a solution to all my problems, not a quick answer that would resolve every battle that is bound to come; what I heard was direction on being not only a hearer, but also a doer. So many times, I have been quick to assume things would go a certain way, I have listened to what is comfortable to me. Yet, I felt God telling in that moment, that life would no longer be simply about me. It was time for me to be a doer, someone that applies what they have been taught and impacts the lives of others not just themselves. So, as we reached the mission camp, my focus changed. My mind was geared on doing for others not worrying about myself. My priority became on not only hearing the word of God, but also applying it in that moment.
Each day of the mission experience was insightful, powerful, and impactful. Not for one moment did I regret the choice I made to be a doer. This mission trip was different from others I have attended because we not only did manual labor in the form of building wheelchair ramps for the disabled, having teams going to visit the elderly, making denim shoe starter kits for children in Uganda, boxing books to shipped to India, or even making jump ropes out of grocery bags to take on future mission trips; there was something more to it than doing these physical things. There was the opportunity to interact, pray, and grow with young adults and college students in a way that we would be able to carry on into our futures, wherever we are led to go.
That, for me was the most amazing thing about this mission experience. We experienced God not only through the work that was done, but also by laboring in love with those around us. Had it not been for our Campus ministers listening to the call of God to go to this place and to do a good work in His name; then I would not have been able to become a doer. Through this experience, I learned that hearing and doing go hand in hand. We cannot be one without the other if we intend to portray the love of God in the lives of others.
Here & Now Shelby, NC Mission Experience: Ammaris Jordan
James 1: 22 KJV "But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves."
School was finally out for the winter break, but with the influx of exams and being in the process of moving out of my dorm, I never fully processed the idea that I was attending a mission trip until the day we boarded the vans and headed down the road to Shelby, NC. My mind was weighed down with the thought of all the obligations and requirements that needed to be met. Everything going through my mind prior to the trip was about me. Questions like, how I would handle life after college? What would be the next step for me? What should I do?
Then it hit me.
As I we were riding down the road toward the mission camp; after the conversation had died down, I finally found the calm and the chance to be alone with my thoughts. (This was in between all the naps that I took.) That was when I really began to listen to God and not just hearing what I wanted to hear, but hearing what was uncomfortable to me. It is always the still small voice that we pray to hear, but when it comes it disrupts all the plans that we have made for ourselves.
What I heard in those quiet moments was not a solution to all my problems, not a quick answer that would resolve every battle that is bound to come; what I heard was direction on being not only a hearer, but also a doer. So many times, I have been quick to assume things would go a certain way, I have listened to what is comfortable to me. Yet, I felt God telling in that moment, that life would no longer be simply about me. It was time for me to be a doer, someone that applies what they have been taught and impacts the lives of others not just themselves. So, as we reached the mission camp, my focus changed. My mind was geared on doing for others not worrying about myself. My priority became on not only hearing the word of God, but also applying it in that moment.
Each day of the mission experience was insightful, powerful, and impactful. Not for one moment did I regret the choice I made to be a doer. This mission trip was different from others I have attended because we not only did manual labor in the form of building wheelchair ramps for the disabled, having teams going to visit the elderly, making denim shoe starter kits for children in Uganda, boxing books to shipped to India, or even making jump ropes out of grocery bags to take on future mission trips; there was something more to it than doing these physical things. There was the opportunity to interact, pray, and grow with young adults and college students in a way that we would be able to carry on into our futures, wherever we are led to go.
That, for me was the most amazing thing about this mission experience. We experienced God not only through the work that was done, but also by laboring in love with those around us. Had it not been for our Campus ministers listening to the call of God to go to this place and to do a good work in His name; then I would not have been able to become a doer. Through this experience, I learned that hearing and doing go hand in hand. We cannot be one without the other if we intend to portray the love of God in the lives of others.