I Know I Have It

So much has happened since the last post I created. This transition has been a stretching experience for me in many ways.

About three weeks after moving in and settling into my space, 7 college students move in to the house, with whom I begin to spend every waking (and sleeping) moment.

Not long after that we began training small group leaders for our convention’s youth summer camp: Super Summer, followed by two weeks of camp. We traveled to Branson, spent afternoons with followers of Christ much wiser than I, studied a book together, ate many meals, shared stories, and just got back from a week and a half of ministry in St. Louis which I plan to share about in an upcoming post.

For many reasons it has been a challenging environment, at no fault of anyone, but rather by sheer circumstance. The timing of my move threw me into a whirlwind internship experience while simultaneously being unsure about my role. I am learning how my job works, and trying to cultivate a welcoming environment for new people when I still feel like a guest in my own world.

I suppose that the most significant piece of advice I received while deep in my perplexity over my role, my influence, and my purpose, was that God still speaks to me; that sheep know the voice of the Shepherd. Some good friends of mine reminded me that I, Beka Todd, hear his voice. And I know that I do. I’ve heard him remind me over and over that in the midst of changing roles and insecurity he speaks and moves. While the enemy hopes and seeks to use my confusion and transition as footholds to tell me many things: I’m worthless, and I’ll never be able to love anyone again; God wants to use that very same breeding ground for life change and molding me more into the image of the Son.

One of the most influential moments so far has been in talking with some of the students I’ve interacted with this summer, getting to explain what a relationship with the Lord looks like in great depth and length. At our training, I noticed a particularly down-trodden face among faces. I asked what was going on. This ultimately led to hours of conversation about grace, relationship, mercy, sin, and the Gospel. These moments are where my soul soars. When I get to answer a seeking mind’s questions about the power of grace and why on earth the creator of the universe, perfect Son of God would ever choose to love me or call me to himself, sacrificing His Son for me. What wondrous love is this.

In the midst of this conversation I remember being asked,  “How do you know you have it?” Essentially referring to the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and ultimately salvation of your soul.

“Do you know you have it?” she asked.

Through teary eyes, I looked back on my life, my emotions, the comfort, the nudgings, the provision, the conviction I’ve known in my life, and answered: 

“I know I have it.”

What joy to be able to confidently say: “I know I have it.”

When many people in this life struggle to find what it even is, I have it, and I thrive when I get to tell other people about it.

While I’ve struggled through two weeks of emotionally, and physically exhausting youth summer camp, projects, mission work, and what life together really looks like. I felt God telling me so many things.

Just like Hagar in the desert I was reminded that “You are the God who sees me.” (Gen. 16:13)  God sees me and knows me and is working everything together for my good.

Our speaker at camp said the phrase, “You don’t let anyone tell you who you are. Only God tells you who you are.”

My whole life's struggle has been and continues to be feeling like Mia Thermopolis from the Princess Diaries, who states that, “my expectation in life is to be invisible; and I’m good at it.”

I want someone just anyone to acknowledge that they see me; that I’m doing good; that I’m doing something meaningful and worthwhile. If I’m honest I want people to notice that and affirm that. I want my productivity in my job to do that, and to provide me with that feeling. As a woman and as a human I will fight the battle all my life to only let God tell me who I am, and to remember that “He is the God who sees me.”

During this process, I know that the phrase, “Jesus is better,” has found it’s way back into my life over and over again. I believe God is challenging me to really, truly believe that “my ways are higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.” (Isaiah 55:8-9) No matter what on earth I strive for, wish I had, or thought I would get; Jesus is better. The fact that I can hold anything up to that statement, is both hard to swallow and beautiful to rest in. God is asking me to trust in his sovereignty over my life and the lives of others in many ways. He’s asking me to walk with my eyes on Him and nothing else.

So in the midst of transition, when I look at the confusion of my life, the fact that I’ve been transported to a whole new world, and see that the expectation I had for my new community, job, and life are not looking exactly the way I pictured, I remind myself: He sees me, and He is better.

So I press on reminding myself of that “I have it.” And really, when I think about that, the rest is just details.

“The fear of man is a snare, but the one who trusts in the lord is protected.” Proverbs 29:25