The Rabenstranger

One of my readers has asked a couple of questions that said I’d answer but haven’t gotten around to yet. Sorry about the delay but here goes:

1. I want a full update on your trip, visit and, well, everything!

The trip went tremendously well. I walked through tunnels, geocached, tubed down the Arkansas river, went to a concert, swam, barbecued, watched a couple movies at a drive-in, hiked and jumped off a cliff a couple times, not necessarily in that order. It was particularly enjoyable because I had such delightful company. I met some of the nicest people I’ve had the good fortune to encounter in a long while.

The second question was actually posed to Trebonte but it definitely deserves my taking a swing at it:

2. Have you always had a heart for the Lord or has that been a more recent part of your maturing and adulthood? … I was just wondering how you, Rabenstrange and whomever you know who lives and believes as you do regarding the Lord.

When I came into the world, God blessed me with parents just a few years out of Bible school. From the cradle, I have been guided by solid Christians who want nothing more than my my spiritual growth. There has never been a time when I have had any difficulty accepting the existence of God or His right to rule the world. I accepted His gift of salvation as a small child.

From this foundation, I grew up believing the right things. I did the “good” things a Christian boy should and avoided the “bad’ things that he shouldn’t. I acknowledged God’s lordship and tried to live accordingly.

Despite all this, I can’t really say that I had much of a heart for God through my teenaged years. I did as I ought because out of duty and gratitude, not because of a particular love for God. My relationship with my Creator had much more the character of master and servant than Father and son. I wasn’t a good servant. I generally thought I was doing well because I showed the outward signs and I knew my Bible better than my peers but my relationship was too intellectual, too theoretical. It wasn’t very personal.

When I moved to Japan, things started to slip a little. I was away from the accustomed supports for my faith and my Bible reading became infrequent. After a month or two I realized that a drastic change in my attitude was necessary. I spent an entire night awake praying that God would reawake a desire in me to know Him and to draw me to Himself. At the time, I saw no immediate change. My Bible study got a little better and I now at least had a desire to desire God but I was still easily distracted.

A few months later, I started a program of self-improvement. I decided to start cutting out some things in my life that were unable to help me or anyone else in the long run and replace them with things that would serve me better. I quit watching TV online and started watching sermons online. I started to feel a new reinvigoration of my desire to serve God. I regularized my Bible reading and started a prayer journal. Again, I didn’t see myself making much progress.

Now, looking back, my time in Japan was a major turning point in my life. I can see that it was there that I really started to really seek after God passionately for myself. What at the time felt like spiritual desert was really a period of life-changing growth. Since that time, I think God has been rapidly shifting my attitudes and shaping my heart to serve him.

I know that I’ve already hit two topics and that I’m already far past the 96 second reading time that the average reader spends on a blog but I’ve got one more thing to get off my chest.

Something really cool happened to me while I was composing this post. For couple months now, I’ve been struggling with why God sent me to Japan. At the time, I knew that He was the driving force that sent me. My previous, seemingly better options fell apart. Meanwhile, everything worked right going to Japan. I got great scholarships, people helped me and it generally felt like the wheels were greased. But since I’ve been back, I haven’t been able to quickly find the great job I was looking for. After all the work and expense of getting a degree in Japan I’m going to need to go back to school and get one here. I’ve been trying to understand, “Why did God do this to me? Did I hear him wrong?” As I wrote this post it all became clear. God sent me to Japan to stand on my own, to force me to seek Him without everyone rooting for me.

Another new insight: remembering my time in Japan and how fruitless my attempts to reach God felt has given me encouragement for today. While praying earlier today, I felt that same lack of progress, but looking back, I am again reminded that I can’t see the work God is doing on me now. It’ll probably be years before today’s progress becomes visible. I need not worry about seeing change now, I only have to keep doing the right thing.

Anyhow, thank you, Mrs. Pam for asking. I’m sure your questions have helped me far more than my answers have helped you.