For years I've written about our awesome Creator, but sometimes I wonder how much truth sinks into my own heart. It seems that enjoying a tasty meal with all of its flavors or admiring a beautiful landscape is different than trusting the One who gave us all of it. I get frustrated with my own disconnect sometimes. I praise God because He is so great, but then I hesitate when He asks me to trust Him. Why is that? Do any of you have such issues?
A situation from over 20 years ago keeps playing through my mind, and because I keep thinking about it, I suspect that God is trying to get my attention in the midst of my current life changes. Years ago, God had told me to lay down my dreams and my idea of ministry.
My husband, Wes, and I had just returned from a trip to Kenya. Our national office had asked him to go to Africa to help with some accounting. Our church offered to pay my way so that I could go with him. I couldn't turn down such a generous offer.
We stayed in the mission compound there and got to know some of the people. We were so impressed with the missionaries and the African people that we came back inspired to serve God like that. We went to the chapel and asked God to help us be fruitful like the African people. He quietly said, "Lay down your dreams."
I had good dreams; I wanted to share His Word and I wanted to be a part of an Indigenous community. I am part Ponca, but I never grew up with the Ponca people. I grew up with the Arapahoe and Shoshone people, and I liked being in a Native community. I had been away from the Wind River Reservation for a lot of years and I just wanted to be a part of a community again.
I pictured having ladies for tea, enjoying a Bible study and praying together. I still love the idea of that picture, and my sweet Lord eventually brought that to me, but I needed to let go of my dreams so He could give me His dream-and His dream was much bigger than I could have ever imagined!
The first part of His dream meant moving to Toronto. I am not a city person! That is the last place I wanted to go. Our response to a job offer from a Toronto church was to drive from Saskatoon, where we lived, over to the Alberta foothills. We drove through ranching country to find a Rocky Mountain stream and somehow establish our identity.
This all sounds a bit silly now, but we declared that we were mountain people. (We had grown up in Wyoming and raised our children in Montana.) We were Westerners and we liked the western culture. A person's word was his or her bond-and all of that. On the way home, God reminded us that we should worship Him instead of His creation. So, we went to Toronto.
We had a wonderful 10 years in the Toronto area. We met amazing people from all over the world. I am grateful for that experience. Along with that came the opportunity for a writing course, and I began writing for Indian Life. God opened opportunities for me to share His wonder in ways I never would have even known to ask for, and, ultimately, He opened the way for us to be a part of a ministry to the Indigenous community here in Thunder Bay. Again, I would never have known about such a ministry.
The God who created the universe, our beautiful earth, and everything in it is a generous God. He gives and loves way beyond anything we can imagine. Isaiah says in verses 55:8, "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord." All we have to do is look around us and see His variety and abundance and then entrust Him with our lives. God bless you in your own journey with our Savior.
Sue Carlisle grew up on the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming. An enrolled member of the Ponca Tribe of Nebraska, her passion is to encourage people to look at creation and see our awesome Creator. Sue is author of Walking with the Creator Along the Narrow Road (see page 19). She and her husband, Wes, now live in Thunder Bay, Ontario.
