My son, Jacob, is graduating from high school today and we are very proud of him! Jacob is on the autism spectrum and this is a milestone accomplishment in his life. The road to this day has been full of hills and twists and turns, but while Jacob has certainly learned a lot in the course of his education, his life and the journey he has travelled has also taught me several lessons along the way about God and his love. I wanted to share three of these as we celebrate his big day.
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Way back in May, when I was first praying about whether God was calling me to go on this trip to Hungary, Jeana, Jacob, and I were sitting in a movie theater getting ready to watch Marvel’s latest blockbuster. Before the movie started, there was a commercial for AirBnb that focused on travel. When it was over, Jeana and I both looked at each other and laughed – it seemed clear that God was speaking through the screen to us. Here’s the narration from the commercial, entitled “The First Law of Travel.”
My role at the Bible camp was to teach the Bible story each day to the campers. Before our trip, I had spent some time thinking about how to explain the gospel to them and especially the cross. Why did Jesus die on the cross and what did His death mean for us? I started thinking about how Jesus took all of our sin on Himself when He went to the cross and an idea started to form about using garbage bags to demonstrate what that looked like and what it meant. As a result, what I like to call “The Trash Bag Gospel” was born.
On a couple of mornings before our Bible camp started, we had the opportunity to visit some of the families in the community around the church. The homes we visited were small, two or three room structures, and the families were all very gracious and hospitable to us. The first family we visited was a couple with five children all around eight years old and younger, including a five month old infant. One of the children, pictured above, was one of my favorites during the camp. He was always so happy and eager to give high fives and hugs. His father helped us during the camp as well. The five month old had to be taken to the hospital later in the week after having a bad reaction to a vaccine. Fortunately, the baby recovered and is doing well.
Prayer played a huge part in our trip to Ukraine. Each team member had a group of people back home praying consistently for them while we were away and each one of us had been praying since the start of our planning for the trip. Prayers take on a heightened fervency when you are outside of your comfort zone and feel more urgently the need for God to intervene, protect, and provide. We always have that need, whether on an international mission trip or simply living our daily lives, but we are more attuned to it when we are stepping out in faith.