What stayed with me most was not the rooftop, the verse, or even the remarkable confirmations that followed.
It was your willingness to remain in the tension.
It seems to me there are two easy responses to experiences like this. One is, "God told me this, therefore no one is allowed to question it." The other is, "God could not have told me this, therefore it didn't happen."
You seem content to live somewhere in between.
That takes a tremendous amount of faith.
As I read, I found myself appreciating your honesty. You aren't trying to build a theology around an experience, nor are you trying to explain the experience away. You are simply bearing witness to something that happened and allowing readers to wrestle with it alongside you.
I suspect many of us who have walked with God for a long time have accumulated moments like these. Moments that don't fit neatly into our theological boxes. Moments where something was impressed upon us, where a verse seemed to arrive with unusual weight, where guidance appeared before understanding. Not enough to build certainty upon, but enough to make us pay attention.
What I found especially beautiful was your observation that the word proved larger than your initial reading of it. That has certainly been my experience. Often I think God is speaking about one thing, only to discover years later that I was standing inside a story much larger than the one I could see at the time.
The older I get, the less interested I am in proving that God spoke and the more interested I am in the fruit that follows. Does it lead us toward greater trust? Greater humility? Greater dependence? Greater love?
This story seems to do exactly that.
The line that lingered with me was the final one: "He rarely shows you the whole map. Just the next step."
Yes.
I have found that frustrating at times, and yet I have also found it to be mercy. If I had seen the whole road ahead in some seasons of my life, I would have been overwhelmed. Instead, grace arrived in smaller portions. Enough light for the next step. Then the next. Then the next.
Thank you for sharing this. Not because it answers the questions, but because it honors them. And because beneath the story I hear something deeper than certainty.
"The line that lingered with me was the final one: "He rarely shows you the whole map. Just the next step."
Yes.
I have found that frustrating at times, and yet I have also found it to be mercy. If I had seen the whole road ahead in some seasons of my life, I would have been overwhelmed. Instead, grace arrived in smaller portions. Enough light for the next step. Then the next. Then the next."
Yes, when God led me out of Tanzania to study theology back home in NZ I'd reassured myself that in two years time I'd have my Masters and able to head back to East Africa.
Turned out to be four years later and I needed the extra time to heal my heart through ways I could only do in NZ close to my parents, and my siblings and their kids after being away for many years. The extra time was also required to build fellowship and trust with a new church, the one that sent me out under their name to Uganda where I met Eden.
If i'd have known it would be four years, not two, I may have never left. The move back would've felt even more overwhelming.
Likewise if I'd have known when my first wife shot through that it would be eight long years before I married again I would very likely have given up hope and either checked myself out permanently or just given up on finding a truly suitable woman and just shacked up with one of those who well meaning, but unhelpful, friends were sending my way.
As you say; it's a total mercy we don't know more of our future than what God has revealed to us.
Thank you for such a thoughtful reply. I really appreciated it.
Your piece resonated with me on a deeply personal level. I'm in the midst of a difficult marriage, and there have been many seasons where my expectations for what I thought life would become have collided with the reality of what it actually is.
I've also spent quite a bit of time in Tanzania over the years, especially around Arusha, Moshi, and the surrounding villages, working with orphanages and among the Maasai communities. That land and its people have a special place in my heart, so your words carried an added sense of familiarity for me.
For a long time, I believed peace would come when my circumstances finally changed. Over the years, though—and often the hard way, because I'm a stubborn man—the Lord has been teaching me something different. He has been teaching me that peace is found in surrender before it is found in resolution. The invitation has never really been to control the outcome, but to trust that He is leading, even when I cannot see where the path is going.
That is what I found myself hearing beneath your writing. It reminded me that faith is less about having the life we expected and more about discovering the One who remains faithful within the life we've been given.
Thank you for sharing your story. It encouraged me more than you probably know.
Andrew,
What stayed with me most was not the rooftop, the verse, or even the remarkable confirmations that followed.
It was your willingness to remain in the tension.
It seems to me there are two easy responses to experiences like this. One is, "God told me this, therefore no one is allowed to question it." The other is, "God could not have told me this, therefore it didn't happen."
You seem content to live somewhere in between.
That takes a tremendous amount of faith.
As I read, I found myself appreciating your honesty. You aren't trying to build a theology around an experience, nor are you trying to explain the experience away. You are simply bearing witness to something that happened and allowing readers to wrestle with it alongside you.
I suspect many of us who have walked with God for a long time have accumulated moments like these. Moments that don't fit neatly into our theological boxes. Moments where something was impressed upon us, where a verse seemed to arrive with unusual weight, where guidance appeared before understanding. Not enough to build certainty upon, but enough to make us pay attention.
What I found especially beautiful was your observation that the word proved larger than your initial reading of it. That has certainly been my experience. Often I think God is speaking about one thing, only to discover years later that I was standing inside a story much larger than the one I could see at the time.
The older I get, the less interested I am in proving that God spoke and the more interested I am in the fruit that follows. Does it lead us toward greater trust? Greater humility? Greater dependence? Greater love?
This story seems to do exactly that.
The line that lingered with me was the final one: "He rarely shows you the whole map. Just the next step."
Yes.
I have found that frustrating at times, and yet I have also found it to be mercy. If I had seen the whole road ahead in some seasons of my life, I would have been overwhelmed. Instead, grace arrived in smaller portions. Enough light for the next step. Then the next. Then the next.
Thank you for sharing this. Not because it answers the questions, but because it honors them. And because beneath the story I hear something deeper than certainty.
I hear trust.
And that is a testimony worth sharing.
Hi Kevin. You wrote: -
"The line that lingered with me was the final one: "He rarely shows you the whole map. Just the next step."
Yes.
I have found that frustrating at times, and yet I have also found it to be mercy. If I had seen the whole road ahead in some seasons of my life, I would have been overwhelmed. Instead, grace arrived in smaller portions. Enough light for the next step. Then the next. Then the next."
Yes, when God led me out of Tanzania to study theology back home in NZ I'd reassured myself that in two years time I'd have my Masters and able to head back to East Africa.
Turned out to be four years later and I needed the extra time to heal my heart through ways I could only do in NZ close to my parents, and my siblings and their kids after being away for many years. The extra time was also required to build fellowship and trust with a new church, the one that sent me out under their name to Uganda where I met Eden.
If i'd have known it would be four years, not two, I may have never left. The move back would've felt even more overwhelming.
Likewise if I'd have known when my first wife shot through that it would be eight long years before I married again I would very likely have given up hope and either checked myself out permanently or just given up on finding a truly suitable woman and just shacked up with one of those who well meaning, but unhelpful, friends were sending my way.
As you say; it's a total mercy we don't know more of our future than what God has revealed to us.
Andrew,
Thank you for such a thoughtful reply. I really appreciated it.
Your piece resonated with me on a deeply personal level. I'm in the midst of a difficult marriage, and there have been many seasons where my expectations for what I thought life would become have collided with the reality of what it actually is.
I've also spent quite a bit of time in Tanzania over the years, especially around Arusha, Moshi, and the surrounding villages, working with orphanages and among the Maasai communities. That land and its people have a special place in my heart, so your words carried an added sense of familiarity for me.
For a long time, I believed peace would come when my circumstances finally changed. Over the years, though—and often the hard way, because I'm a stubborn man—the Lord has been teaching me something different. He has been teaching me that peace is found in surrender before it is found in resolution. The invitation has never really been to control the outcome, but to trust that He is leading, even when I cannot see where the path is going.
That is what I found myself hearing beneath your writing. It reminded me that faith is less about having the life we expected and more about discovering the One who remains faithful within the life we've been given.
Thank you for sharing your story. It encouraged me more than you probably know.