What God taught me in China - Part Two

“For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with these,” (1 Tim. 6:7-8).

Will we?

Before going to China if someone had said these words to me, I would have been a little unsure. Do I really rejoice and thank God for providing me with food and clothing every day? Well no is the honest answer, and I'm pretty sure most of you reading will agree - these are just something we take for granted aren't they?

There were times in China when all I wanted to do was go home. It was too hot. I was tired. I didn't like the food. There was no proper toilet. There was no proper shower. I missed my family... I could go on.

Before China I saw myself as a bit of a quitter. During 6th form for example, I missed about a quarter of those two years because I had Depression and found it easier to stay in bed all day than try and make myself be happy. I was grateful for the days when God got me through but I wasn't content in them. During my first year at Uni (the academic year before China) I was much happier with life and thankful to God for this. But I wasn't content. I was happy.

What is the difference you may be thinking. I was thinking about this a lot in China. Could I honestly say that I was happy getting 3 hours sleep a night because I was so hot and my mattress and pillow were made of bamboo?! No, not really.
Could I honestly say that whilst sitting in a dirty, outside hospital in Jiangxi with sick all over the floor, babies screaming, no translator and nurses stabbing me here there and everywhere with (what I believed to be) dirty needles, that I was happy?! Unless one is a masochist, I'm pretty sure all our answers will be no...

I was content though.

In my preparations for China I was worried that I would quit as soon as anything got vaguely difficult because I'm not happy when I'm not comfortable. During Orientation (a week of training and fellowship), my attitude changed towards, well life, really. A lady called Joanne came and gave us a talk about what to expect in China. I left the talk feeling excited, nervous and confused all at the same time. One thing she said though really stuck with me.

'You are a guest here and therefore have no sense of entitlement. View everything as a privelege.'

I had no idea what she meant by this until faced with my first difficulty. Looking back actually, the food from the canteen at the first school in Beijing, was a million times better than what we had in store for us at the other places, but at the time it felt really awful. After a few meals of eating as much as I could and still feeling hungry and sick, I began to understand what Joanne meant. I wasn't entitled to this food. I wasn't paying for it and it was a privelege that it was there and edible. Gradually as the trip went on I learnt to adopt this attitude in most things I did and it made me really content to be there. I was really content living under God's provision because I knew that literally everything may be taken away any minute so it was really reassuring to know that the God of the Universe had it all covered and knew exactly what he was doing.

I believe God provided me with difficult situations to test me and to give me the perseverance to run the race, when previously I would have quit as soon as I got tired. It baffles me to think about how much God has changed me in the past few months. I remember feeling really annoyed and grumpy about the fact that our air con didn't work in the youth hostel the day I arrived in Beijing, and by the third camp I was looking forward to waking up at 6am to have a cold bucket 'shower' after a night with a wooden slab for a mattress!

In terms of where to go from here with the learning curve, I still believe there is a lot to learn. Joanne's comment about having no sense of entitlement can still be applied to life here, and actually, life in general. I was a guest in China and this is why I had no sense of entitlement. But here on earth I am a guest in God's Creation, and i've messed it up - so how much less is my sense of entitlement when it comes to Him! Jesus allowed us to have a relationship with God, but he didn't give us the right to just expect that God will bless us and give us everything we want. It says in Timothy (see above) that actually so long as we have food and clothing, we will be content.

I so often get bogged down with life and still get my depressive tendencies from time to time. God is teaching me though that I have everything I need to be content. My main reason to be content is that I have a relationship with Jesus, and the awesome Creator and Sustainer of the Universe sustaining me - every day. And on top of this He has given me not only what I need, but also a lot of things I want.

I know I often forget this, but I'm so much more aware of it now than I was before. Even though there were many tough things I encountered during the summer, and many times i wanted to go home and pack it all in, God, in His usual wonderful fashion, used these things for my good and His glory, and this is why I wanted to share this thing that He taught me in China.

:-)