He Fights For Us

Well, the past few weeks have been crazy, busy, and more then anything...challenging. Two weeks ago I had my first "official" bracelet making night here in Fayetteville where my roomates so graciously agreed to opening up our apartment for a bunch of girls to come over and make the soda tab bracelets which are being sold to raise money for our girls home in Addis Ababa.

The clock struck 7pm just as I pulled out the final batch of gooey buter cake cookies. I placed the warm cookies on a plate beside the array or veggies, muffins, cupcakes, and other goodies scattered throughout the kitchen. Finally, I could breathe. All of the preprations were complete. After a day full of cleaning, organzing, planing, preparing, and decorating the apartment had never sparkled quite like this.

In the quietness and [pride] of a job well done, I felt it once again. That was not the first time that day I had felt a little butterfly make its way across my stomach. Okay what is the deal here? I kept offering up reasons for the unmistakable nerves settling in. Looking back now, I suppose He was simply preparing for what was to come, but in the moments prior, the flutters left me pondering.

7:05pm. Well, fashionably late is in right? I pull out the Word as I race to fill my mind with reminders of why I am doing this in the first place. There is NO room for lies in these thoughts I could hear myself replay over and over. 7:10pm. Finally, I hear footsteps outside with the windws wide open on this perfect spring evening. The knob turns as one of my roomates glides in. My usual excitement to see her walk through the door was replaced with more flutters. Lots more flutters. What if no one shows up? I began to panic.

We made little chit chat, but the tension in the room could be felt miles away. More footsteps. 7:20pm. Yes they are just outstide our door. Praise the Lord at least someone will help is eat all this food! The knob twists once again as another one of my roomates comes in. Despite the relief that she brought to an otherwise tense siuation, I could not help but hold back the tears for a bit longer. More flutters. More lies. At this point it hits me:  no one is coming.

Sure enough, no one came. Turns out I picked the wrong night; 80% of the friends I invited were at another event scheduled the same night, something I didn't realize until it was too late to change this event. The others had random reasons for not coming when we talked about it later...a few went out of town, one had a friend in town, another completely forgot. Despite the reailty of this, an overwhleming weight of failure and dissapointment lingered in my fragile heart. My roomates tried to save the day by sitting down and allowing me to teach them how to make these bracelets. That didn't last too long before tensions rose and the insecurity and disapointment I was experiencing came tumbling out, not in the most graceful way of course. Words were uttered between us and feelings were hurt.

After it all came tumbling down, I found myself curled up in a ball on my bed, head burried as the tears began to stream down my cheeks. It didn't take long for that deep, uncontrolable, utterly miserable weeping to take over as the tears dreanched the pillow. Shortly two of my roomates came in and sat on each side of me. Somone's hand rubbed my back while the other spoke softly. In that moment it was like one of thoseout of body experiences...where it's like you decide if you close your eyes and think hard enough, then this will all be one crazy dream that never really happened. Unfortunately, I never woke up. Welcome to reality.

I was hurting and the lies were rolling through on replay like a broken record. See, I told you no one would come. You really don't have any friends...what have I been telling you all along? You're not cut out for this...don't you see, you will never be good enough. And they're only here because they have to be...I mean you heard her earlier, she never even wanted to even come in the first place. Well, you really messed things up now, child!

After Rachel and Kelley helped pull me out of my pity party, they helped me to see past the lies that seeed to overtake rather quickly. The enemy was bound and determined to destroy the work the Lord had called us to complete that night...and even when it turned out nothing like I expected and brought so much unexpected and hurt, that night I saw my Jesus.

I saw the way HE has tirelessly pursued me. I tasted a just a bit of His hurt when I turn from Him. I saw a glimmer of light...a Truth worth clinging to. So I did. Even though my mind was handing out free lies all night long, I had to make a deision in that moment of how I was going to respond. Was the Jesus who I claimed would transform the lives of these girls who have spent years of thier lives enslaved to the sexual desires of men enough for me in this moment of hurt and disappointment?

Some of our bracelet-making supplies!

My precious roomie called up a few boys (one of whom wasn't even a beleiver) and for the next few hours we made bracelets. Yes, even the boys. As the night wore on, in the most unexpected, out of my control, not in my plans, completely soverign will of God I saw His heart, a heart broken for His daughters in Ethiopia and around the world. He didn't need my compulsive planning, my endless systems, my spectacular cooking or even my few friends. He didn't need me to understand all the happenings of the night. All He asked was that I seek His face...that I submit to His ways...that I am faithful in the small things. In that moment, head burried in the pillow, lies flooding my mind, feelings outweighing the Truth He never asked me to get up and fight. He didn't even ask me to fix the mess I felt like I made or to find a way to get all these bracelets made.

All He required was this: "I will fight for you; you need only to be still." Exodus 14:14

In the stillness, Jesus speaks.

And He did fight for me...for them really. With the help of these random boys we made just over 60 braelets that night. For a long time I did wonder "Why am I doing this? What's the point? I'm not getting anywhere in this campaign. How will one college girl ever make any significant impact in the lives of these girls? Where is $10,000 going to come from?" Then I remember...in the stillness Jesus speaks. And He doesn't need me to do any of it...if He wanted these girls out tomorrow, He obviously has the ability to provide the money tonight. In the same sense, if He wanted those bracelets made by a bunch of the girls I invited, they would have showed up. But He had other plans. As much as the night was suppossed to be about the girls, I think He actually used it minister to my heart. To give me a gentle nudge, a gracious reminder of the fact that He doesn't need me to be doing any of this...this isn't about me...or them really. This is about HIM, the only One who has the ability to trasform them. The one to whom all the honor, praise and glory belongs.
"Courtney, I will fight for you! I will fight for them! You just chill out and let me do it...after all, my ways are higher then yours, yeah?"

So as I sat there pondering what exactly He was trying to tell me when no one showed up...perhaps that I wasn't supposed to be doing this campaign...in the stillness, I knew He was fighting for us--for me and and for them. And sure enough, He did!

A few of our elastic colors

Some campaign materials spread out throughout the apartment

Some of the finished and packaged bracelets ready to be sold!

Seems as if this constant opposition and being faithful in the small things really has become an overarching theme down here in the south the past couple weeks. Things have been quiet and yet quite heavy every time that I continue to forget who is doing the fighting...and who already won the victory!

Ironically, this hangs in my room.