Fear & Trust

Much-Afraid (Looking Back on a Year in Asia Part 3)

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Trust and obey, For there’s no other way, To be happy in Jesus, But to trust and obey.

That’s the chorus to my favorite hymn as a little girl. I’m not even sure I knew what it meant at the time. But it seems to have followed me throughout my life.

I had lots of worries.

My worries took on a life of their own during pregnancy. I would inevitably contract toxoplasmosis if I so much as walked into a house with a cat (which posed some problems for a youth ministry wife who might need to visit the houses of people who owned cats). I thought I would die of tetanus from a small tape dispenser scrape, even if I was up-to-date on my tetanus shots. I was absolutely convinced my baby would have fetal alcohol syndrome if I swished with Listerine for gum health. Or the cortisone cream I used in early pregnancy? That’ll probably cause my baby to have a cleft lip.

Unfortunately, I am not making any of this up.

But who worries about that kind of stuff anyway??

That would be me, the Hypochondriac.

I’m a Hypochondriac by nature, a Germophobe by trade. My husband even came up with a song for times when the Hypochondriac started taking over my mind: “Hypo hypo hypo, hypochondriac, I’m married to a hypo, hypochondriac!”

And he wasn’t joking.

My fears threatened to swamp me when I was pregnant with Hannah. But the words of Jesus in Matthew 6:25-34 have always buoyed me. Words like:

25Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life.

 27Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?

 30O you of little faith?

34Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

After Hannah’s birth, when Jonathan first suggested we apply with Team Expansion, I was Scared.Out.Of.My.Mind, but we still moved forward with the application process. We had to take various psychological tests — you know, the kind where you answer, all-in-one-sitting, exactly 750 multiple choice questions about yourself. Then we sat across the room from the nice head doctor in Louisville as he gave us the results. One of the categories was called Harm Avoidance. (The upside to the Insanely Long Psych Test? We finally had a name for my peculiar behavior.)

I had scored a perfect 100%.

No one avoids harm better than me. No one can top that score.

Jonathan’s Harm Avoidance score was 7%.

The psychologist told Jonathan, rather sedately, “you’ll probably have to be considerate of that in your life overseas.”

Hmmm.

Really??

If he only knew. Harm Avoidance was the only reason I had reservations about going to Cambodia at all.

But I live here without fear, at least of the daily, hourly, minutely type. (Is minutely even a word? Well, I’m going to use it anyway. Because it’s an accurate description of the hounding power of my former fears.)

Oh sure, I still startle easily. I still have an overactive imagination. And I’m still germophobic enough to bring Germ-X with me everywhere I go. (Hey now, who in their right mind wouldn’t bring hand sanitizer with them everywhere they go??)

But I shave my legs, brush my teeth, and wash my dishes in the tap water. And I don’t die of massive internal infection. (And neither will you, if you visit.)

I “trusted and obeyed,” in spite of my fears. And I said “yes” to God. That is really all that can be said about my part. God’s part was graciously taking away the fears. I said yes without assurance that He would take away the fears. I only knew He would be with me in my fears. And knowing that was enough for me to say yes.

I’m no longer captive to my Fears. This is the most significant part of my journey so far. It has the greatest impact on my daily life, and I cannot take any credit for it at all. God did this. In fact, if you asked me how He accomplished this in me, I would not be able to tell you. I only know He did.

I might not be Fearless. But I’m no longer Much-Afraid.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Perfect love casts out fear. 1 John 4:18

Climb Every Mountain (Or, How I got to the Top of Mt. Meru & Back Down Again)

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by Elizabeth

Recently our family traveled to Angkor Wat, an ancient Hindu temple in Cambodia. The center of the main temple represents the mythical Mt Meru (the Hindu center of the universe), and to get to the top you must climb treacherously steep stairs (read: nearly vertical).  This design illustrates the difficulty of aspiring to the home of the gods, and in essence, it requires the climber to crawl up those stairs, prostrate before the gods.

Since it was my first time to Angkor Wat, I figured I wanted to climb to the top of that central tower. I decided to do that without thinking how high or steep it would be.  This is my view from the bottom.

For safety purposes, the original stone steps have been covered with wooden steps, but they are still quite steep. Tourists also have the benefit of a hand rail. Unafraid, I stand at the bottom and start climbing. A few steps up, I realize just how high I am going to get, and just how fast that’s going to happen. I tell myself not to look down. I tell myself not to look up. I tell myself just to look at the steps in front of me. I whisper one of Elisabeth Elliot’s favorite quotations to myself: “Do the next thing.” So I do the next thing: I take the next step.

When I get to the top I’m a little shaky because I know I will eventually have to climb back down. But I follow the tourist signs around the tower, and in only a few minutes I find myself back at the stairs. I tell myself to do the next thing: focus on each step and don’t forget to hold on to the rail.  This is me on my way down.

I had to climb the “mountain” one step at a time. I couldn’t look at the big picture of what I was really attempting. It was too scary. Each step was still scary, but it wasn’t as terrifying as looking at the entire wall I had to climb.

My life with God has been like that.

I’ve never had a Master Plan for my life. At each step of the way I just asked Him what to do next, and I felt He answered.

I asked Him whom I should marry. He led me to marry Jonathan.

Together we asked Him what to do at our first church home in Rolla, MO. He led us to work with youth.

We asked Him when to start a family. And He said “now.”

We asked Him what to do and where to go after I graduated from university. He led Jonathan to go to nursing school in Kansas City.

We asked Him to supply a job in Kansas City, and He led us to work as youth ministers at Red Bridge.

We asked Him to supply a nursing job for Jonathan, and He led him to Truman Medical Center’s Emergency Department.

We asked Him whether we should apply with Team Expansion, and He said “yes.”And even though I was scared out of my mind, we followed Him. Each step of the application process was scary. But I only had to finish one step at a time.

 

Now that I’m in Cambodia, it doesn’t seem so scary. But if you had told me when I was saying “I do” to Jonathan Trotter, that in 12 years we would take 4 young children across the Pacific to a 4th world country as missionaries . . .

Thankfully, God has been gracious to me. He knew I couldn’t follow Him if I knew the Master Plan. He knew my fear would paralyze me. So He gave me an incremental plan, and now I can look back and say, “Oh, so that’s why You led us to do ____________!” Each piece of our life puzzle prepared us for where we are now. That’s the amazing grace of God, that He can script our life story if we will only “do the next thing.”

Fearless – by Elizabeth

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Recently Red Bridge’s missionary family to Germany visited us.  After speaking on Sunday they showed pictures set to a Zoe Group song.  The song could have been written solely for me.

We are not afraid, to follow where You lead, Leaving what we know, for what we cannot see. We are not afraid for we are not alone, and so we’ll go with You into the unknown.

I am a creature of habit.  I feed my beloved family with regular trips to Aldi.  I fund my children’s education through the public library.  I speak English at home and out.  I don’t even like moving across town, and change of any kind is hard for me.  I cried when I heard these words.

We are not afraid to love the way You do, to serve with the same grace we receive from You.  We are not afraid to look beyond ourselves, and offer hope to those who cannot help themselves.

Can I give up my comfortable life to share eternity with people who don’t know the truth about Jesus?  I cried some more.

We are not afraid though some say we should wait, the cost is just too high, the danger is too great.  We are not afraid to move when You say move,   Trusting in Your voice, We will follow You.

I’ve met people who have a hard time understanding why we would leave the country with young children, almost as if they think they love my children more than I do, more than the God who would ask me to go.  I scored 100% on harm avoidance in one of Team Expansion’s psychologist’s tests, so safety is very important to me too.  But He has asked me to move, and I cried even more.

We will be fearless for You.  Fearless for You.  We will be faithful in all that we do.  If we step out on the waves or walk through the flames, Whatever you ask us to do, we will be fearless for You.

But do I feel fearless?  Not so much.  I’m not sure I have to be completely fearless, but I am determined to walk through the fear and do it anyway.  These days fear doesn’t haunt me nearly so much as it did before, but I still need to have faith that He will be with me, that I’m not alone.

When I’m alone with this song, I practically shout those words to Him.  I want so desperately to be fearless for Him.  But in the meantime I’ll have to settle for trusting Him to help me through the fears.

Follow Close – The Song

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For the last year or so, God has really been opening up our eyes about the theme of simply following.  Trusting him enough to follow him.  So we’re moving to Asia.  🙂

As I’ve mentioned before, God used Psalm 63, among other things, to push us into this whole mission adventure thing.  We wrote a song based on that Psalm, and it has been such a blessing and comfort to us.  We humbly share it with you now.  (One cool note: this version was recorded one evening during my trip to Cambodia this past February.  The night sounds of Phnom Penh can be heard in the background, and the commentators are Chris and Casey Allison.)

May we all have the courage to follow close, wherever He leads.

Why Go? (some thoughts from Elizabeth)

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“Break my heart for what breaks Yours, Everything I am for Your Kingdom’s cause.” Hillsong’s Hosanna brought me to tears this week (even before Doug Lucas quoted the words). I listened to the song over and over. That’s because I am in a place where I am indeed giving everything for His Kingdom’s cause. Over the last few years I have been reluctantly following along in this whole missionary future. I knew it was probably the right thing, but I didn’t really want to do it. As a result I didn’t hear much from God, and I felt dry.

After Jonathan traveled to Cambodia for our initial survey trip, I was excited. He did awesome recon work and answered my questions about how we could live as a family in a 4th world country. Then, when we set a departure date I got cold feet – so much so that we considered calling off the whole thing. We went to our elders and parents and those at Team Expansion for prayer and counsel and took time off to re-examine our call. I really listened to God’s voice, not just Jonathan’s voice. I came out of that time knowing positively that yes, going to Cambodia is God’s plan for our family, not just Jonathan’s crazy idea to save the world. Before, I had felt pressure to go, but not any longer. I had peace and knew God would be with me when I left America.

Since that time, I no longer feel God is silent. I have been able to enjoy worship music again. And it was in that personal revival that I heard Hosanna. I resonated with the idea that I was giving everything, my whole life here in America, for His Kingdom’s cause. I may not be the primary evangelist for our team in Southeast Asia, but I will be serving God with everything I have and supporting the cause of Christ wholeheartedly.