What Needed to be Said

Dear Readers, 

I hope you are well. This is my second training letter to you all, sharing of the experiences I had the pleasure of being a part of while at training camp for The World Race.

Let’s hop right into it. It’s a fantastic story.

Within the first 4 days or so we were asked to split off into groups to act out a skit dramatizing different missionary situations that ‘could’ happen overseas. Specifically how we could share the Gospel in each situation.  

My group was about 5 of us or so, and as soon as we came together I knew we were brought together for a reason. Fun fact, I don’t believe in coincidence.

We started brainstorming together what our skit would look like, and one of my Squad Mates (Lydia) shared a story that she experienced with a Witch Doctor while she served overseas in Tanzania. I was immediately drawn to her story, and it gave me such a fire, “Our skit needs to be just like that.” I spoke up. “And I think I’m supposed to play the Witch Doctor.” 

Everyone was in agreement. One of the girls said “But wait, how are we going to do it? What are you going to say?” 

I was very still.I was praying at that time, and I didn’t have a good answer. So I looked back towards her saying “I don’t think I’m going to tell you what I’m going to say, so in the moment it will be very authentic with how you respond.” The group decided that Lydia should play the leading role seeing as she had originally been apart of the actual story we were basing it off of. 

Fast forward a little bit, our groups start getting up and acting out their different scenarios. As we watched the others, I felt a tug on my heart saying 

“We need to go last. Make sure you go last.” 

I leaned over and told everyone what I heard. 

I began to pray. “Holy Spirit would you put your words in my mouth that you want this room to hear?” 

I heard very distinctively, “Make sure you yell.” 

The skits started to come to the end. After the skit before us had ended they said “We don’t have enough time to do the last skit…”

I almost leapt to my feet demanding we needed to do it. I was practically shaking with anticipation of what God was going to do through us. 

“…But we will make sure that they do before the end of the night.” 

Peace of mind came over me. 

Something big was gonna happen in this skit. God wants to say something through me. Through us. But its not time yet. 

We left to go eat a meal together, a couple people came up to talk with me, they asked how I was doing. “I’m excited.” Would always be my answer. 

“Why?” 

“God’s going to do something big with this skit, I just know it. And I get to be a part of it.”

With every person I talked to beforehand the excitement inside of me grew more and more. 

We walked back into our next session, and learned that they were running late. “Hey, does that last group wanna do their skit?” 

I got onto my feet so fast and walked in front of the group. I started to pace, off to the side. The room went silent. 

It was about to begin.  

My heart pumping, and my voice shaking I walked over, “Why are you here?” I shouted. “This is my land, you have no place here!”

The Lydia looked at me, and replied very calmly, “We’re just missionaries sharing the Gospel…”

“NO! You cannot do that here!”

“God has given me a voice and i am not afraid of you. Because God has given me power over fear and I will not be shaken.“

One of the girls starts flipping through her bible. “There’s gotta be an answer in here somewhere.” 

The room starts to laugh at the joke. 

Everything inside of me burned. “Shut Up!”

The group went silent. In my head I heard “This isn’t something to laugh at.”

Lydia looked deep into my eyes. They were full of compassion. The joke didn’t distract her at all, she had a goal, this man needed to hear the truth.

“But Jesus loves you.”

“NO! Jesus cannot love me. He doesn’t know what I’ve done. How many girls I have raped, how many people I have killed. He cannot love me.” 

Tears start to fill my eyes, my hands shaking. With every word that left my lips. 

“He doesn’t see all those mistakes. He looks at you with Love. All of that can be wiped clean from your slate. He died for you, and rose again from the dead.” Lydia moved a bit closer to me, her voice is calming, every word she spoke was saturated with truth. 

“I like my power! This village, they fear me. I walk with the Devil. He gives me power you couldn’t imagine. I’ve raised people from the dead too. Show me proof that your Jesus is more powerful than me.”

The room went silent. 

Lydia stopped for a moment, carefully preparing her response. 

“Alright, and we’re going to have to call that good…” The leader in the back calls out. 

The girls all sit down. I could hear a couple people whispering throughout the room. 

“What was that all about?”

“Where did that come from?”

“He never told us what he was going to say. That was all improv.”

”Man that was really good.”

I walked off to the side and sat down on the floor. My heart racing with every breath I took. 

We did it. The Holy Spirit was there moving in the room. 

After processing this event, and praying for clarity and discernment I came to this conclusion, which was the ultimate purpose of the skit. 

“Not all missionary work is joyful and rewarding. Sometimes you have to fight, speak truth, and love recklessly. And you don’t always see the redemption and reconciliation come to pass.”

What would you have done if you were in Lydia’s shoes? What would you have said? Could you fight for the sake of the Gospel if the opportunity arose?

These are questions that I’ve been asking myself almost everyday ever since that day. My walk with Christ is growing, morphing, and evolving. And I pray that I am ready with a response when someone yells at me… 

“You have no place here. Get out!”

 

I will speak to you soon in the next letter. Til then. 

 

-Mitchell