You Wore That Shirt For Me

Jesus, You are so sweet. And Your timing is perfect. Last Thursday night, I was really struggling with something that I had let grow into a huge trial in my life. And God was so merciful. To catch up, it's near the end of my freshman year at Texas A&M University. It's been a story of His grace abounding, and that's for sure.

One of His greatest blessings to me this spring was giving me the position of a counselor for Impact. Impact is a Christian intro-to-college program that starts with a 4 day camp in the summer with the goals of telling fish about Jesus, providing relationships and a support structure of Believers, and introducing them to the many Christian organization in the College Station area. This carries over to the school year through "follow up", which is about being there for the freshman and discipling them, and just loving God alongside them. Being a counselor means I will have around 8-10 freshman assigned to me and my partner (a guy named Luke Lusk - super legit fellow). We get to answer questions, share our testimonies, and just love on them in general with the love of Jesus the Sacrificer.

Each Impact session (there are 3) is split up into camps, by the names of the tribes of Israel. Each camp has 7 counselor partnerships (7 guys, 7 girls), a prayer team partnership, and a cochair partnership (the captains of the camp). The prayer teamers are there for us to call anytime, about anything. They are devoted to bringing us before the Lord and encouraging us.

I was having a bit of a breakdown on Thursday, and was really letting one of my struggles blow up huge in my mind until it was handicapping me from focusing on anything or anyone else. I texted my prayer teamer, and she called and prayed for me. Afterwards I walked into the gym. As I was in line to swipe my student ID, I looked up and aimlessly read the shirt of one of the other guys in line. I read, "My grace is sufficient for you, and My power is made perfect in weakness..." - this is the first part of 2 Corinthians 12:9. It hit me so hard. I was not asking God to be perfect in my weakness, I just was begging Him to stop me from being weak. He changed my perspective in that instant. Spoke to me where I was, met me where I was.

It's okay to struggle, Jesus told the disciples multiple times that trials of many kinds would come - but God's grace is sufficient for me. I cannot be too much of a failure for Him to love, or for Him to want to use. His power is made perfect in my weakness, because it is then that I am the most available to be used as a vessel of His love. It is in my weakness that I most value how powerful my Father is. And He is patient enough to remind me again and again. In His power He orchestrated that for me, having that guy wear that shirt on that day. Having him be at the gym at that specific time. He doesn't even know that he wore that shirt for me. God had him wear it for me.