Day 18: This is Not About You Doing Something New

“Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours,
be done.”49 You have probably read or heard this passage before. It is commonly
shared at Easter services, highlighting Jesus’ last moments in prayer on the night He was
betrayed. What is surprising about this passage?
Jesus had one purpose in coming to earth as a man: “In this the love of God was made
manifest among us, that God sent His only Son into the world, so that we might live
through Him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that He loved us and sent
His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.”50 What is remarkable about Jesus’ prayer in
the Garden of Gethsemane on the night of His betrayal was that His will was NOT to
fulfill the will of God. He did it not out of desire to bear the sins of the world or die on the
cross, but out of obedience to the Heavenly Father. God the Father sent Jesus into the
world as part of His perfect plan; it was not about Jesus creating something new but
about fulfilling the calling God placed on His life.
Just as Jesus lived out of obedience to the
will of God, so too must we as we seek not to
do something for God or on behalf of God,
but to join Him in the work that He is already
doing. Your role as you go to Cambodia
with AIM is to build on what God is already
doing through the ministry and the staff, not
to create something new.
Think back to earlier days in this devotional
in which we discussed paternalism in
different forms and humility. There are
doubtless people on your team, maybe
even yourself, who are visionaries – people
who see potential in problematic situations – and your work is to try to find solutions. You
might come up with great ideas about how to help the people of Cambodia.
However, your role first is to look around you, to ask how God’s plan is being worked out
through AIM staff and through His church in Cambodia, and to understand how you fit
within that plan.
This is not to discourage new ideas, but your first mission is to do work that will benefit
the host organization and the long term missionaries on the ground, rather than
creating a project upon which you and your team can put your name. It may be the case that you will be able to assist on a project that has a discrete beginning, middle
and end, it may be that you construct a new building or help to launch a new
program, but it may also be that you won’t ever see the fruit that your individual work
in-country produces.
Regardless, God has a plan that He is working out in a mighty way in Cambodia, and
you have the privilege to be part of that work. Even amidst the poverty and the moral
depravity, you won’t have to look far to see God’s work among His people. God has
been raising up pastors through AIM for the past twenty-five years throughout the
country – in the cities and in rural villages. There are daily outreaches to brick factory
workers, and the Svay Pak kids’ club serves hundreds of children each day who work in
those factories, giving them showers, food, clean clothes, and a safe place for nap
time. AIM staff are also working with the brick factory owners and their families to get
their children enrolled in school. Church services are ongoing in red light districts, new
believers are being discipled, pimps and traffickers are being saved and brought to the
Lord, young women are leaving karaoke clubs to receive better opportunities through
Rahab’s House in Siem Reap and the Agape Training Center, and the list goes on.
People are being saved, the kingdom is advancing and God is at work! There are two
perspectives you can have coming into this environment: one is thinking how you can
create something new with your own fingerprint on it, and the other is thinking how you
can recognize quickly what God is doing and support it.
Consider the following prayer:
Lord, show me your fingerprints in Cambodia, the evidence of your workmanship in lives
all throughout the country. Teach me to partner with what you are doing first before I
ask for your blessings on something I’m dreaming about. Teach me to pray the prayer
of Jesus, “not my will, but yours be done.”