Last week at Connect Group we were looking at how God is
Trustworthy. And I'd like to share a little adventure I got up to last June
called Escape and Pray.
The idea of Escape and Pray is pretty simple. You turn up at
an airport with an envelope a couple of hours before your flight. You have no
idea where you are going. You have no accommodation booked for the 48 hours you
will be away for. All you have is 20 euros each.
I went with two second year girls, Esther and Emma and at 5
am on Tuesday 14th June we found out we were going to Vienna – we flew out just
after 7.
It was a crazy adventure and there is so much to share from
it, but there are two main lessons I felt I learnt about how God is
trustworthy.
The first is to accept generosity, in our culture today we are
taught to be independent, to not lean on anyone else’s strength but rely on
our own. Which is completely different to where we stand as Christians, fully
dependent on God’s character and what he has done (and is doing) for us. So often
this means we need to accept God’s generosity to us, which can be through amazing
displays of provision but also the little ones. On the Tuesday night we headed
out from our accommodation (thank you God and Christ Church, Vienna) to a
student group, on our way back one of the girls from the group said she wanted
to give us the money she had in her purse for the next day. It was only a few
Euros, and in true British form, I refused her offer of money. On our final
morning we went to buy our train tickets back to the airport and guess how much
money we were short by – the same number
she offered us.
The other lesson that stands out to pray for your daily
bread. Whilst we had been offered accommodation for the evening we arrived, we
didn’t get offered a meal so after sandwiches for breakfast and lunch we then
bought bread and sandwich fillings for dinner. We had two main options, buy
enough for that night and trust God’s provision for the next day or buy more
for the next day too. We went for the latter option only to be utterly blessed
with hot meals the next day so we never ate the extra food!
In the Lord’s prayer, Jesus teaches us to pray for our daily
bread, not our fortnightly shop. Why? Because by praying for our daily bread we
come to him each day, it means we talk to him each day, it builds our relationship with him, it builds our trust in him.
Escape and Pray was an incredible adventure, rich in God’s
blessings, but it was a challenge; I like to be organised. I like to be in
control, and Escape and Pray took it all away. It made be dependent on God and
at times I found that so hard and yet I’m so glad I did it. Now when I’m
faced with a challenge I can look back and see God’s provision and trust he
will provide again.
