Everything is Different but the Same

Over the past few weeks here in Cambodia we have had a few ups and downs as most of you have. We have had several friends leave and go back to their passport country. We have friends from our church called to missions. We had World Race teams come and go. We have had opportunities to serve at our local church. We have had a time of revival as some would say. We have had a certain illness that I will not name. I have always been told never give the enemy an audience. We are shaken by the bad news and encouraged by the good news. So everything is different but the same.  

Looking back over the past few months our life here in Cambodia is very different but the same as life in the States (that is how everybody says it when they are American and want to be cool about it). I remember when friends would be called to pastor a church or called to missions and leave us both excited and heart broken. The same thing happens here, our church is planting a church in Thailand and we are so excited and heartbroken to see our friends leave. This is also a change for us because we are usually the ones leaving. Different but the same. We have World Race teams come and leave. Very similar experience we would have every year as our summer team would leave and go home. Different but the same.  We started volunteering at our church and they put us on the Host Team. We welcome members and guests when they arrive at church. We were greeters at our church in Florida at First Baptist Merritt Island. Guess what we welcomed members and guests. Different but the same. We had an event at our local church called Liberty Week. It was a time of prayer, repentance and testimony. Very similar to our times back in Ohio when we would have a church revival. Different but the same. We are experiencing a time of unrest due to a certain illness. I remember 9/11/2001 it was a time of unrest. It was a time we wanted to draw our families close and we had a fear of the outside world. Different but the same. 

It makes me think back to all of the times in the Old Testament that God’s people had experienced times of unrest and repentance they came to the conclusion that it was different but the same. We read of Jesus' healings in the New Testament and we say wow that is so different. In the end people were healed and brought to repentance. Different but the same. We see things happen in this world and we think, “Wow, how can this happen? How will we ever deal with this? How will we be able to overcome this giant obstacle?” Once we get past every obstacle we have faced, we can look back and see God working through all of it. We see God working and we think this is so different but in the end, it is the same.  

So what I want to leave you with is: God is always on our side fighting for us in the different because He sees it as the same.  We have no idea how He is going to do it but we can trust that He is working. In the end the results are different but the same--we win!