This past week was Spiritual Emphasis Week. We invited a group called Station2 to come to our school to lead us in worship through song and through worship in the Word. There is something uniquely powerful about having a chapel every day with the same group or the same speaker every day.

Station2 is 2 people, named Dave and Travis, and they are a wonderful live band—they use looping techniques and through it, these two people sound like a full band. It’s quite an experience. Check out their website and their Myspace, and be blessed.

Anyway, much prayer went into this week; much fasting went into this week; and God answered big time. The Spirit was moving in an electric manner, and by Tuesday, when Travis talked about hiding sin, we watched as people were broken, sitting there weeping at the end of the chapel, asking God to come into their lives and cleanse them.

On Wednesday, it happened again, and then, as if all the walls that had been up fell in a great big boom, on Thursday, it started to explode. After chapel, I had the privilege of sitting and talking with four guys for about an hour and a half about Christ and how he cleanses sin and how he forgives even the hardest sinners.

Then, I had the pleasure of sitting with another guy for another hour or so, and heard about his life, and shared Christ with him, and God moved, and the brother looked at me, and asked to pray, and in my classroom, prayed to receive Christ in his heart.

I mention this not because I’m anything special. 2 Corinthians 4:5-7 states, “For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.” I mention this because the vessel, or the one being used, is not who is important. It is the user, it is the message giver, it is God who is important in this equation. And I give Him all praise and glory and thanks that I got the opportunity to be here to watch all this happen.

Today, it was even more powerful. People were crying out for unbelieving parents, friends, and other family members. People were giving their life to Christ, and Christians were repenting of neglecting the call to share; repenting of living a false life; repenting of trying to live two lives. It was amazing. It made a 27-year-old man weep in the back. Not tears of sadness…no way! But tears of overwhelming joy. Revival is happening, and how sweet is it that I get to be the Bible teacher who gets to fan that flame!

I mentioned to another teacher that my life is finally starting to make sense. That all the sin and all the messing up I’ve done in my life is so that I can look into a teenager’s eye and say, with a clear conscience, “Brother, I’ve been there. I’ve struggled too. I’ve sinned just like you’ve sinned. However, the only difference is that I have a wonderful savior who has taken that sin and wiped it away, and now, I live in freedom.”

I do not believe in coincidences. I believe in the absolute sovereignty of God. I believe that God orchestrated everything that happened in making me leave Wheaton Academy and to come to, of all places, a small school in the middle of rice paddies in Korea so that I could be here to watch this. So that I could be here to be part of it. So I could be here so that God could use me to fan flames.

I am here because in the Great Physician’s insane asylum, this move to Korea is my therapy. This is my cleansing. This is my awakening to something so much bigger than what I thought was important. This is His freeing me from what I thought I needed to be happy. In short, I came to Korea to be a blessing; I now realize that I have been the one who has been blessed.

David Livingstone and Hudson Taylor both said, “I never made a sacrifice.” Each of those individuals were giants in the cause of global missions. Each of them faced much difficulty, much persecution, much sickness, and much loneliness. However, the joy of the Lord filled them so much that all of the bad stuff was erased by the love of the One who had called them and the One who had kept them.

Oh, how I long for the day to stride into a pulpit in America, or to tell anyone when I get back in December, that yes, it was hard; yes, it was lonely at times; yes, I missed some of the creature comforts; yes, I felt homesick; yes, I felt strange at times; and yes, in the eyes of some, what I’m doing is foolish. However, I have drawn so near to God, who is so completely satisfying; who is so amazing that He uses me to help people; who is so great so as to bring me around other teachers that I absolutely love; who is so good to me to bring me into the lives of teenagers who have taken me in and that I love to teach; who has given me an outlet for an unquenchable fire that I have for Him; and who has satisfied every need I’ve had since I’ve been here.

I never made a sacrifice.