[Spiritual Care] Where is your strength coming from?

So I've been thinking a lot about doing this kind of an episode, and not just one episode, but starting a regular series of episodes about this topic. And this has been on my mind now for well over a year.

Probably even more than that, I've been thinking a lot about doing an episode and episodes around things that have nothing to do with the CELPIP exam or learning English, but instead the that are focused on helping you with spiritual care.

Because here's what I Immigrating to a new country isn't only just piles and piles of paperwork and trying to get a high enough score on the CELPIP or the ielts. There's way more to it than that, isn't there? Even though that seems like what it's all about.

But you're also having to go through the process of leaving behind your old life from the country where you're from.

You're having to let go of familiar customs, of relationships with loved ones, your work, your normal life, and starting over again in Canada completely from zero. You have no or very few friends. You have new customs to get used to and new ways of life, of doing things that you have to get used to.

You might not have work, or maybe you have work, but that work has absolutely nothing to do with what you are already well trained for back home. This experience is tough. And it's not just that physical experience of the paperwork and the moving and the changing of your routines.

And I strongly believe that this is a spiritual experience as well, that you are facing challenges and pressures you likely never dreamed you'd be facing. And these challenges hit you in your most vulnerable parts.

Your sense of identity, who you are, your sense of purpose, your sense of belonging, your sense of being accepted.

All of these and more come under direct assault at one time or another, sometimes all at once while you're trying to get yourself set up again here in Canada. And you know what? I don't often, in fact, if ever, hear people talking enough about this or at all about it.

But this pressure can be so heavy and intense that it can make you want to give up. It can take you to the breaking point of who you are and maybe even can make you want to go back home again.

I know this is true because I've got close friends who are going through it in front of me, you know, Or I hope you know what you need to be doing to get ready for your CELPIP exam. Right?

I hope you know what you need to be doing to get your paperwork in order to comply with whatever Immigration Canada program you are working under. But I wonder how often are you looking into protecting and caring for and nurturing your spiritual side?

And before I share one more word here, I want to make sure that you know where I'm coming from.

I don't see myself as some spiritual care expert or as someone who has it all together and has somehow come to a place where I am above the struggles that you and I go through every single day. No, not at all. I am wanting you to know that I'm walking with you.

I'm working through my own challenges and my own struggles and I know how important it is to protect and nurture your spiritual life.

And so I want to be sharing with you some of the things that God has been doing in me or speaking to me about through the Bible that not as me preaching to you, but me sharing with you and hopefully encouraging you in your own journey. I will never ever present myself as having it all together. Where I'm struggling, I will share it with you.

Where I'm finding encouragement and strength from God in His Word, I will share that with you too.

Again, never I hope sounding like I'm preaching, but instead as hopefully someone relatable that you can listen to and maybe find some common ground with or feel like encouraged as you listen to whatever I have to share with you. And I want to be clear from the get go, I'm going to be talking about the Bible quite a bit and Jesus quite a bit.

Not in a preachy way like I said before, but for me this is the foundation of my life and I want to invite you to come along with me and learn with me as I am learning to stand on that foundation a little more each day.

My hope with these episodes is to encourage you with and through God's word, the Bible, and to be encouraging you to find your hope and your strength to make it through this challenging time in the only one who can really help the Maker of Heaven and Earth. So hey, if this doesn't sound like something you want to listen to, I totally get it. Please feel free to skip these episodes.

I'm going to be purposeful in labeling these spiritual care episodes clearly so that you know which one is which.

And if you want to keep listening for the regular episodes around getting ready for the SELP of exam and building your English skills, those are going to continue and they're separate, separate episodes and you'll know which one is which. It's going to be simple to identify. Okay? And like I said before, if you're not into the spiritual side of things. I get it.

And I'm not trying to force you into it, which is why I'm creating a separate episode that's going to drop on a different day than my regular episodes that will be clearly labeled for you. All right. So that you can pick and choose which ones you want to follow along with. And like I said, you're more than welcome to keep listening.

And I hope that you keep listening, to get ready for yourself, of exam, and to be building your English skills. And I hope also that you'll give this these episodes a chance too. But if you don't want to, I get it. All right. Okay.

So let's get started with what I would like to share with you today. So if you have a Bible handy or your Bible app on your phone, both of them count. Or if you don't, that's fine too.

But if you do have one handy, I would like to invite you to check out Ephesians chapter four, verse ten. I'm just going to read one verse. Ephesians chapter four, verse 10. This is what it says. Finally be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.

Nice and simple, right? I'm going to read it one more time. Finally be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.

You know, this week this verse has been encouraging me to no end. But like a lot, facing some really difficult and challenging situations inside of my family and in my extended family.

And I'm not going to go into details about what is going on, but just know that it's enough that there have been so many moments where I've been feeling very discouraged about some of the things going on, not everything. I mean, I've got.

In general, I think I'm blessed with a great relationship with everyone in my family, but there are things inside of my family that are not working right. Like it's not all perfect is what I'm trying to say. And that brokenness hurts.

And I've done so many things, me trying to create change in that relationship. And sometimes it works. But the vast majority of the times it's just not getting any better.

And that brokenness, that disconnect that seems to be to be there messes everything up. Like, think about, you know, we just got through Easter, we just went through Christmas a few months before.

Those times are usually times where at least here in Canada and at least in my background and upbringing, those are huge family times where we just get together with family and celebrate those seasons together with usually a big meal, having fun together. Spending time together.

But for us, the nature of the situation that, that I'm sharing with you about is that that kind of relationship is not happening very well right now. And I don't know how to fix it. Not with my immediate, like my wife and my kids, but with my family and my extended family.

There's just some disconnects, painful disconnects that have been so hard to try to figure out how to mend, how to fix, how to heal. And like I said a moment ago, I've been trying myself to find ways to fix it. And I've just come to the end of what I can do.

I don't know what else to do. And this situation has been weighing heavily on me. Like, I worry about it, I stress about it, and I try to. Well, I don't know what to do.

It literally makes me lose sleep sometimes. And, well, this verse, finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.

All that has been helpful for me because I am at the end of my strength when it comes to dealing with this situation, and I don't know what to do. So this verse has been speaking to me a lot about one. I need to stop relying on myself to solve this issue, because I can't.

I've done what I can do, or at least what I know what to do. And now I am needing to rely on God somehow.

I need to be presenting this situation to him and asking for his help and his intervention in this situation to bring healing if that is something that he would like to do. So that's how. At least one way. There have been multiple ways where this verse has been speaking to me this week, but that is one way.

And I'm sharing this with you so that you know that I am working this out in my life, too. Like I said in the intro to this, I don't have it all together. And I am learning how to rely on Jesus a little bit more each day. I haven't arrived.

I haven't made it. I'm not some expert, okay? I'm working this out in my life, too.

And this is just one way where this verse has been speaking to me, that it's not about me trying to come up with a solution for this problem. It's about me learning to trust a little bit more in what God is able to do, which is way more than what I can do, right?

And here's what I think it might mean for you, or maybe what it might mean for you. And that is this.

It's not in your strength either this whole process of trying to immigrate to Canada, of trying to comply with all of your paperwork and getting your English scores high enough to be able to apply for those programs, yes, there are things that you need to be doing, right? There are practical things that you need to do.

You need to fill out those forms, and you need to be working as much as you can to improve your English skills.

But there comes a point, right, where you run out of your own strength, where you very quickly realize, I've done everything that I can, and I'm doing everything that I can, and it still is not enough, just like how I am finding it with my extended family. And I think that this verse. I'll read it again, finally. Be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.

I think this verse passes such a powerful challenge for you and I, because in our society, especially in Canadian or Western culture, the big emphasis is on you, right? The big emphasis is on you being able to do things, you being independent, you being strong enough, you working hard enough to make your life happen.

And yet we come so quickly to the end of our strength, right?

And I think that this verse has a powerful challenge for us, and that is to realize that achieving all these things, while I need to do my best in them, I don't have the full strength that I need to make them happen. I need God's help. And so that's my first idea for you.

In the middle of your circumstances, I don't know what you're going through, but I know based on the people that I've been getting to know, I know that you are facing a lot of pressure, a lot of challenge, and a lot of things that probably are keeping you up at night, that's making you lose sleep, that's probably making you feel like you're breaking on the inside because you don't know what to do. My friend, if that's where you are at, I want to encourage you to say, it's okay.

I don't have the strength, but I'm going to turn to the one who does.

You know, when I was going through my immigration process, when I was trying to live in Mexico, and maybe you know this if you've been a regular listener.

I lived in Mexico City for 16 years, so I had to go through my own immigration process and my own process of starting my life over again from zero when I first moved there and I had zero Spanish, like, the Spanish that I learned wasn't even the right stinking Spanish to learn. I mean, it was back in the day when you could buy a CD ROM and put it in your computer. And that's what I was doing.

I was trying to learn Spanish vocabulary. But you know what? I didn't know this until I got there.

But there are different kinds of Spanish, and the Spanish that I was learning was kind of like Spanish from Spain or it wasn't.

It wasn't the Mexican style of Spanish that I very quickly realized once I got down there that what I have been working to learn had almost nothing to do with what was going on in real life in Mexico City. So in all areas of my life, I was very rudely taken back to zero, and I had to start over again.

And honestly, boy, I ran out of strength so many times. And it was only my. My faith in Jesus, my relationship with him that brought me through.

And in future episodes, I'm going to be sharing little bits and pieces of that journey with you. But for now, it's just enough to know that I know that I did. I couldn't make it. I didn't make it for 16 years on my own strength. I needed God's help.

And I think that I want to offer that to you today as well. So that kind of begs the question, doesn't it? Okay, so I know that I can't rely on myself for everything.

I know that there are limits to what I humanly am able to do, and immigrating and starting life over again and trying to get certain English scores very quickly take me to the limits of my skills. And then what? And then what am I supposed to do? How do I rely on God's strength when I am facing these problems?

And I want to offer you how the amplified version of the Bible renders this verse that I just read to you. Ephesians, chapter 6, verse 10. It's the same verse, but the amplified version does what the. What it says. It does. It amplifies it.

It kind of expands on some words to help us understand a little bit more what it's talking about. And this is what it says. And you can feel free to look this up if you. If you would like to. It's the amplified version, and this is what it says.

In conclusion. Be strong in the Lord.

Draw your strength from him, and be empowered through your union or through your relationship with him and in the power of his boundless might. I'm going to read that again, especially if you, you know, you can't read along in the moment.

Maybe you're listening to this as you're driving, whatever, but here is the amplified version. In conclusion, be strong in the Lord.

Draw your strength from him and be empowered through your union or through your relationship with him and in the power of his boundless might. What speaks to me through that or what helps me to have a very clear idea in my head about what this whole relying on the Lord means.

It's through your relationship with him that you draw this spiritual strength, this strength for your life from. It's not something that you can go out and get in a store somewhere. It's through a relationship with Jesus.

And what is amazing that I find here is that my strength has limits. My strength is finite. I very quickly get to what I am no longer able to do. It's just the way it is.

But what I love about this verse is that it says that God's might and God's power is boundless. It means that there are no limits to what he is able to do. And at the beginning I referenced one of his titles.

He is the maker of heaven and earth, and the one who made heaven and earth has no limits, has no restrictions on his power and ability to help you and me. And so leaning into that relationship, that's what I want to encourage you to do today.

If you are feeling at the limit, at the edge of what you're able to do, and you're feeling like you don't have enough strength to keep going, my friend, I want to encourage you to, first of all, that it's okay to get to that spot.

It's great actually, because it means you're in a prime position to lean on and look for help from the Maker of heaven and earth, the one who can step into your situation, lift you up on the inside, in with ways that you can't even understand. That just makes no sense.

You know, the Bible talks about the Lord giving you peace that goes beyond all understanding, like in the middle of the craziest of circumstances.

And my friend, I've been through so many crazy circumstances, even in the last year, where I know that in my own I had no way to get through it, but somehow through that, walking it out day by day in relationship with God, he has brought me that strength a little bit each day, not instantaneously resolving everything, which, boy, oh boy, I wish you would do sometimes. But.

And I bet you you think like that too sometimes, like God, why don't you just make whatever, you know, fill in the blank problem you were struggling with go away. I prayed that way so many times. If you could see into my prayer journal that I Keep.

You would see many pages where I'd said, lord, please just resolve this thing. Take this thing away. But so often I've seen over the years that he walks with us through those problems and gives us strength to make it through.

That's what I wanted to share with you today. I want to encourage you to look into your relationship with Jesus, with God, and draw strength from that relationship.

No matter what your circumstances are, no matter how hopeless those circumstances might feel, or no matter how impossible those circumstances might feel. I believe that you are here on purpose. I don't think you're here by an accident.

And I think that God is wanting to do something in your life as you're going through these challenging circumstances. And I think one of those things is that he's trying to draw you closer into relationship with him.

And my friend, I want to end this by praying for you and with you.

And first of all, if you're listening to this and you realize I don't really have a relationship with God, or I had one, but I've just kind of walked away from it. I don't want anything to do with it, or it's just been. It's been a minute since I've even thought about God.

But all of this that I'm going through right now has me thinking a lot about him. And I'm wanting to lean into that again, but I'm not quite sure how. Then I want to encourage you to pray with me as I pray this prayer.

And it's nothing magical that I'm going to pray. I just want you to use it as a starting point for yourself. But, yeah, let's pray.

Lord Jesus, here I am in the middle of so many great challenges that I don't even know what to do anymore. I'm feeling down and discouraged and empty, like I've given it everything that I have, and yet I'm still so far away from seeing what I'm.

What I'm hoping and longing to see. And I just can't make it on my own.

Jesus, you say that you are the maker of heaven and earth, and you say that you want me to draw my strength from you. And I don't necessarily know how to do that. But, Lord, I want you. I want you in my life.

I want to depend on you for strength and what I'm going through. And I ask right now that you would come in into my life, into this messy circumstance that I'm in, and that you would help me.

I put my hope and my trust in you right now in my imperfect way, but Lord, I recognize that I need you. I'm at the end of my strength. Thank you, Lord, for inviting me in today into that relationship with you.

I come joyfully and with desperate need into that relationship in Jesus name, Amen. And friend, if you already have that relationship, I also want to pray for you right now.

Lord, I pray for my friends who are going through such challenging circumstances right now. I know you see them. I know that you are not a stranger to what they're going through.

I know that you're not shocked or somehow surprised that they are finding themselves in this difficult circumstance. I know you don't cause this difficult circumstances to come on our lives, Lord, but I know that you use them to draw us near.

And I want to ask that you would cause my friend who's listening to this right now, who's maybe just at the end of their rope with nothing else left, I want to ask that you would fill their heart right now with hope and with courage and with great strength that you give, Lord, I ask that you would cause them to feel your boundless strength coursing in and through them. And Lord, we ask that you would lead them and guide their steps as they're going through all these challenging times.

And that, Lord, they would feel that encouragement and invitation to lean in to that relationship with you as. As their source, as their. As their way forward. Lord, you are the way, the truth and the life. And we don't have any other way forward but through you.

I just ask that you bless whoever it is that's listening to these words today.

I ask, Lord, that you would let them know that you are real, that you are caring and loving, and that you are directly involved with whatever they're going through. Jesus name, Amen.