To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: A time to be born, a time to die; A time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; A time to kill, and a time to heal; A time to break down, and a time to build up; A time to weep, and a time to laugh; A time to mourn, and a time to dance; A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; A time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; A time to gain, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; A time to tear apart, and a time to sew together; A time to keep silence, and a time to speak; A time to love, and a time to hate; A time of war, and a time of peace. -Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

In this season of my life on a mission, I have come to a place of appreciating every moment. Whether it be a big moment or a small one. Some of these moments might look like riding in the back of a little toyota truck as it travels down from the middle of the mountains of Guatemala. Me looking up at the heavens as I  ponder over the long day of ministry. Repeating the moments in my head of sitting down in the tall grass, speaking of the wonders of Jesus to the most innocent kids in the whole world, kids that haven't even seen a white man before. Kids that work every day and all day in coffee fields to make just enough quetzales to provide daily bread for their family. Or maybe I'm up in the clouds utop the side of the volcano Acetenango. At four in the morning, steadily keeping a pace to keep myself warm enough to continue to the next step. Hearing and feeling the rumbles of the nearby volcano Fuego letting her pressure release through the air. Finally, on top of the world at 13,000 feet, I sit just above the clouds and look across the country of Guatemala, all the way to the Pacific Ocean. I stand there in the 30 mph winds and shed a tear at God’s perfect and beautiful creation of such a place on earth. Maybe I’m laying down in the bottom bunk of my bed, just trying to get a few moments of peace before the long day. The other guys in the room are blaring country music to get their day started.  Just trying to give themselves a little taste of home before they go out to immerse themselves in a place of foreign language, dusty dirt roads, and stepping into the homes of tiny tin roofs filled with the aroma of hot maize tortillas. I lay there, praying to God, praying for him to use me someway for the day. Someway new, someway crazy, someway to be his witness in such a time and season as this. 

I can sit in these moments for just a few seconds before I must move on to the next thing. I realize how easy and pitiful it is to take moments for granted in this short but long life. What is the point of life if you just overlook where you are now and keep your eyes on the next thing? I’ve learned that life is about living moment to moment, to appreciate where you are now. Who knows if you'll ever be in this kind of place or season again? To be able to grow from such an experience? It isn't always fun to be in some moments of life. Especially when it feels like suffering, a space of trying to understand where you are and why. A space of confusion, a place where you can’t see the purpose. But guess what? We can still rest in these moments, and the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. -Philippians 4:7. Yes, even in the most difficult situations we could imagine, we can rest. Knowing that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called, them he also justified: and whom he also justified, them he also glorified. What shall we say then to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us? -Romans 8:28-31. 

There's been wonderful blessed weeks here and there's been frustrating, difficult, blessed weeks here. I know I do grow and learn the most in the difficult weeks, they make me rely on the Father more, they allow me to push deeper into the fire and the refining and molding into the form of Jesus Christ. My only desires are doing the perfect and pleasing will of the Father, You could have everything on this earth, and without the love of God in the forefront, there’s no point. So I say to you, dive deeper, knock at his door, ask of him, and he will answer, he will show you his ways that are above our ways. He wants to show you, only if you would reach for Him.    Isaiah 55:7

                                         -Through Jesus, Zach Flowers