Teach me
Many times, I don’t understand the meaning of my path
INGRID HERRERA
I often wonder why I live here.
Many things I did not well in my life
But you tell me that all has its purpose for you
Teach me to see life with your eyes
Teach me the laws of your kingdom
Teach me to love like you loved
Teach me to live with you Lord
Father, you give me bread and not stone
But when I don’t ask, I don’t receive anything
I’m going to start asking with faith
I’m knowing that your plans are perfect for me
Sometimes you don’t allow the world to deliver
Because I have to learn to look only in you
You want to be the source of joy and happiness
Everything else is a just flower on the road
Live with you every day in your presence
Spend my time and my life for you
It makes me understand that you are the king of heaven
and even though that I am small I’m important to you
Sister，What are some of the challenges you have faced in your life, and how do you feel about them now?
One of my challenges I took was, to ride 200 km by bike in one day. I wanted to visit my grandfather after I had graduated from school and he lived far away. Of course, it was possible to go by train, but since I already went to school by bike every day, I took the challenge to do it.
There was no audience, when I gave all to reach my goal, no sports coach and nothing, I went there totally alone with my bike and my suitcase on my bike. After 100 km I nearly fainted, because I did not have more energy. But then the endorphins entered my blood and I got more energy and I spent a very nice time with my grandfather in the summer of his last year here on earth.
The impact that challenge left for me was, learning not to give up in difficult situations, that there is power left, when we think all has finished.
After the death of my grandfather, I felt a great emptiness in my heart, because he gave me much love and I missed him. That was one reason because I began to ask about God, who gives us much more love.
Mentioning the coaching certificate, I attended this university, because when I was in a life crisis, there were a lot of people who made it worse with their comments even they only wanted to help. I wanted to be a good friend for the people around me, so I qualified me. Unfortunately, I came into a coaching situation with a very close friend, but today everything is ok.
How do you understand the purpose of your path in life, and what steps have you taken to align your actions with that purpose?
I think, it is too difficult for us to understand Gods purpose for our life’s. There is always a higher meaning as in the life of Job, that I already mentioned. Even a life of poverty and suffering can be a purpose as the story of the poor Lazarus in the bible.
When you would like to have a good advice, which steps we should take to fulfill Gods purpose, my best advice is, to take your hands out of a difficult situation and let God enter in the difficult situation, pray for the situation and wait with patience for what God will do with you.
My children are grown up, they take their own decisions and I can t and don t want to hinder them, because they have to live at the end with their decisions. But I can carry them in my thoughts and present them before God that he may give them wisdom to take the right decisions.
Can you share an experience where you felt like God was teaching you a lesson through a difficult situation?
I was writing down my income and costs and I had a time high cost, because installing yourself in another country is expensive. I always wrote a spending plan, too, and I saw, that the costs will be higher than my income.
I wrote an email to the pastor for to ask if he knows about some work for me, he even did not answer the mail.
But during the time of economical struggle, friends came to my house and asked me to do some computer work and they paid me for to do it. I could sell some of my CDs and I had avocado.
I think, I already told this story, but this story was the motivation to write this song, and the words: Sometimes you don t allow that the world delivers, because I have to learn to search only in you.
Short time after, everything got easier, but in the moment, I could only confide in God.
What does it mean to you to “see life with God’s eyes,” and how do you strive to cultivate this perspective in your daily life?
We see our daily life, our job, our household, our friends and all those things. We are worried about not to lose our job, to have enough money for to live a comfort life and all these things and there is nothing wrong with it.
But Jesus says: Do not worry about what to eat and drink and about your clothes, your father in heaven will provide, you can confide.
Since I was in an economic struggle when I wrote this song, I wanted to see life like Jesus, who says don t worry about nothing.
In what ways have you experienced God’s love and care for you, and how has this impacted your relationship with Him?
When I was alone in Chile, I experienced Gods love and care. First, I got friends, then a job, than a husband. This has impacted my relationship to him to be bolder when I talk about him, because I can say, I am not telling a fairytale or a fantasy, I have lived what I am telling and I know that there is a God in heaven who takes care of us all, if we allow him to do this.
How do you approach asking God for guidance and support in your life, and what role does faith play in this process?
Sometimes it is very difficult to see Gods will on our life, because we mix it up with our own will. And when we have put our own will higher than Gods, we expect that God helps us to come out of the consequences, but unfortunately, life is not so.
But we always may come back and he helps us to correct the path we went wrong.
When I married my husband, I searched guidance with all my heart, I read the bible, bible comments, asked mature Christian people what to do and when we were shore, that we are not mixing in our own will, we married. Through all the process I had faith that God will close the door or do something if we commit a mistake and the most important was, I over gave God my situation, in the meaning, that I said, if you say no, I will accept your will.
How do you balance your desire for happiness and joy in life with your commitment to serving God and living according to His will?
Serving God is joy and happiness. Many thinks, that they are not allowed to do this and that, when they are serving God, but it is the opposite. You need not to this and that and you experience as freedom in Christ, that he fills your heart with joy and you have everything in him.
For example: I don t smoke anymore, I don t drink alcohol and I don t go out at night to the disco or casino. But for me it is freedom, that I don t need this case of amusement, I have joy with God and in my family.
This is the reason why Jesus said to the woman of Samaria: Who drinks of my water will not thirst anymore. The woman searched for happiness in six relationships, she got divorced 5 times and the man number 6 only lived with her. But then she found Jesus and converted in the first missionary woman in the bible.
I talked this week to a brother in Christ who is serving the Lord since he is 8 years old. He had such a happy face, because his love to the Lord was stronger as the love to the dust of the world.
Faced with infinitely expanding material desires, how can we clearly understand what we really want? How does God teach us to make choices?
First of all, I don t buy something by window shopping in a quick manner. I really think, what I want to have and how this thing will serve me in my daily life.
God tell us to be conform when we have food and clothes. So, we know that all things that God allow us to have apart from this is luxury. When we make a decision, we should be aware of this, but we are living in the year 2023 and for our daily life, a telephone and a computer are normal.
I had a type of kitchen machine 30 years long in my kitchen and I missed it, when it got broken. I used it almost every day and it made kitchen work easier. So, I was thinking about three years if I may buy this kitchen machine new, because I want to be shore about it.
Of course, there appeared other desires, too, because my phone is old, my computer is old and cheap and it was a temptation to renew the phone or the computer.
At last, I decided was is my highest responsibility in daily life as a housewife. It is to make good and healthy food. Because of the increasing of prices, sometimes we can’t select the food in the shop, we have to buy what is cheap today. But with my machine, I can quickly select other recipes and make some other healthy dish.
In the letter of James, James said: You don t get something from God because you want to spend it for your carnal lusts.
So, when we would like to have something, we have to ask ourselves: why would I like to have this thing, what is the purpose and will I buy it for to fulfill my works or to entertain myself and having fun outside the kingdom of God
