Be an ant.

Sounds funny, right? You are probably wondering why I am telling someone to be an ant. Ants are tiny, annoying, pestering little creatures, but there was one morning that the Lord spoke to me through several little ants.

One morning, I was sitting outside of our home way earlier than I would like to have been. One of my goals on this journey has been to wake up early and spend time with the Lord. Before the race, I was never the biggest fan of early mornings, but just as everything else in my life has changed, this aspect has, too. I love early morning times with Jesus.

It just so happens that the house we are living in is where some very important switches are placed, so we get woken up at all hours of the morning to turn the switches on or off. At first, I was annoyed, but then I realized that this is the Lord’s way of saying, “Get up and spend time with me.”

Through this, I have had some of the sweetest and most meaningful times with the Lord. I have experienced the Lord in some special ways and have heard his voice so clearly through these early mornings with him. I am thankful for early mornings with Jesus, and I’m thankful that we have a Father that knows exactly what we need and he will give that to us in a roundabout way.

One morning, I was sitting outside on our porch, and there were hundreds of huge ants wandering around my feet. They caught my attention, and I just sat and watched them in silence for a few minutes, and that’s when the Lord began to speak to me.

I noticed that a lot of them were carrying things that were entirely way too big for them. Some were even carrying things that were twice their size. Some ants were carrying things that they could handle, while some were carrying things that they could not handle alone.

Some ants were really struggling, but what stood out to me the most was that these ants never gave up. They fought hard and they worked hard to get to the place that they wanted to be. I even saw some ants helping other ants and working together to make the load a little lighter.

At one point, I even saw the “big king ant” come to help the struggling ants carry the piece of food that was too big for them to carry themselves. A lot of the ants were aimlessly wandering around searching for something good enough to take back to their colony. I also saw some ants carrying around some dead ants. And through this, the Lord spoke to me even deeper.

How often in life do we have things that are way too big for us to handle? How often in life are we carrying things that are way too big for us to carry alone? How often do we aimlessly wander around in life when things get too hard or we are struggling, searching for whatever we can to satisfy our needs?

That very thing we need and are searching for is Jesus. While we are much different than ants, we are similar in so many ways. We work hard in life, we fight for what we want, but sometimes the struggle is too hard for us and we feel like giving up, even though we know the prize at the end of the struggle will be worth it.

It’s so similar to our walk with Jesus. We are told as Christians that we will suffer. Life will be far from easy, but we know the one in whom we trust. We know that he is able, he is faithful and he is good. We will go through times of struggling, but it’s in those times that we have to stop relying on ourselves and rely on Jesus.

Sometimes, our life gets hard, sometimes, we struggle, but we have to be willing to let the “dead” things go. We, just like ants, carry dead things around with us in life. The ants feed off of the dead things. The dead things provide food for them. And in a way, this is similar to us, too.

Satan deceives the “dead” things in our lives to look like food to us, satisfying us, giving us a sense of belonging, giving us exactly what we needed, feeding us with the wrong things. We have to be willing to let the “dead” things in our life go.

Just as these ants were surrounded by ants to help them carry their load, we, too, are surrounded by people the Lord has so sweetly placed into our lives. When life gets hard, when life is too much for us, we need our fellow “ants” to pick us up, carry us a little ways and help us through the struggle to make the journey a little easier.

To be an ant. Give the big things in your life to Jesus. There are things that we can’t carry alone, that the only thing that can do any good is Jesus. He is our only hope. Fight through the struggles. Fight hard for where you want to be in life.

Sometimes, we carry things that are way too big for us to handle. Sometimes, we search aimlessly for something that is good enough for us. Sometimes, we carry around “dead” things in our lives. But we have Jesus, the one true king, to help us along the way.

Through this, I have learned that if we take the time to listen and be still that the Lord actually speaks us through so many things. Oftentimes, the Lord will speak to me through things of this sort or my teammates or the people surrounding me, but I have to remind myself that I have to be still enough to give the Lord space to speak.

Our present troubles produce lasting glory, and until God within you becomes enough for you, nothing else will ever be enough.

Surrender all to him.

Keia Blair is a Seymour native who attends Cincinnati Christian University. During her nine-month mission trip around the world, she is submitting a series of blogs that will appear in The Tribune. Send comments to [email protected].