When you go overseas on a short term mission trip you expect some God-sized moment, an emotional response to what you see and experience, to never want to leave, to hear God more clearly…the list could go on.
While in Cuba the people around me were having these moments. It’s not that I wasn’t. I just don’t think I ever had a HUGE moment. I had small whispers of moments.

When we were sitting around in the hotel room in Miami for our first team meeting Meredith and Ashton started playing and singing. They weren’t one phrase in before the rest of us joined in. That moment brought a team who had only know each other for a few hours into a closer relationship with one another. That was the moment we became a team. But it came in a whisper of a moment.

Watching the sun rise over the ocean was magnificent. Before the sun ever reaches the horizon, its rays are taking over the darkness and not matter how much the darkness tries to stay it can’t. The light from the sun is just too strong. The grandness of who God is and that we can see Him in every part of creation hit me…in a gentle whisper.

Sitting with one of my teammates as she poured out her heart at the sadness and hurt she was feeling about not getting to see the children we’d spent two days with was heartbreaking and encouraging. It was heartbreaking because she was hurting. She loves big, with all she has, with no hindrances. That was encouraging. And God spoke in a whisper to me as I spoke with her that it is okay to love even when it cost us something. After all, that’s how Jesus loves us.

Listening to a Cuban pastor explain the wonders of God and worshiping Him as we all sat crowded and sweating in small living room was one of the highlights. The words were almost whispered as he spoke them.

Watching my teammates as they interacted with children and teenagers was encouraging. I couldn’t help but stand back to watch them, smiling to myself. Seeing that God uses the quiet and shy of us, the outgoing, the funny, the enthusiastic. I realized this on a Thursday afternoon while my teammates played thumb war with children they couldn’t communicate with and again, it came to me in a whisper. 

Seeing a woman who’d been very quiet and meek during the week boldly leading her church in worship. Unashamedly boasting in Christ as she led in the praise of her Lord, Savior, King and Redeemer. And although everyone was singing loudly, I heard a soft whisper.

Spending time with my teammates, laughing, sharing, crying…knowing that something special was happening and we were experiencing it together. That created a bond that I don’t think will ever be broken between us. And it all happened in whispers of moments.

Realizing that I wasn’t spending my time thinking about my children, missing them, crying for them, longing for them was something that happened when I got back. And I heard in a whisper Christ is sufficient in all things.

Seeing Paul baptize people in the sea. While everyone around me was cheering with excitement, I was still, listening to a whisper say that I would never forget that moment because it was a moment God had orchestrated.

We often overlook whispers, not realizing how much God can teach us about Himself in those moments of softness.