Lately I have been really busy- as you can probably tell, I up dated more when I was at camp than I have since I have been home. I started working with this apartment complex. I give 60-80 hours of volunteer time a month and they will pay for me to live at the complex. This is one of the biggest complexes in Memphis. The people...are okay and the attendants, people who live there, are busy- like the rest of the world. To me, October has been the busiest month ever- I will dread this time next year.
There have been a lot of things that happened this month that have been great and others that have not been so great... The good things have been BIG and the bad things have been fairly small- but there have been a good number of the small... haha
The complex is volunteer, but it is also a ministry started by my sister church. The purpose from the church prospective is outreach, which is right up my ally. I believe in out reach and I believed in this Ministry. I had prayed about it and I believed this was where the Lord wanted me.
Now that I am here I am starting to question motives and seriousness of this "ministry". I have since learned that the Apartment complex uses the service of the church member just to have events and to make themselves look good. Not surprising, that is the way that business works and it’s not like we, as a church, are not benefiting as well.
Then we get to the church. The church has decided that this form of outreach is not “good enough” and they would like to have other forms of outreach. If you know me, you know that I do not think there could be enough outreach in the world. And I think that a church should have more than one form of outreach, including something to do with the Global community. I am not, however, a person that is okay with just dropping a ministry for “something better”. I like to finish things through, I like to make sure that when I am done with something, anything, it is better than before and the Lord is happy with the way that it was handled and completed. Many times I believe that people forget that God has an order to the way He wants things done for Him. Being a Christian is a full time job, with struggles and benefits; so often people only want the benefits.
I read a quote…somewhere... that stated everything we go through in life is transforming us into the likeness of Christ- something we got through for his name sake. So if you walk away from something that you know the Lord wants you to do, or something He did not give you permission to walk away from, you are really walking away from the opportunity to be transformed into His likeness. “God , I like You, but you’re not worth all that…”
“One of the reasons we are not as Christ- centered and cross saturated as we should be is that we have not realized that everything- everything good and everything that turns out for good of His redeemed children- was purchased with by the death of Christ for her.”
John Piper Don’t Waste your Life
So yes, I know what you’re thinking, or at least if I were you what I would be thinking. That quote applies to you too, yea it’s hard- but why are you complaining. I needed to vent and trust me, I know that the things that I am involved in right now are hard because I am actively doing God’s work and being transformed to the likeness if the Son. Which I was warned is like Iron sharpening Iron and Glass going through the shaping fire.
Don’t forget to check the Mirror sometimes- Are you reflecting Greatness?
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