Sunday, October 22, 2006

 

Sunday, October 22, 2006

Ezekiel 36. We read today in church verses 25-27. It was about having a kingdom heart.

At least since I have been at UC, all I have heard about is missions. It seems like everything is about that this year. I can’t get away from it! Focus was all about the Great Awakening and missions. (focus is a 3-day conference for college kids offering many ways to serve others) Many convo sessions and Celebration days have been spent talking about missions. (convo is something we were required to go to as a student at UC that usually included different speakers, something that many students resented because of how ridiculously boring it was. Celebration days happened once a week on campus and were a time for worship and usually a student speaker from the school) I went home and went to church on Wednesday – missions. On Sunday morning, a guest preacher came, and he talked about missions. Not only did he, but the entire service was about. (I believe that Sunday a couple people from the church shared their own stories of mission trips they had recently been on) Is it coincidence?

My family group spent an entire section on missions. (family groups were a group of on-campus small groups that met on different days of the week where different Bible studies were held) I know it’s on purpose this is happening. It’s so crazy how it keeps coming and keeps coming, never going away.

Today at church I went to the alter. I asked God to send me where he wants me to go, when he wants to. I told him to be in control, to take over. To send me wherever it may be according to his will.

Over the next several months, I started a process with North American Mission Board that included interviews, application forms and meetings. I had to choose 3 different locations, out of several hundred, where I would be a summer missionary that following summer. I ended up at not my first choice of places, but the second. Rapid City, South Dakota. I had to look the city up on the map because I had no clue where it was located in the state or any idea what it looked like. 

When my plane took off, it was surrounded by expressways, hotels, other buildings, and many many planes on the ground. When I saw where I was landing, I was surrounded by grass, dirt, and more grass and dirt. I was sure I was in the middle of nowhere, wondering what I had got myself into going out west for the summer. There was a lot of culture shock and things I had to get used to, but it was the best experience I could have hoped for. I instantly became friends with a girl from Oklahoma who would be working with me with the church’s children’s ministry. We literally spent every day together, whether if we were working or not. Shawna eventually would be a bridesmaid in my wedding as a married a wonderful man from the church I was working at. He always reminds me that I don’t remember meeting him on that first Sunday as he introduced himself as Joel MacDonald, the pastor’s son. That is because, for once, my heart was not focused on finding my future boyfriend or husband, but was focused on serving God and that church, city, and state. 

I cannot wait to one day share the story of how Joel and I met with our children, and the many many stories and memories I gained that particular summer of 2007 spent  in Rapid City, South Dakota. What if I wouldn’t have listened to God? Or not noticed the signs he was throwing at me over, and over, and over again? What if I wouldn’t have prayed to let God be in control of where I go, rather than me choosing the city I wanted to be? My life would be so different than it is this day. I wouldn’t trade my current life for anything, even with the trials and struggles it contains.

Sufficient through God

Your job at any given moment is to bring all your gifts, all your talents, all your propensities, and all your passions into this thing called life and believe that they are good enough to produce the fruit that is expected of you. 

This is a quote from a book I am currently reading titled The Resolution for Women, written by Priscilla Shirer. I re-read this sentence several times trying to grasp all that it is saying. This particular sentence is really speaking to me in this season of my life. No matter what situation I am in, I am to give everything I have in order to produce fruit. Not just any fruit, but the good kind, the kind you look forward to sinking your teeth in as you see it sitting on the counter top. God expects me to use the talents and passions I have for him. After all, he is the one that instilled them in me. He is the one that made me to be the person I am. I may not like a lot of who I am today, but it is my job to use what he has given me for his glory and to figure out ways to do that. 

In this book, I have something underlined or a comment written beside it in almost every paragraph. So much of it feels as if it is written directly to me, as if the dedication page reads my name. Another part I feel that is written not only for me, but all women is the statement below.

Rather than seeking to impress and outperform others, and rather than feeling ashamed by what you don’t have and can’t do, relish the opportunity to stand as a living, walking, eating, breathing example of what God’s grace can do with a woman. He has set apart, weaknesses and all, to be a scared vessel to His service.

If we could just focus on what we are supposed to be doing and how we can fulfill God’s will, and stop worrying about how much prettier, smarter, wealthier, and more put together all the other women around us are, we could probably get twice as much accomplished. This is something I am really working on. It’s hard, seeing other women my age buying houses, succeeding in their careers, growing their family, and all their other accomplishments. It’s hard to not get jealous, but I’m working on it. Yes, I know that we will have children someday (one way or another) and I am content to not have children at this moment and that God will bless us financially. And I am actually content with the job that I have right now, I do feel it is where God wants me. I know that God does have his reasons, but it’s still a working progress. 

Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God.

 2 Corinthians 3:5

I am sufficient only through God, and without him I am not.