I can remember walking into Walmart and asking the Lord if He wanted to use me. I can remember praying and asking for God to use me in whatever way He wanted to, whether praying for someone while getting groceries or speaking life into other people, or sharing His message of reconciliation. I also remember being terrified that He would say something. I felt obligated to ask because I knew that I was His servant, and it helped that if I couldn’t feel loved by God, I could at least be useful and needed in my own eyes.
Since that time there have been many more visits to Walmart, or Target, or a gas station, with the question, “God, what do you want me to do here?” The thing is that every time I have asked or made myself available, God answers.
Every time.
During my time in Nicaragua we have been prayer walking through the streets and each time we go out there is always someone that the Lord highlights.
Someone to encourage, someone for whom to pray, someone with whom to speak truth, someone with whom to rejoice, someone with whom to share the message of the gospel and the list can go on because God is always at work.
-My Father is always at work and to this day, even I am working.
Before going out for prayer walking, we always pray together as a group. As we stood in a circle all praying together aloud, Scott, our ministry host, prayed a closing prayer and thanked God for the laborers going out into the fields. Jesus was quoted saying,
-Pray for the Lord of the harvest to send more laborers into the fields, for the harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few.
And in that moment I began to realize how plentiful the harvest is actually. I remembered all the times I made myself available to God in situations and He used me – not because He had to find something for me to do, but because there is always something to be done in the Kingdom of God. Here on earth, there will always be the poor, the sick, the hurting, the depressed that need God. There is a plentiful harvest that our Father is asking us of which to be a part and it can be anywhere.
There is one thing I had very wrong when I was younger, though. I am not obligated to be a part of God’s mission.
God’s work on the earth is a gift of which to be a part.
“All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation.”
Therefore, we get to be a part of God’s work on earth.
And the thing is, there is always a plentiful harvest. Every time you open yourself up and ask God how you can love others today or be a part of His mission you will be used.
