Last Tuesday, I received some awesome encouragement while
reading the weekly newsletter from Stonebridge Church — our home church in
Marietta, Georgia. It was just a small part of the email that was reiterating
what Pastor David spoke about on Sunday, but it had God’s perfect timing in my
life.
Earlier that day, I had been notified by our ministry
contact in Lago Agrio that I would be preaching that evening in front of the
church. For those of you that do not know me, I am very scared of public
speaking and have never prepared a sermon in my life. So when I heard that I
would be preaching and would have to prepare a sermon in just one afternoon, I
got nervous.
When we returned home for lunch, I checked my email and saw
the Stonebridge newsletter. I figured I would just check it to see how things
were going back home, but to my surprise, God had a much bigger purpose. Here
is the part that really stood out to me:
“Lastly- are you willing to ‘fail?’ If you are being
obedient it’s impossible to fail in God’s eye, but often success in His book
looks a lot like failure to us. If we aren’t willing to endure that
pain/humiliation of being misunderstood, of things not working out like we
thought they would/should, of losing, then we will pull up when we should be
holding steady.”
After reading this I had such a peace about preaching that
evening. I knew that it was something that God had called me to do and that I
was being obedient to God’s desires and was going to be successful in God’s
eyes even if I stumbled through the sermon and made a fool of myself. Obedience
is all that God asks for and He will take care of the rest.
When it came time for me to speak that evening, I was not
nervous; I did not have butterflies in my stomach; I was not shaking. I was
able to confidently deliver my sermon and trust God to use my words to speak to
the peoples’ hearts. It was not a very extravagant sermon and it was pretty
short, but I know that I did what God wanted me to do and that His word will
not return void.
Failure is not an option when we are obedient to God.
