Week one of ministry has felt like a months worth. If I’m being honest this is the first time on the race that I hit my breaking point. I was confused on why the Lord brought us here, I felt a weight on my shoulders filled with high expectations, not enough time to fill up after pouring out, I felt drained.
This week has like nonstop moving, going from one thing to the next with little time in between to spend time as a team or even time alone. This ministry has so much they want to accomplish, the vision is amazing! They want to establish relationships with kids before they introduce them to Jesus (I love that), they want to share Gods love with the community (another thing I love) and share the gospel to the lost people of Albania (YES), but they need a lot of help getting everything started. Many of the programs needed haven’t been established yet, that’s been part of our task for the month.
This week we have gotten questions like
“Why have you come?”
“What resources did you bring?”
“How do you do Kids ministry?”
“How do we get people to come to church?”
“How do you do teen ministry?”
“Where are the people?”
“How do you do women’s ministry?”
“Where do we go to find equipment for church?”
All great questions but many of them we don’t know a direct answer to. Most of us don’t have a background in building a church. Yah, we can do construction work or some painting but when it can down to establishing programs, we didn’t really know what to do or how to respond..
One word to describe this week is out of control. And sometimes life is like that. God gives you phases of life that you cant control so you depend on HIM for guidance.
You go through seasons where things are thrown at you and life seems impossible. You look at all the things you need to do or the expectations that are weighing heavy and you start to crumble thinking HOW WILL I GET THIS DONE.
You can have all the faith in the world and still feel defeated before you even start. Building a church and establishing all the parts that go with ministry cannot happen in a few weeks but here’s one thing we do know…
God is faithful.
Side note: I want to remind you, you don’t EVER have to earn Gods love or acceptance of you.
Hebrews 11 is titled “Impossible Faith” verse 1 reads:
“Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.”
It is impossible to please God without faith.
God is always MOVING and he expects those who are following him to do the same.
What happens when you move? Pain, Change, Uncomfortability, the unknown, the unfamiliar come into your life.
Seasons come and go but the one constant in the universe is change.
God is always up to something, so instead of thinking
“LORD WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!?!“
Think this, “Whatever you’re doing, I’m in”
What are you more focused on, your faithfulness or HIS faithfulness, I feel like a lot of the time we think “oh if I could just believe more, things will get better.” But what we really need to focus on is being expectant of his response.
God always rewards or RESPONDS.
He responds in his time table, not ours.
This is what I have to remind myself this month:
Focus on Jesus.
His faithfulness.
His GOODNESS.
The purpose He gave us in putting us here.
The realization that HE is the one we need to satisfy.
The promise of restoration.
The promise of love.
That His timing is perfect in everything.
We can pray for things now for this ministry that we wont see in our lifetime.
God is always working.
God is always moving.
I’ve been waiting for the HARD month, the month where things start to get old, where it takes everything to get up and give it your all.
It gave me time to refocus. It gave me time to DIG DEEPER.
