I was talking to my grandad today about fleshing this out, and he challenged me about how I'm living my life. I tend to live with alot of 2nd guessing my actions and what I should be doing in moment to moment interactions. He asked, "Jessica, how sovereign is your God?" Wow. That nailed it. He's all-sovereign, meaning that in everything I do, He has a purpose. He would not place a situation in my life if it wasn't going to be used to lead me to deeper faith and trust in Him. With Him at the center, I can rest.
But resting in my heart does not mean that I don't DO anything. Grandad told me that the word "RISK" in Chinese is 2 characters, and those characters are "dangerous" + "opportunity". Wow again! This is what I want! When we are praying, "Lord Jesus, You are at the center of my life; WHAT do You want me to do in this moment?" we can be sure He will lay someone on our hearts. We can go out and--in His power--share LIFE with others.
Directly after that conversation, the people at Panera Bread gave me a huge bag of pastries and breads as they were closing early. When I came home and surveyed the goods with my mom, we decided that we should share them with neighbors. I have been wanting for some time to bake cookies or something and go take them to the people living near us to start developing relationships and begin to share the Gospel. Well, the food was there, and all that needed to be done was to go. So I went.
God was bathing every moment with His grace. My next-door neighbor's health is failing rapidly, and I have shared the Gospel with her before, but as I was visiting with her, God was pressing me to do it once again. We talked for quite some time, and she listened as I explained the story of salvation again. She did not commit her life to Christ, but she had tears in her eyes, and I believe that God used this encounter and is at work in her life right now. I am just in awe that He is so in love with people and that He uses His children to share His Love with those that don't know Him.
This is not about me. This is about the power of God that is at work in ALL of our lives. We start out with a plate of donated goodies, and God can turn it into eternal glories. The point is that we need to take those "risks" and get out there and see what God does. Even if all we say is "God bless you" to someone, we are in His plan seeking for Him to use us everywhere we go. We will not be disappointed. And we can take no credit. It is HIS POWER ALONE.
What a MIGHTY GOD we serve.
That is really true about second guessing our life. It is hard to see what God is doing, and if we don't get instant results we tend to think that maybe we messed up and made a bad decision. However, God has a plan for our life, and we can trust Him to see His plan out.
ReplyDeleteI was thinking the other day about how much preparation we have for a few minutes of service. Think about Jim Elliot- God was working in his entire life to prepare him for the mission field, and yet there were only a few days at the end of his life that he actually was in a high profile positions. God used him a lot, but it took a lot of preparation time when I'm sure he didn't know what was going on.
josh beets