Ministry Happens

So, now that I have more control over my time, I asked myself what are the things I really wanted to do with this flexibility.  One thing that stuck out for me was that I wanted to hold tightly to sharing Jesus with other people.  I wanted to take it a step further and invite my children to come along with me.

So, week 3 and I have failed, but I'm not one to give up.  I know I need to be intentional, i.e. put it on the schedule! 

Yesterday, I had put on the schedule to bake pumpkin bread.  At the designated time, I gathered the kids and headed to the kitchen.  I needed 5 eggs.  I had none.

Now, I have a yard full of chickens, so I pushed myself out the door.  I found 1 egg in the chicken yard. 

I sighed and put off baking bread until Friday, because I'd go to the grocery store Thursday for eggs.

Sigh, sigh, sigh.  But, God knew how serious I was about this thing.  I had a special visit I wanted to make, a promise to see a couple who were dear to me.

This morning, the kids went out to spend time with their farm animals and when they came back in they said, "Mama, how many eggs did you need for the bread?"

I said, "Five."

They smiled and said, "We picked up four this morning!"  Four plus one equals five.

Boom.  And, that's God. 

Hello, there God.  Thank you for being faithful when my efforts are meager.  Thank you for speaking to me, for prodding me along on this journey. For saying, "Hey, I say you.  Let's keep walking."

So, baking bread it is at lunch time today!  And a much waited on phone call to make that first visit will follow.

And in true God-speaks-fashion, I was later touched by a book I read during my time for decompressing after teaching my sweet Chinese children this morning.  It is a book by Shannan Martin called, The Ministry of Ordinary Places.  Shannan really digs deep into what it looks like to show God's love to people and says, "....what if we all made a pact to not invite anyone to church if we hadn't already invited them over for a meal?"

I love that.

I've often felt invitations to church were made without love, without cost, and without caring.  I know I want to feel loved.  If you invite me to church, when I show up, I want to feel a connection to you.  If I don't know you, if we've never shared a conversation, a meal, a heartache, a peek into each other's REAL lives, how can I have a connection to you?

It brings to my mind a time when I was invited to a church conference.  I knew many of the people at the conference, but when I showed up alone....I felt alone.  It was a very sad experience for me.  I don't know what happened, except that I sat alone.  I worshiped alone. At lunch, I scanned tables for familiar faces, but ended up sitting with people I did not know.  I felt alone.  I left that service with my heart crying.  Now, maybe I was being a little dramatic, but it is how I felt.  There were many women there who I knew and who knew me.  We offered each other the common "hello's" and "how are you's" and then I became invisible. 

This experience taught me one thing about church.  You must be engaged to really reach out to people.  You can't be lazy and go through your normal business. 

For instance, at church, it is super easy for me to sit with my family if we are having a social gathering.  I want to!  Yet, I think of all the lost opportunity to expand our ministry when we don't mesh with others.  This ministry stuff takes erasing boundaries, expanding borders, and doing some things that you initially don't WANT to do.

But, when we do those things we don't want to do, the pay-out is...heavenly.