This has been a season of change and transformation. At times I find myself apologizing to God for failing to commit enough of my time to meeting with others in order to build our ministry team. At other times, I take a step back and praise God for all the things He is teaching me along the way. Fears arise and are put at ease. I let worry set in and He calms me. But the most important thing that God has taught me lately is quite basic, yet it has been extremely important for me to grasp. Are you ready?......
IT IS NOT ABOUT ME
Not a very profound statement right? But in order for our ministry to be a success, it can’t be about us. It has to be all about Him.
As I have struggled with myself to grasp this concept, God has shown the joy and rest that comes with laying all my burdens on Him. Sometimes I think about our support raising and the amount we have left to go, and admittedly it has given me a big lump in my gut if I dwell on it long enough. I have found myself asking God, “How are we ever going to raise the support to go?”. But it’s in these times when God reminds me that it’s not about me. It’s not about what I can do. Can I raise the funds needed to go myself? I just don’t think so. God can though and He will. After all it is His ministry, not mine. I didn’t create it, He did, and He invited us to join Him. It’s His job to get us there.
God continues to show us time and time again that He already has all of our supporters picked out. When we are down emotionally, He hasn’t failed yet to remind us that He is in charge of our financial support by bringing a new supporter whom we didn’t technically ask to support us. We’ve worried at times about sharing our ministry with others fearing that we may not use all the tools and methods we’ve been taught regarding raising ministry support, but again, when it comes down to it the funds are Gods job. There’s no formula or methodology to ensure that everyone we ask will join our support team. It’s God who will stir the hearts of those who will join us and then He will provide us with the funds.
Throughout the Bible you can read of how God is the one who blessed His people with financial support.
• Numbers 18:21: 21 "To the Levites I have given every tithe in Israel for an inheritance, in return for their service that they do, their service in the tent of meeting,
I’ve also been reading a book lately in which the author provides an example of how he sees tithing, which has been a great example for me. To paraphrase, the author thinks of our tithe as going straight up to God on Sunday morning, then He throws it back down into the offering baskets in the Usher’s closet just before they begin counting. God supports His people. When we give, we give to Him, and He in turn gives back to us His people.
God has shown me our job. Our job as His children is to bring Him glory through our ministry, sharing the awesome things He’s done in our lives and in the lives of our friends already on the mission field, ultimately encouraging others to live for Christ and find comfort and joy in fulfilling the roles that He has created us for. After realizing this, it hit me; God has already given us a passion to share about the great things He is doing. To encourage others to be a functioning part of the body. To bring Him glory and in the process watch people’s faith in God grow as they learn and/or see first hand how our He interacts with His people. When I look at it this way, my job is not so hard after all! It is our joy to honor Him. He has already instilled this passion in us. We just need to use it to point others to Him, because after all, it is not about us. What an awesome and loving God we serve.
So with that, I have thought of updating one of our prayer requests. For those that have our brochure, in it you will find we ask for prayer that our financial support needs would be met. Honestly though, I feel like this is somewhat a childish prayer request. We already have the answer. God will meet our needs. He already has everything planned out and everyone picked out. He has called us to go and He will get us to where He wants us to be. If I could change our prayer request on our brochure, I might change it to this:
• Please pray that our hearts would be focused on glorifying God through our ministry.
It’s a simple prayer request, but with so much weighing in on us, it’s not that difficult to lose focus and return to our selfish natures. The more we focus on ourselves, the less we focus on Him and what He’s doing. The less we focus on Him, the less we get the chance to glorify Him by sharing the great things He is doing in our lives. The less we share, the less others are encouraged.
So here is my prayer for you who read this: That you would be encouraged by the great work of the Lord and that you would be refreshed by His outpouring of love on His children. In Jesus name I pray, Amen.
