What I am is a BA in language & Literature ~ with a little pottering in Drama. What I like doing is research & writing. It makes me perfectly happy. In a perfect world I would do nothing else except a little painting & gardening on the side. I am academically inclined, useless for most practical tasks, which is one reason I'm sure, I was given 5 hyperactive, capable, practical children. They bemuse me as I'm sure I do them.
When we moved here, nearly 20 years ago, we doubled the numbers of the little protestant church every time we attended. I can't speak for the Catholic church but Christians of any denomination were rather thin on the ground. We all worshiped once a month at the little Anglican church because the Anglicans were the only denomination prepared to send a minister over, even so irregularly as once a month. I had trouble remembering which week he came so our church attendance was scatty. However this little group of elderly ladies had been praying for a retired minister who would be prepared to do a service every week for a nominal fee, that being all our tiny congregation could offer him & we have had a series of retired ministers since; but being elderly themselves they have a habit of dying unexpectedly on us.
As our church grew (though 50 is hardly a large church) we gradually began to see we could only continue to function if we didn't rely so much on an actual minister & used the people with their God given gifts much more than we were. I do not have the gift of helps; I am a nusiance in the kitchen; hospitality sends me into hysterics; believe it or not I'm terribly shy so greeting was not for me. Then one terrible day my dearest, who happened to be the chairman at the time & was responsible for filling the pulpit, got a phone call 48 hours before our Christmas service to say our speaker was terribly ill & there was no way he could take the service. Dearest & I stared at each other in horror.
'Well, jeannie,' said dearest, 'It's me or you.' Dearest, bless his heart, is so dyslexic he can't string a sentence together. I knew it would be me however much I might protest. I hit all the panic buttons. I had words to say to the Lord about it too, believe you me! Now it wasn't the research that had me worried. Research is the joy of my life. Obsure facts that no~one else knows are so much fun. Nor was it the writting out of a sermon. No not even the ogre of public speaking bothered me. What had me panicking like a headless chook was the scripture that says those who preach & teach will be judged more stringently. I am NOT a qualified preacher & I don't pretend to be. What I am is an over~educated female with a little knack for writing & an ability to research my facts that God can use.
God has been dragging me kicking & screaming but despite all my objections: I'm a SAHM, I have 5 kids & a disabled husband, I homeschool, I don't have time for this; I have been asked to speak more & more often. Speak, not lead. Someone else always leads the service. All my objections are valid plus one more. When I am given a speaking date I go to the Lord & say, 'OK, what do you want me to speak on this time?' Then I wait. Usually something pops up in the back of my mind, something I would never in a thousand years have thought of speaking on. My mind being a bit of a white elephant stall I usually whinge, ' Can you be a bit clearer, Lord,' but once I'm sure I've heard correctly I check the scriptures & get on the net. I make a pile of notes & let it sit simmering on the backburner of my mind. There's 2 reasons for this. One I write a lot in my head so that when I actually sit down at the computer it flows. The other is a practical consideration. Once I have my message written up the Holy Spirit really starts to drive me to get up & preach what I've been given to say. This is most uncomfortable when the set date is still weeks away.
Not only am I a panic merchant I discovered early on doing a message was absolutely guarrenteed to bring my whole household under spiritual attack & there is nothing worse when you are scrabbling to meet a deadline so I have taken to getting my messages finished early. Yep, I am sitting on one now. I am doing Job for Mother's Day. Odd choice but I'm not quibbling with the One giving the instructions. The next few weeks are going to be most uncomfortable. Dearest, who is always so supportive & encouraging & has never shown the least jealousy, (more like relief it's not him) has gone into prayer for me. Just at present my prayers are more like a rant & we start schooling again at the end of the week So if the thought of a female in the pulpit doesn't completely horrify you & the Spirit leads you that way, spare the odd prayer for me & my household. We are going to need all the prayer we can get.
1 comment:
Absolutely prayers for you and your family! My real father who is an ordained Assemby of God minister was once asked to fill in for a Pastor who got sick. The Lord laid a heavy salvation message on his heart. He questioned if this had come from God because the congregation was die-hards, people who had probably been save at least 20 years! Still he was obedient.
At the invitaional, just as he figured, no one came forward. He wondered how he could've gotten it wrong. On Tuesday, the Pastor of the church called him and told him that a woman had come to see him the day before. She told him that she was so despondent that she wasd going to commit suicide bu as she walked past the church, on her way home, she felt this incredible pull to go inside.
Unbeknownst my father, she was standing at the very back of the church and heard the Gospel message for the very first time. When my father gave the invitational, she knew that something strange had just happened to her. She came back on Monday morning, expecting to find my father to talk more with him on what she had heard for the first time. The Pastor had the priviledge of leading her to the Lord.
You never know how God will use something that makes no sense whatsoever to us in our flesh, for His kingdom purposes!
You're right, satan will step up the Spiritual warfare whenever God is on the move!
Connie
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