Obedience

I should have known better than to let the world know I am trying to walk in obedience. It never fails that when I begin to seek hard after God, and I let others know that I am trying hard to obey, my world gets rocky. I am beginning to understand that standing up and admitting that I am following Jesus is the same thing as putting a target on my chest and handing the devil a quiver full of arrows!

This week I am struggling with doubts. I find myself wondering if this desire to do ministry more purposefully is a real calling from God or a feeling. My desire to learn more about God's word and perhaps go to seminary has been challenged by more than one person this week telling me I may "loose" my faith in such a process. My frustration in my "mom hat" area of life causes me to wonder if my family could really live in a fishbowl.

But then I remember, I am called to obey God, not necessarily know the next step.

There is a wonderful story in Genesis about a man named Abram whom God called out of his homeland: ¹Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. ²And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. ³ I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed." (from Genesis 12 ESV)

And with that, and ONLY that, Abram got up and left!

This story never ceases to amaze me. Abram left the place of his birth not knowing anything about where he was going. He just got up and left. No arguing with God about the timing of it all or how he had to uproot his family. No asking God if they could wait till the weather was better. The only thing God gave Abram was an amazing promise: Obey Me and I will make you great and bless you.

WOW!

In some ways I feel like Abram. God has not told me where my "land" may be, He just told me to go and minister to others. I know I have a ministry right where God has me; I wrote about it here. What I don't know is what step to take next, and as I am sure Abram was thinking, I wish I had a map!

One of the books I am reading says that we can know the map of our lives if we read the story of our life. It's a fascinating concept, but I am just having a hard time believing my past is my road map to the future. What if Abram used his past as his road map? Would he have left Ur? Would the Israelites have ever come into existence? I don't know the answers to these questions but I know one thing, God allows my past to help shape my ministry.

God, in His mercy and kindness, has allowed me to experience a bit of pain in every area of life. That's not a bragging point by any means, just a reality. My reality and the pain I've gone through allows me to minister to a much broader group of women than I could have ever imagined. In this sense I think my past is a bit of a map. Something in this book I'm reading really hit me: "The tragedies of life, small and large, carve contours in our character that draw us to a different way of living, one that God intends to both use and transform" (Allender p.87). Now the hard part; patience during transformation.

As badly as I want that map that details my next step, I must wait on the Lord and His timing. I am not going to assume my past points me in the direction of my future but am going to rely on the bestselling "map", God's word, as I walk in faith on this trail of ministry. Want to come on a walk?