Hello friends! Quick word about the past week or so and then I can get to the goods…
Summer has “started,” but the only aspects of summer that I’ve participated in so far is staying up really late (but not getting to sleep in), and sweating like a fat man. SOAR has been really busy as of late but the first session of orientation starts in 8 or so hours and so it’s gonna be awesome. Ministry opportunities out the wazoo! So be praying for me to get use this job as a platform to point some new little Lion cubs to Jesus.
We’re back to 1 Cor. 3 and the analogies Paul gives us about our function as ministers of reconciling man to God. I wrote about our personal significance, based on what we bring to the table: none. The second installment was about viewing our ministry like the newly healed blind man who told Jesus, “I see men as trees, walking” (Mark 8:24) and how we are to take care to nurture these trees’ growth. So no comes the next analogy of the wise builder.
“Now he that planteth and he that watereth are one: and every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labour. For we are labourers together with God: ye are God's husbandry, ye are God's building. According to the grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise masterbuilder, I have laid the foundation, and another buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon. For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.” (verses 8-11)
Small point about this section of scripture that I think is cool, but just a nugget compared to the big Mac God was serving me in Africa…
Paul says that he is the Master builder, that laid the foundation (which is Christ). This was written a little south of 2000 years ago. A message of God’s specific revelation to the church, via Paul. It is so amazing to me, to know that throughout the ages, God has preordained a people that would be called his. Followers of Him and inheritors of His Kingdom, who would be led by His word. With all that man has done to try and rule God out and discredit His Word, it has endured and caused its followers to endure as well, and will until Christ comes again. We just had church up in this blog!
...Back to Corinthians...So since the foundation—Christ—has been laid, it’s time to build a house. “...But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon,” says verse 10. From this one half of a verse is where God began to throw down the message…
If I’m building a house, two very crucial parts of the house are going to be windows and doors. Physically speaking, no one wants to live in a house without either, no one builds a house without either.I mean prisons have them! Its not only important to have them, but also where are you going to put them? Where is the best place that is going to make your house appealing but also going to be practical and functional? Spiritually speaking it is equally important. The shelter part is fantastic, but no windows or doors means you’re life with Christ is in a box, edifying no one on the inside or outside of it and doors or windows in the wrong places are inconvenient or just useless. Putting your front door in your bathroom is not only inconvenient but also awkward and probably against public decency laws. Spiritually, I see the windows and doors of the house as ministry. These are the points where the personal meet the public. But what is so very key is to distinguish the difference between the two. I’ll use my time in Senegal to make all this previous stuff make sense…
I’m sure its pretty standard in the Christian world for most people who go on mission trips or even hear about one to think “Do I need to be a full-time missionary? Is this God’s will for my life?” While in Senegal I fought that feeling of getting caught up into the hype of it all just because I was on the mission field. I certainly felt like I could be there forever, but I can’t tell God what His plan for me is. But while there I caught such a vision and a passion to see the Wolof people come to trust in Jesus. “Surely, it can’t be a bad thing for me to just forget America and come live here and do this!” is what I thought, but I really couldn’t have been more wrong. (Back to the house) Senegal is not my Door. As of now, it is one of my windows. Because of where I am in my life, I can’t just pick up and go live there. All my money would eventually run out and I would be miserable because God hasn’t called me there. A door is somewhere you go out and get into the world and do work, and bring people into your house as a refuge and to shelter them. A window, is a small opening in which you can serve a little bit at a time, but you don’t put your whole self through a window. The only people who enter and exit through windows are people who are going to or coming from somewhere they don’t need to be.
I love Senegal and it, along with all of my new family there, will always have a special place in my heart; but it can only be a window for me as of right now. Who knows, in time God may give the go ahead to knock out the window to make way for my front door to go, but until then it can’t be my main ministry. As of now, my door is in Florence to the students at UNA. Its where I am most surrounded by people and have the most influence. It has to be the door until God directs me to change the floor plan. Until then I will serve Senegal by praying and visiting when I can, and will give money to support other global projects, because God has given me some resources to do that with, and I will just focus on where He's got me right now.
I really hope this idea makes sense because this is a point that we all can get so confused on, seeking for, "Where does God want me? and What am I supposed to be?"
Honestly, if you have to go across the world just to actually start caring about pointing people to Christ, then you’re missing what missions is completely. To quote my beautiful, wise, virtuous mother: “God doesn’t care where your feet are, as much as He cares about where your heart is.”
Grace and Peace, my fellow-laborers and builders.
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