Hello
Emmanuel,
When
being a Christian feels really difficult, don’t forget to look back and see why
it’s so worth it.
My
family and I received an invitation to attend a celebration on March 30th. In 2004, Ansonia UMC finished building a $700,000
multi-purpose facility which included a large kitchen, a carpeted fellowship
hall and 2 classrooms. I was appointed to
Ansonia just as they were breaking ground.
It was a lot of hard work and a significant commitment for a church of
80 people to make such a leap of faith.
What followed was a whole lot of God stuff.
It
is 10 years later and I got the invitation to look back with Ansonia and see why
it’s so worth it. Story after story of
churched and unchurched people flowed through that new addition and were
impacted by God’s grace in various forms. It will be interesting to meet with the people
of Ansonia UMC again and talk about how God has been so good.
The
lesson I’m learning is to not be so easily frustrated with ministry. We want to change the world and the world
doesn’t get changed. However, what does
happen is one village gets changed or one neighborhood gets changed or one
family gets changed or one individual at a time gets changed. Over time it all adds up to God having a plan
of one sort or another.
We
are on this earth for 90-100 years if we are lucky. In God terms, that is a miniscule snapshot of
a much bigger picture. Truth is we don’t
even see things from a 100 year perspective.
We often reduce ourselves to thinking about how our day went. If it went well, then we think things are
well. If the day went bad, we think
things are bad. With this mindset, it is
no wonder we interpret life as a rollercoaster.
I
wonder how we would evaluate our life if we could look back 1,000 years and
compare where we are to where we were. I
suspect we would be much more optimistic.
I know that as I look at where Ansonia was 15 years ago I get all warm
and fuzzy. Not that they didn’t have
their down days or even down years, but over the course of many years God was
clearly working among them.
When
you get frustrated with your day or week or year, consider taking a look back
and seeing where you have been. I find
that most people do make strides forward even if it was a bumpy ride. And I also find that people of the faith who
are committed to listening to God’s voice generally finish up stronger than
when they started.
And
if you don’t, then look back even further.
Who you will find is the life and sacrifice of Christ who makes anyone’s
rough years look gentle.
God
is Good,
Pastor
Joe
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