February 8, 2012 Making It Count?

Matthew 25:21, 26-27 The master was full of praise. "Well done, my good and faithful servant. You have been faithful in handling this small amount, so now I will give you many more responsibilities. Let's celebrate together....The master replied, "You wicked and lazy servant! You think I'm a hard man, do you, harvesting crops I didn't plant and gathering crops I didn't cultivate? Well, you should at least have put a little money into the bank so that I could have some interest."

It is missions conference here at BBC, and yesterday Kristi Walker, an alumna now serving in Germany spoke in chapel...hmmm, spoke in chapel just doesn't do justice to what happened yesterday. Kristi, in her words and with her gestures "shared her heart," and she just didn't talk to the students, she nailed the faculty and staff as well.

Among the many things she said were a couple of things I want to share here. The first, and maybe the most important, thing she said is that you should not wait for a call, for a feeling. We have all be called to represent God, to serve Him out of our giftedness. Then she talked about trusting God, that our plans and demands (without consulting God) don't end well, that God loves us and His plans will always end well, if we trust Him and follow Him. Finally, she got in our faces, and in so many words, said some of us were just doing a job, when God wanted more. He wants our hearts. He does not want, though, more than He has given us, because He will make much of the little we think we have if we give it to Him.

Well, here I am again. Maybe the same place I am at every mission conference, wondering what I am doing, and whether what I am doing is making any difference, and wondering if there is something else I should be doing. As I reflect on what I have said in the last month or so to a few people, it is not always about the end, about the big things or what we accomplish. Sometimes it is more about the journey and that "so great cloud of witnesses," some of whom we see and some we do not. What am I showing them about the difference it makes to love God back...because He did love me, and you first?

I don't sing. I don't paint. I definitely do not play basketball. But I write, and I love to coach writers...and since I am old as the hills, I do have some life lessons to share....so I guess I'm in a good place to do those things - maybe you could say, I am in my mission field...and I have to be careful to recognize the evil one's strategies in this place - like discouragement, like desiring too much to see fruit, like fatigue or busyness, and like the thing that happens when we compare our lives to someone else's.