Monday, February 2, 2009

Giving Love

This one reminded me of the first night on the Navajo reservation. The team was sitting around that night doing our devotional. Shana came around and annointed everyones hands, and then we prayed something along the lines of "God, we give you our hands for the week. We want to use them to build this church, and to show Your love to these children." At first I was caught up in it, and started my own little prayer of "yes God! And I give my feet, my smile, my words, my everything! However you want to use me this week, I want to follow Your plan for me!" And then I subsequently broke down in bitter tears. All I could think was How many times have I prayed that same prayer? How many times have I tried to offer my life in service to Him? And how lost have I always felt? Since missionaries came to our church when I was little, the thought niggled in my mind: I want to do that! I want to give hope to the hopeless! I want to go where He leads me and let Him speak and work through me! And yet, how hypocritical it would be for me. How can I encourage someone in that relationship with God that I myself cannot figure out how to possess?

Now I know many people would tell me, "well maybe you're on His path, doing His will, and you just don't recognize it!" I hope that is the case, because for now, I feel like I'm floundering around lost with who I am supposed to reach out to. I pray most mornings for God's love to flow through me and out to the hurting families that I see all day, and I hope that there may be little seeds being planted, because I sure have trouble seeing my own fruits growing. And by the fruits can you judge the tree.

Forgive the negative rant, but those were my thoughts for today.

1 comment:

Carol said...

Although I recognize many of the sentiments you so eloquently express, having gone through many of them mostly early in my own journey, I must again say I think you are being too harsh/critical of yourself. It seems that many of the answers you are looking for are based on an emotional response, and that may be the problem. Look at things through your rational eyes. I don't have much time right now; work is calling. But I do want to explore this further because it seems to be a reoccurring theme for you.