This week we were asked to evaluate our spiritual growth over the past year, and even over the past two weeks in our internship at River City. We were also asked to evaluate our efforts in what we have done to grow. This is a very convicting question. While I have seen growth in myself over the past year, and even the past two weeks, I know that there is so much more growing that needs to happen in me as a follower of Christ and a person in love with Jesus. For now, however, I will focus on the growth that has happened.
Over the past year I have developed a thirst for the Word. There is so much I do not know and so many questions I cannot answer and I have just been feeling the constant need to know more. Now, being human and very imperfect, I still have a hard time carving out time each day to spend in the word and listening for God's voice, but where I am now compared to where I was this time last year is a giant leap in the right direction. When I read the Bible I don't just read it...I search for truth and guidance, I study it, I want to know it cover to cover. This has made my faith so much stronger. I can say with confidence that there is nothing that will cause my faith to waiver. Faith grounded in the word is strong faith. It takes knowing God and His promises in order to know what you believe, why you believe it, and be sure that nothing can shake it! While I am far from knowing everything I want to know, I believe I am headed in the right direction to having an unmovable faith based on the truth's found in God's Word.
Over the past two weeks, even though it is a very short time, I know that I have grown in my understanding of who God is. At the beginning of the summer, Jonathan spoke at youth on Wednesday night about God and who He is and how we often times don't understand How great He really is. From that point on I have been convicted about how I view God. I think that even though I am extremely involved in my church and things going on here, I had a very small image of God. I knew what and who He was but I didn't act like I did. He is the creator of the universe, He pieced together human beings and the intricate details that make up our bodies. He put 3000 different types of trees in one square mile of the Amazon jungle just because He could. He made the universe with so many puzzling and amazing details that we as humans could never possibly understand them all, yet He still did it. He wrote his love letter for us on every piece of creation. He created all these spectacular things so that we can know Him through His creation. "For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities - His eternal power and divine nature - have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse." Romans 1:20
I think that for both of these spiritual growth areas, all that I have done is read and study the Bible and recognize my need for more understanding. God has worked in me and made me realize the importance of knowing Him and His word.
Thursday, June 2, 2011
Expanding on My Ministry
So after writing my last blog about my ministry, Jason Powers asked the following questions to provoke deeper thought on my part;
With the idea of "calling" in the area of your chosen ministry...
1. What does it mean?
2. How do we know?
3. And what implications does it have?
In my chosen ministry, whether it be youth, worship, missions, etc, I believe that God puts something in me calling me to serve in that area of ministry. This calling may be different at different times in your life, but I do believe that it is something put in you by God, with the purpose of directing you to the place He wants you to serve.
I believe the way we hear this calling is by praying, listening for God's voice, taking advice from Godly council, recognizing gifts He has put in us, and analyzing the fruit we see from our service in that ministry we are called to. I do not believe that God will call you to do something you are not good at, and if He does, He will equip you to do it and you will become "good at it". I think that if we are called to something we will feel a passion for that area of service and we will see good fruit in our work with that ministry. I know for myself, God has put a passion in me to see youth come to know Him. I know that this is the ministry He has called me to, for the time being, because I have seen good fruit from my work with youth. I know that if this was not where He was calling me, I would not be seeing good fruit in my work, because all good fruit comes from Him.
I do believe that when we are called by God to something, we had better listen! God is not some teacher who THINKS He knows best for us and just puts us somewhere He THINKS will work. God KNOWS what is best for us and He puts us where He KNOWS we need to be. He is all knowing and all powerful and yet we sometimes doubt His calling...To quote from the movie Hot Rod, "Where do we get off?!". I think sometimes we have this vision of God of an old man playing a harp and just making suggestions as we go along in life. That is not the God we serve. He knows us better than we know ourselves. He has a perfect plan for our lives and He wants to use us. It is up to us to hand over the reigns and let Him.
With the idea of "calling" in the area of your chosen ministry...
1. What does it mean?
2. How do we know?
3. And what implications does it have?
In my chosen ministry, whether it be youth, worship, missions, etc, I believe that God puts something in me calling me to serve in that area of ministry. This calling may be different at different times in your life, but I do believe that it is something put in you by God, with the purpose of directing you to the place He wants you to serve.
I believe the way we hear this calling is by praying, listening for God's voice, taking advice from Godly council, recognizing gifts He has put in us, and analyzing the fruit we see from our service in that ministry we are called to. I do not believe that God will call you to do something you are not good at, and if He does, He will equip you to do it and you will become "good at it". I think that if we are called to something we will feel a passion for that area of service and we will see good fruit in our work with that ministry. I know for myself, God has put a passion in me to see youth come to know Him. I know that this is the ministry He has called me to, for the time being, because I have seen good fruit from my work with youth. I know that if this was not where He was calling me, I would not be seeing good fruit in my work, because all good fruit comes from Him.
I do believe that when we are called by God to something, we had better listen! God is not some teacher who THINKS He knows best for us and just puts us somewhere He THINKS will work. God KNOWS what is best for us and He puts us where He KNOWS we need to be. He is all knowing and all powerful and yet we sometimes doubt His calling...To quote from the movie Hot Rod, "Where do we get off?!". I think sometimes we have this vision of God of an old man playing a harp and just making suggestions as we go along in life. That is not the God we serve. He knows us better than we know ourselves. He has a perfect plan for our lives and He wants to use us. It is up to us to hand over the reigns and let Him.
Thursday, May 26, 2011
What is MY Ministry?
There are two ways to look at ministry. My personal and individual ministry, and the ministry that I commit myself to. My personal ministry is what I do to spread my faith. My personal ministry is putting into action what I say I believe. It can happen anywhere, in any setting. Anywhere I go, my ministry goes with me. As I said in my last blog, I believe ministry as a whole is done most effectively in community, however, that ministry extends to every individual in that community, everywhere that individual goes, and everything they do. The ministry you commit to is a place for you to serve, a place where you spend time investing in people. A place where you serve side by side other followers of Jesus to do His work.
My personal ministry is to be the hands and feet of Jesus, extended. I want to love people as He did. Serve as He did. Live as He did. I want to take the truth of His word and reach people who need to know Him wherever I go. I want people to see His reflection in me. I want people to know without a shadow of a doubt, who it is that I serve, and through me, to see His love for them. This is the ministry that does not change. No matter what I do, or where life takes me, this ministry will always be MY ministry.
The ministry I have committed to is Youth ministry. I love seeing students discover Jesus...His love, and His mission for their lives. Not every student I minister to will get it, and I know this, but the ones who do...The ones who do make absolutely everything worth it. To prevent even just one student from falling for the lies Satan constantly feeds them, and having that student be a light amongst their peers, their family, and their world, is why I do this. Youth have such a powerful influence on the world, wether good or bad, that influence is and always will be there. I want to help shape a generation of youth that use that influence for Jesus. I want to help influence and train a generation of world changers. People so on fire for Christ that Satan trembles when he sees them coming. I want to equip students who will not back down from their faith, who are so passionate about Jesus that nothing can sway them no matter what. I want them to stand before God and hear "well done, good and faithful servant". I want their lives to be a map to the one who created them. This is the ministry I have committed to and this is MY ministry.
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
What is Ministry?
Our first journal assignment is to answer the question, "What is ministry?". I did a google search on the word "ministry" to see what the first thing to come up was...
~ Ministry (collective executive); the complete body of government ministers under the leadership of a prime minister.
I thought this definition was interesting because even though it doesn't say it, it very closely resembles the Christian's relationship to God, our "Prime Minister". The idea of ministry, in my opinion, is brothers and sisters in Christ coming together for a common purpose; to serve the Father by reaching His people, and doing this by showing the world His love.
Ministry is what we as followers of Christ are called to do. Now, that ministry may look different for every person and may target different people groups. While some are called to reach kids, others are called to reach foreign nations, while others are called to reach students, while still others may be called to reach young married couples and their families. The list of people to minister to is endless. You can subdivide types of people into countless different "ministry target groups", based on interests, backgrounds, age, gender, location, etc. The bottom line is, ministry is serving God by reaching people.
It is also my opinion that ministry is best done in community. Jesus put great emphasis on community in his time here on earth. He traveled and lived life with a group of disciples, community. Matthew 18:20 says, "For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them." There is power when believers come together for the united purpose of worshipping and serving the Creator. When in community, we encourage and celebrate each other, we complement each other's weaknesses, we offer much more as a whole than we do individually. Ministry done in community is effective because it offers not only answers to questions for unbelievers, but a place to find rest, a place to find acceptance and relationships, something all human beings crave. Ministry done in community not only considers how to reach people, but how to grow them as believers once they have been reached.
Ministry as a community is a powerful thing that God designed for us. When I consider ministry, I cannot fathom it without community. So for my first journal entry, long answer summed up...
Ministry is the act of serving, loving, and reaching people around us, telling them about what their Savior did for them because He loves them, and doing this through community.
~ Ministry (collective executive); the complete body of government ministers under the leadership of a prime minister.
I thought this definition was interesting because even though it doesn't say it, it very closely resembles the Christian's relationship to God, our "Prime Minister". The idea of ministry, in my opinion, is brothers and sisters in Christ coming together for a common purpose; to serve the Father by reaching His people, and doing this by showing the world His love.
Ministry is what we as followers of Christ are called to do. Now, that ministry may look different for every person and may target different people groups. While some are called to reach kids, others are called to reach foreign nations, while others are called to reach students, while still others may be called to reach young married couples and their families. The list of people to minister to is endless. You can subdivide types of people into countless different "ministry target groups", based on interests, backgrounds, age, gender, location, etc. The bottom line is, ministry is serving God by reaching people.
It is also my opinion that ministry is best done in community. Jesus put great emphasis on community in his time here on earth. He traveled and lived life with a group of disciples, community. Matthew 18:20 says, "For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them." There is power when believers come together for the united purpose of worshipping and serving the Creator. When in community, we encourage and celebrate each other, we complement each other's weaknesses, we offer much more as a whole than we do individually. Ministry done in community is effective because it offers not only answers to questions for unbelievers, but a place to find rest, a place to find acceptance and relationships, something all human beings crave. Ministry done in community not only considers how to reach people, but how to grow them as believers once they have been reached.
Ministry as a community is a powerful thing that God designed for us. When I consider ministry, I cannot fathom it without community. So for my first journal entry, long answer summed up...
Ministry is the act of serving, loving, and reaching people around us, telling them about what their Savior did for them because He loves them, and doing this through community.
Summer Internship!
So this summer I am an intern at River City Community Church...my church :) I am extremely excited about this opportunity to learn whatever I can, serve in whatever way I'm needed, and love everyone I come into contact with! I have 4 fellow interns...lots of us this year! One of them is my fiance, Jonathan Shepherd, and the other 3 are some awesome students from Bethel college in Indiana! We spent today getting to know each other and going through orientation with Jason Powers, our beloved intern coordinator. This summer is going to be incredibly busy but incredibly awesome! Jonathan and myself are also taking a full load of college courses online this summer so we are gunna be busier than ever, but I am so looking forward to what God is going to do! I will be posting weekly about what is going on at the church and in the youth as well as doing weekly "journal" assignments given to us by Jason. I hope that this will be enough to keep everyone posted on what's happening with me and with River City this summer!
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