For over 8 years I’ve had the pleasure, honor, privileged
and challenge to serve in the Children’s Ministry. I’ve been faithful and
obedient to God’s nudges – okay sometimes they were more like pushes during
that time. I started out as greeter and somehow ended up as the KidStuf
Director. I’ve served with so many great people and learned so much. KidStuf
and the Children’s Ministry was such a huge part of my life and my identity –
that was who I was. Sometimes I think that at times it overshadow my other
titles as mom and wife. This was my identity; who I was!
Many months ago, it became apparent to me that I was losing
steam. I was getting tired and I began to get frustrated with those around me
because I wasn’t getting the help I needed and I knew I wasn’t going to be able
to do all that needed to be done. But me being who I am, continued to try and
get it done. The harder I worked, the more tired I became. So I did what we all
do in those situations. I started to pray.
Now since giving my life to Christ I’ve seen many of my
prayers answered so for me to start praying for help wasn’t strange or new. I
prayed for months for God to help me. I prayed that he would give me the
strength to go on. I prayed that he would bring the right people into my life
to help me with the mission, but mostly I prayed for rest because I was just so
tired.
Well in late May God finally answered my prayer. Unfortunately
in his fashion he didn’t answer it the way I wanted nor the way I thought he
was going to. In late May I was asked to step down from my position in Family
Ministries for an indefinite time so that I could rest and I could recharge. As
you can imagine I didn’t take this news well. I was hurt beyond anything I
could write here and I saw nothing in my future but pain. I was angry at those
around me, how in the world could they do that to me? What was going to become
of KidStuf? What was to become of the kids? I was KidStuf, this was the wrong
thing to do. These were just some of the thoughts that were swirling in my
head, I’m sure you get the idea, I wasn’t a happy camper.
Now during all of this I could feel God around me. I could
feel him holding me. I knew that he had a plan for me, but I was just so hurt
and confused that it didn’t register that in fact this was God’s answer to my
prayer. You see I always felt I was stepping out in faith and that I was being
obedient to his call. He had created be to be a story teller. I knew that I was
created to share the bible, his word, with children. I know that he wants me to
break the chains of generational sin one child at a time. What I didn’t realize
is that during this time I became so caught up in KidStuf and that identity
that I had lost focus on who I was in him. I was defined by what I did and not
by who I was.
After several months of wallowing in the pain, anger and
confusion like a child in a mud puddle I was able to wipe the mud from my eyes
and see God’s hand in all of this. Now I’m working on cleaning off all the “mud’
and I’m still a little dirty, but slowly with his help I’m wiping away the pain
and the anger. I’m like that kid who is bouncing up and down on the balls of
their feet yelling
“Can I go now, I’m ready” I can almost hear God chuckling “No,
my child not yet. You’ve still got a little mud on you and you need to clean up
a little more”
God does answer prayer! God is faithful! There is never a
doubt about that. The problem comes when He does answer them, but not the way
we want or envisioned. He does have the plan and now I have to trust him to
lead me as he was done in the past. Now I have to remember that I am defined by
who I am and not what I do. I have no idea what the future holds, hence the
confusion, but I do know that there is no way on earth I’m going to be able to
move forward from this place until I stop looking at who I was and starting
looking forward to who I’m going to
become.
