Be careful what you pray for.....

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.