Or hanging out with this girl! Catherine and I have gotten to know each other pretty well since this past winter. We just have a ton of fun laughing together. Its so fun to have friends that you can laugh with one second, and then be totally serious with the next- friends that know me and listen to me even when I am being ridiculous. I'm going to miss summer nights driving around town!
Anyways, school did start, and after I got past my flip-out moment I am actually really excited for the year. I feel like slowly, with every year of school I get a little bit wiser. I have so much room to grow, but one thing I am really excited about this year is just "doing ministry" a little bit differently. The past couple of years, I feel like I have planned and structured my ministry in a way that I thought would be good to bear fruit. But I feel like the last couple of years were pretty fruitless. A lot of times I feel like I went through the motions but if I am not doing life in the power of the Holy Spirit- Jesus promises me that my ministry and my life will be fruitless (John 15).
So, I'm doing things differently. I want to spend less time planning, and more time being filled. Instead of spending a couple of hours preparing a Bible study, I want to spend a couple hours being filled myself through God's Word, and then let God himself lead the Bible study. Instead of planning for the future, I want to embrace the instructions and promises of this passage:
After this the Lord appointed seventy-two[a] others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go. 2 He told them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field. 3 Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves. 4 Do not take a purse or bag or sandals; and do not greet anyone on the road.
5 “When you enter a house, first say, ‘Peace to this house.’ 6 If someone who promotes peace is there, your peace will rest on them; if not, it will return to you. 7 Stay there, eating and drinking whatever they give you, for the worker deserves his wages. Do not move around from house to house.
8 “When you enter a town and are welcomed, eat what is offered to you. 9 Heal the sick who are there and tell them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’ 10 But when you enter a town and are not welcomed, go into its streets and say, 11 ‘Even the dust of your town we wipe from our feet as a warning to you. Yet be sure of this: The kingdom of God has come near.’
I am one who is appointed. I am appointed to go out, to leave "The Jungle" every day and be an ambassador for Christ. This year, I am in class with some of my really good friends, and I am in a family who I love deeply. I am uniquely placed in these positions. I do not know where I will be a year from now, but that doesn't matter. Right now, today, I am appointed. I am sent out like a lamb among wolves. The harvest is plentiful- people are ready to hear about Jesus. I am a lamb- I have to go in a non-threatening way, I don't need to FORCE anyone to believe. If people don't want the gospel, I just shake the dust from my shoes and go on. I have a partner! Bekah is a friend from class who I get along with really well, and she loves Jesus. Just like Jesus sent out the seventy-two in pairs, I am being "sent" out in a pair with Bekah, what a fun blessing! My prayer for this year is that, among the nursing class of 2013, Bekah and I would be able to "make disciples, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and teach them to obey."
I feel like I could go on and on about this passage, it is just so cool, and I love how I get to apply it to my life right now. I won't exhaust you with every little thought I have about this passage, but I think the major point that I feel Jesus is telling me in this is that I need to change my attitude. Change it from one that says I am going to be sent to one who is sent.
love your blog!
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