Service for Jesus

“You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide…”

John 15:16, ESV
Jesus’ words are such an encouragement to me, as is what Paul wrote in Ephesians 2:10: “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” I didn’t save myself; I don’t sanctify myself. God choose me specifically and He gave me certain talents and abilities to use in His service, but it is His grace and strength that accomplishes the work. I do my part and submit to His working, and then trust Him with the results!

top left: street witnessing in San Francisco;
middle left: camp projects;
bottom left: inviting people to church by hanging door flyers;
right: spending time with people and investing in their lives

So when I start viewing my teammates as more talented, more experienced, or better equipped, I have to remember that God didn’t choose a single one of us because we were talented, experienced, or equipped. God chooses us…and then He supplies the grace to do the job in His strength for His glory. He gives each of us different jobs in unique measures.

 

“Of this gospel I was made a minister

according to the gift of God's grace,

which was given me by the working of his power. …

Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly

than all that we ask or think, according to the power

at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in

Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever.

Amen.” Ephesians 3:7, 20-21, ESV

The Depths of Love

Here is love, vast as the ocean,

Lovingkindness as the flood,

When the Prince of Life, our Ransom,

Shed for us His precious blood.

Who His love will not remember?

Who can cease to sing His praise?

He can never be forgotten,

Throughout Heav’n’s eternal days.

On the mount of crucifixion,

Fountains opened deep and wide;

Through the floodgates of God’s mercy

Flowed a vast and gracious tide.

Grace and love, like mighty rivers,

Poured incessant from above,

And Heav’n’s peace and perfect justice

Kissed a guilty world in love.

The devotional theme of my trip was my heart. Our leaders had the Team West leader from last year speak to us at the end of first semester. He told us that the best preparation for the team was for each of us to warm our hearts with the love of Christ…but not to do it just for the trip. Let that love fill our hearts for all our lives! That stayed with me for the whole of second semester, and I wasn’t surprised to see the reoccurring theme in my devotions throughout the trip: what does my heart look like? what is it filled with? what is pouring out of it?

Dr. Innes, the pastor of the church in San Francisco, said, “The bottom line of love is selflessness.” I can recount a few times on the trip that my problems went back to a selfish heart. I wanted my own way; I was being selfish. I wasn’t willing to say yes to God’s plan; I wasn’t loving Him. I spent a lot of time praying that God would empty my heart of my self and selfishness, and fill me with His love!

Christ’s love is sacrificial. Christ’s love said yes to the hard things. Christ’s love gave up His rights. Christ’s love portrayed in me is sacrificial, says yes to the hard things, gives up my rights. Christ’s love portrayed in me offers my life completely for the service and worship of God. Christ’s love portrayed in me says that I want to live every moment for His glory…and there is no room for self in that.

Let me all Thy love accepting,

Love Thee, ever all my days;

Let me seek Thy kingdom only

And my life be to Thy praise. […]

Of Thy fullness Thou art pouring

Thy great love and power on me,

Without measure, full and boundless,

Drawing out my heart to Thee.

~Here is Love by William Rees and William Williams

California Story: The Beginning

The picture on the right is all of us standing on the state that we are from.
In the left, we're all in California. :)

California. Sometimes God has plans that exceed our wildest dreams!

I grew up on missionary stories—giant tarantulas in glass jars, pictures of small huts in jungle clearings, exclamations of God’s sustaining grace in all situations. Missionaries ate around our dinner table and spent the night. I saved up my “Jesus money” (tithe :)) for the offering at our annual missions conference that would go to help a missionary’s special project, and in high school I started helping support missionaries financially.

When I was little, I wanted to marry a pastor and move to an exotic mission field. :) And for as long as I can remember, I’ve always wanted to go on a missions trip.

My youth group went to Brazil the year before I graduated high school, but God closed the door on that opportunity for me. Maybe I can go when I’m in college… But the reality of college for me saving money for 2 years and attending a community college part time while working part time. Reality was 40-hour work weeks during summer breaks.

And then another reality hit me the Spring of my junior year: the summer after I graduated might be different. Perhaps I would have a loan to pay off…but if I didn’t have another school semester looming in front of me, the time crunch wouldn’t be there.

So I prayed. And I put the BJU summer missions teams link in my favorites and visited it often, reading the weekly updates—and praying I would be them next summer.

School began again—my senior year! It was a tough semester, but God’s grace sustained me, and when the “Mission Team Organizational Meetings” took place in October, I was there. We could choose three teams to visit and get information about. I went to Australia first, because I was sure that was where God was taking me. My one criteria was English-speaking, so I didn’t even bother to investigate anything overseas except for Australia. The second meeting I chose to attend was Alaska’s, mainly because the Alaska team goes out every year and so I knew about it even though camp work wasn’t high on my list of interests. I could attend a third meeting that night, and looking through my list of options—and not ready to go back to the dorm and open the books—I choose California. A meeting about California would at least be interesting, right?

I walked back to my dorm with doubt forming about Australia—were some of the things they mentioned what I really had in mind?—and with interest forming about California.

Each team had preliminary meetings during the next few weeks. The California team’s meetings were the only ones I had open availability too; for Australia’s I would have had to find a sub at work (not an easy task). It’s interesting to see how God planned even that out! As I attending those meetings, my interest in California and church planting grew. About a month later, I knew: I was a part of the team going to California! But I didn't know this was only the beginning of what God was planning to do...

Bearing Fruit

California

Right after I graduated this spring, I spent 5 weeks in California with a group of students from Bob Jones University ministering to/with several churches—mostly newer church plants but a few older, established churches as well. It was an amazing time personally as well as seeing what God is doing in California.

Because “He who is mighty has done great things for me,” in the spirit of “go home to your friends and tell them how much the Lord has done for you,” I plan to share some of the things I learned during my time out west over the next few weeks. Stay tuned. :)

(Verses are Luke 1:49 and Mark 5:19, ESV)

Good Shepherd

Shepherd, go before me, wise and loving Guide;
I have seen Your goodness proven sure when tried.
Shepherd go before me.

Shepherd, choose the pathway You deem best for me.
Plan and pace the journey, swift or slow to be.

Shepherd, place the fences, closing in my way.
Safe behind the Shepherd I would ever stay.
~Eileen Berry~

Love Is...

Love. That is a tall command, only I never used to realize exactly how hard loving people is. The closer Jesus has drawn me to Himself, the more He has asked me to love—and it’s not been easy.

Why is it so hard to love? Because, as I read somewhere, you can’t love without giving. Love requires sacrifice. Love requires putting others before ourselves. Love requires unselfishness, because love has no room for itself. For the first few years after my high school graduation, the theme of what God was teaching me was to love. Love when it’s easy, love when it’s hard. Love the fun people, love the not-so-fun people.

In my job (I work at a fast food restaurant), I run into all kinds of people. I work with all kinds of people, I meet all kinds of people, I serve all kinds of people. People who are fun, enjoyable, those whom I look forward to seeing—but also people who are grumpy, annoying, rude, and hard to get along with.

I am required to be nice, as part of my job description—to smile, to welcome people cheerfully, to wish them a good day when they leave. This is done to everybody, whether we hope they come back soon…or not.

When I first started working five years ago, I was surprised at how easy it is to take things personally. While we have a lot of regulars, most people come in and we don’t recognize them or they us. At times I doubt they even see us as people—and when the guests are rude and mean, that is when loving is tough. I am supposed to cheerfully serve those people, too. Love is not complaining about the situation later. Love is praying for that person: “Lord, bless their day. Draw them to Yourself!” Love is truly meaning that smile I give them.

Love is still wishing the lady who laughed at my mistake “a good day.” Love is cheerfully taking an order and conversing with the guest who, on his last visit, was very rude. Love is being nice to the people who get labeled as “weird.” Love is, I have to admit to myself, not seeing those people as weird! Love is loving those people who seemingly do not “deserve” it, but it was Jesus Himself who said, “if you only love those who love you, what credit is that?” Love is seeing every person—guests, fellow employees, my family, individuals at church, the people walking down the street—as somebody who needs a smile, the love of Jesus, and someone to be kind to them. No matter what…because that is what love really is.

Psalm 1

"Blessed is the man who walks not

in the counsel of the ungodly,
Nor stands in the path of sinners,
Nor sits in the seat of the scornful;

But his delight is in the law of the Lord,
And in His law he meditates day and night.

He shall be like a tree
Planted by the rivers of water,
That brings forth its fruit in its season,
Whose leaf also shall not wither;
And whatever he does shall prosper."
Psalm 1:1-3

The Lesson of the Potter

"The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD: 'Arise, and go down to the potter's house, and there I will let you hear my words.' So I went down to the potter's house, and there he was working at his wheel. And the vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter's hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as it seemed good to the potter to do. Then the word of the LORD came to me: 'O house of Israel, can I not do with you as this potter has done? declares the LORD. Behold, like the clay in the potter's hand, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel.' " Jeremiah 18:1-6, ESV

God is working on me; He is conforming me into the image of Jesus Christ for my good and His glory. That process requires that I be broken down again and again. My plans, my dreams, my desires, my life—everything must be broken so that I can be built up again as God wants me to be.

“You turn things upside down! Shall the potter be regarded as the clay, that the thing made should say of its maker, ‘He did not make me’; or the thing formed say of him who formed it, ‘He has no understanding’?” Isaiah 29:16, ESV. God knows what He’s doing. God builds; my responsibility is to be submissive. God is working for my good and His glory: I will know Jesus more intimately and God will be glorified in His work!

God's Gifts

“Every good gift and

every perfect gift

is from above,
and comes down from

the Father of lights,
with whom there is no

variation or shadow of turning.”
(James 1:17, NKJV)

This verse comes after the passage on the growth of sin (vv. 13-15). We are willing to trade in good gifts from God Himself for the wilting pleasure of sin that will eventually bring death. God has abundant life! Look for His gifts and let go of what the world (and self) offers.

Matthew 7:11 says, “If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him!” God desires to give us good things—we who fail Him so often. Praise God for His grace and love, and may that compel us to live for Him!

Trusting God

Oh, Lord, I trust Your Word;

it gives me hope and light to see.
The path ahead, though now obscured,

will open wide for me.

Oh, Lord, I trust Your love;

I feel its warm and changeless glow;
My life or death shall only prove

its everlasting flow.

Oh, trust in God, my soul,

and look into His face.
Oh, trust in God, my soul;

His holy will embrace.
Then I shall stand complete and whole,

a trophy of His grace
As I trust God.

(Francis Havergal and David Burke)