04 Dec To Plan or To Follow
I wonder why God had to take me to Guatemala to break me of my pride. Why is it that we ministers of the gospel feel that we are in full control and that it is our responsibility to plan out every detail of our lives? When Jesus rescued us from darkness did we not say that we would follow him; follow being the key word. Clearly my life in ministry has not been mirroring my Savior in that he willingly and completely submitted to the Father. Why would I think that my life would or should look any different from Jesus?s life of obedience.
Leaving my home and its comforts to live in another country as a missionary is not the hard part. For me, fully engaging where I am without planning for the future seems to be my area of struggle. My urgency to share Christ with those who have not heard the gospel and to disciple others is healthy until I start putting limitations on my God of when, how, and where I will serve him. Maybe you can relate.
As a Generation LINK Administrative and Missions Resident I have had the tremendous privilege to work with the church that my local church is partnering with in Guatemala. While our short-term team was in Guatemala God reminded me of the sweet simplicity of following him. During the day we were able to feed children a bowl of cereal as they watched a pretty convincing reenactment of David and Goliath. When we were not with the children we would do various home visits with some of our sister church?s members in order to pray. When the door was opened to us we found many who were eager to share their stories of God?s faithfulness to them. We also found many who were lost that could not see that we were showing them hope in the gospel of Jesus. Our team had no elaborate game plan or strategy. We were available for the Spirit to lead us to specific homes that housed specific individuals that needed prayer and the gospel. This model of ministry is not reserved only for the foreign mission field.
I am not trying to communicate that planning is wrong. There is a good, healthy time for a plan to be put into action that can unite people to one cause. For those of you like me who are type A and like to plan every millisecond of life I am here to tell you to rest. May we not strategize to conquer a enemy city until we have been saturated in prayer asking God to communicate HIS perfect game plan to us. We are meant to follow Jesus. Even our most honorary spiritual leaders are in fact followers; perhaps that is why they are good at leading others.
Let?s remember the beautiful simplicity of following Jesus because he has a plan. In fact, he knows all the days of our lives! He already has them planned out. Jesus said that the harvest is white and ready. In Luke 10:2 Jesus says that we are to ask him to send out workers to his field. The field is his and he knows exactly how he wants it to be harvested. When we are living a life of servanthood let?s be obedient to pray and to follow.