The Many Faces of Service

Have you ever stopped to think about just how many different ways there are to serve?

Often we think that to serve others, it must be in some grandiose way...something big, formal, well planned.

That is sometimes the case.

We travel on missions trips to China and Honduras; to Haiti and Ukraine.  These efforts are important and impact lives.  Hopefully through their efforts, teams share and show the Gospel with those they meet.  Maybe this is done through Vacation Bible School, digging wells, building houses, or distributing Bibles.

But what about the everyday things that we do to serve?  Buying a few extra cans of food for the food bank, leaving a quarter in the Aldi's cart, raking our neighbor's leaves. 

In John 12:26 it says,

"Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be. 

My Father will honor the one who serves me."

Continuing in Galatians 5:13 we read,

"You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. 

But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh;
rather, serve one another humbly in love."

What does your day look like?  Who will you come in contact with?  How might you serve them?  Maybe you'll buy a cup of coffee for the person behind you in the drive-through line; maybe you'll go with us to serve at a homeless women's shelter; maybe you'll hold the door for a mom struggling to carry 2 toddlers and their associated paraphernalia; maybe...

The thing that is important isn't HOW you serve, but that you DO serve.  Serving is putting someone else first; it is humbly showing love to another; it is striving to follow in the footsteps of Jesus.

The Goal is NOT Perfection

I know that I'm not alone in my ongoing struggle to want to be perfect. From the time I was a little girl, I wanted things to be "just so." I had pictures in my head and my heart of what my life would look like when I "grew up" - the kind of house I would live in, what my family would look like, the lifestyle we would share. It's funny how, even though I don't remember a time when Christ wasn't a part of my life, He wasn't in/on the list of things that the "younger Jen" dreamt of.

It never ceases to amaze and impact me how God uses a conversation, a book, a verse of scripture to remind you who you are, whose you are, and what is really important.

There are always going to be parts of my heart that I try to hold back, that are full of sin, and need forgiveness. No matter how hard I try, I am unable on my own to be the person that God has designed me to be.

This morning as Olivia and I were having some quiet time, we prayed and asked God to show us what He wanted us to read. We closed our eyes, opened the Bible, and put our finger down.

Luke 18:27 - "Jesus replied, 'What is impossible with men is possible with God.'"

A special friend gave me a book a few months ago that I kept looking at but hadn't gotten around to reading past the first day. Today, here is what I read:

"The goal is not perfection. It's simply to be in an intimate relationship with Christ each day, fully embrace who he created us to be, and seek to fulfill the purpose he has for us. He is our greatest strength - and the One who enables us to live out all the other strengths he's placed within us.

Hey you...
The one wondering if you've got strengths.
You do.
The one questioning if God really even wants to use you.
He does.
You've got gifts to offer the world.
Things that are good and right and true.
No one else can make a difference like you can.
Like you already do.
Dare to believe it.
Dare to receive it.
Stand tall, be strong, just go out there and be you in your own wonderful way.
Today."
(from "You're Already Awesome" by Holly Gerth)

There are oh so many parts of my heart and my life that I need to work on. But I know that as I seek to dare to draw closer to the One who has more for me, the One who has designed a better life for me than I can ever imagine, that he, and others he puts in my life, will work to refine and heal them.

No matter how hard I try, I will never be perfect. But I can be with the One who is. So can you.

Here We Go Again...

Its that time of year again...tickets are being booked, visas are being applied for, details are carefully being arranged for summer service trips.

One of the things that I learned early on in my missions work - and which, as a recovering A-type personality has been one of my greatest opportunities for growth - is that we are to plan to the best of our abilities and then know and expect that these plans will change.  It is not unusual that our conversations at the start of the day about what we will do sound very different from our day-end debriefing reviewing how we served.  Most of the time, though, it ends up a lot better than expected.

But that really isn't too different from every day life, is it?  We have a plan, an agenda, of how we are going to live our life.  Of the job that we'll have, the person we will spend our life with, the home in which we will live.  If we are honest, we want it our way, and we want it now.  But how often does that really happen?  Probably a lot less than we desire.  But even though it is different, when we take a moment to pause and honestly reflect, it, too, is usually better  isn't it?   Especially when we open ourselves to be used as God's instrument to advance His Kingdom.  (You can read about how my life has been impacted here.)

 

Tomorrow, on May 1, Into the Field will celebrate its 6th birthday.  This amazes me.  Much of how we are serving was not on our agenda when we filed those incorporation papers.  May 1, 2008 was the National Day of Prayer and then, as now, my prayer was that we would be open to God's leading and be faithful enough to keep stepping forward.    His plans are definitely better than any we could have made on our own.

 

 

Go. Serve. Love. Give.

It is hard to believe that we have hit the end of the first quarter for 2014.  How can we be 25% through the year?  Even harder (for me) to believe is that we are 1 month away from celebrating Into the Field's 6th birthday.  A lot has happened in these past six years.  A lot of lives have been touched and changed, and hopefully a lot people have seen Jesus.

In reflecting back over what has gone well (and some things that maybe didn't go the way we'd have liked), one thing remains clear.  We seek to continue to live our mission of serving the servants around the corner and around the world.  Simplistically this means that we GO, SERVE, LOVE, and GIVE.

Why do you GO?  Easy.  Check out what it has to say:

"How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!”

Romans 10:14-15

What about this SERVE thing?

"Serve The Lord your God."

Deuteronomy 10:25

 

"serve with all your heart"

Joshua 22:5

 

"Serve whole heartedly as if serving The Lord not people."

Ephesians 6:7

 

"the Son of man did not come to be seed but to serve"

Matthew 20:27

 

"Serve one another humbly in love"

Galatians 5:13

Well, LOVE just makes sense, right?  There are SO many reasons, but here is a biggie:

"And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.”

Luke 10:27

And GIVE?  Throughout the Bible we are presented of examples, over and over, of God giving to us.  So much more than we deserve.  He gives us: food, land, life, hope, a future, mercy, grace, strength, HIS SON.  Every. Single. Need.  And more.  I think our giving needs to start as David says:

 "I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart;

I will recount all of your wonderful deeds."

Psalm 9:1

 

And then put that into action as in the 2nd part of Luke 12:48

"From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked."

Luke 12:48b

There are going to be some subtle and not so subtle changes showing up in the life and ministry of Into the Field.  Our hearts desire is that they will not only follow the directive to GO, SERVE, LOVE, and GIVE, but will also encourage others to do the same.