Author: Sondra

Balance. How many times have I heard that word since I began working in youth ministry? Let’s just say that I hear it A LOT. But there is so much work to be done. Who has time to pursue balance? How can I go after balance when there is so much to do in ministry? I don’t have time for a social life!

Jesus did. And His ministry calendar was much more intense than mine! In John 2:1-2 we read of Him taking time out to attend a wedding. Jesus Christ, the Messiah, took time out to go watch someone get married? He sure did! His ministry was just getting off the ground at this time. He had a million things to do. Yet, in the midst of saving the world, He took time out for a social life. He took time out to just be with people. Why? Because He understood something. He understood that without people, there was no ministry.

Later on in this chapter, we read that Jesus performed His first miracle here at the wedding in Cana. He turned the water into wine. He didn’t go to the wedding for that purpose. We know that Mary, His mother compelled Him to do something when the wine ran out. Had Jesus not taken time out of work to pursue balance, He would not have been present to do the miracle. If we don’t take time out to pursue balance, we won’t be able to minister to people.

We should take Jesus where people are. Our ministry is not just in the church. It’s not only on the platform, preaching the Word or leading worship. Our ministry is not just in our Sunday school classroom. Our ministry is where people are. Take time out to go to a ballgame. Go ahead and sign up to go on the outing with a group of friends. Go to lunch with a co-worker. Take your kids to the amusement park. Leave the laptop at home next time you go on vacation. It’s ok! Your work will wait! (And you’ll be more focused when you return) True balance is when we learn to take Jesus into times of pleasure as well as times of work.

“For I know the plans I have for you,” says the LORD.” –Jeremiah 29:11 (NLT)

I don’t know about you, but the fact that God is a planner puts me at ease. I love knowing that He already has all the details worked out ahead of time. It gives me great peace that nothing surprises Him. It warms my heart that He loves me enough to have those plans for me. That means He’s thought about me. I’ve been on the mind of God!

I am a planner myself, so I know the great deal of thought that goes into planning. I like to be prepared so I go through everything that could possibly happen. What will I do if plan A goes south? What if plan B falls flat on its face? I like knowing what is going to happen next. I like knowing what I am going to do tomorrow. Or next Friday. Or next year. I do not like surprises and I find it hard to be spontaneous.

Recently, I sat down and made a “five year plan” for my life. I prayed. I planned. I wrote everything down. It’s all right there in black and white. I have goals and I know what I should be doing in October of 2016 to get to where I’m going in my life. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It’s good to have goals. It’s good to be conscientious about the future. If God is a planner, then I think it’s ok if we look ahead in our lives, too. The problem is, however, that there are times when we can be so caught up with what God has planned for us in the future that we forget to live in the present. We’re always looking ahead to what is next instead of embracing the moment we are in. We neglect to realize that He also has plans for us right now. We pray, “Lord, show me Your plans for my life,” expecting Him to show us 10 years from now, but forgetting about what He has planned for us in the present.

God is not a procrastinator. His plans for your life do not begin in five years. In one year. In a month. Or even in one day. His plans for your life began before you were even born. He has orchestrated your whole life up to this point, and He’s in control of the rest of it from this moment forward. Pray for God to show you the plans He has for you, fully expecting them to start immediately. And then live in the moment. God has a plan for your life right now!

“I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”

“With God, all things are possible.”

Those are probably two of the most quoted scriptures in the whole Bible. I know that I’ve surely said them thousands of times. Do I always believe them? My actions don’t suggest that I do. Because if I DID believe them, there’s a whole lot more I would be attempting for the cause of Christ. If I did believe that I could truly do ALL things through Christ, I’d surely be about doing His business more than I am. If I believed that all things are possible with God, I wouldn’t be so worried about failing. I wouldn’t let the fears of my own abilities stop me from attempting what God wants me to do.

Ah, but there it is. if I’m dependent on my own abilities, I can do nothing except fall short. I have every reason to fear failure if I don’t include God in the mix. The scripture doesn’t say that I can do all things by myself. It doesn’t tell me that all things are possible if I work hard enough, or practice six hours a day, or study two hours for every one hour of class time. There is absolutely nothing in myself that guarantees success. Nothing.

But with God…now that’s a different story. With God, all things really are possible. I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength. And so can you. So here’s the question: What would you do for God if you knew that you could not fail? And knowing that He won’t let you fail, what are you waiting for?

I’m losing on all my Words With Friends games, and besides, it’s been a while since I’ve blogged, so I thought I’d hammer out a few thoughts on the keyboard. How many commas does that last sentence have, and are they all appropriate? Who knows.

I’m feeling a little out-of-sorts the past week. Short version: last week I was diagnosed with hypertension. “Diagnosed” makes it sound so…serious. And it is. Hypertension is the “silent killer” and ranks pretty high up there on the list of things that will send you to meet your Maker. Many, many people have it and don’t even know it because symptoms are rare or misdiagnosed. But I did say “short version.” The meds the doctor put me on are working wonders in bringing my blood pressure down, but they are also doing a number on my body in other ways. So much so, in fact, that I no longer remember where I was going with this. 🙂

All this business with hypertension and the “silent killer” has gotten me to thinking of the brevity of life. Life really is a vapor, as James describes it in the Bible. He’s talking about people making plans, saying they will do this tomorrow or they will go here tomorrow. Yet, we don’t know if we have a tomorrow because life is “but a vapor, here today and gone tomorrow.” The New Living Translation puts it this way: ” How do you know what your life will be like tomorrow? Your life is like the morning fog—it’s here a little while, then it’s gone.” So what gives us the right to say what we will or will not do tomorrow or a year from now? I’m not saying that making plans is foolish. Without a vision or a dream or a plan, we resemble a 4 year-old on a bicycle with training wheels, stuck in a pothole, peddling as fast as we can, going no where because we’re on unlevel ground. What I am saying is what James said in verse 1 5 of the same chapter. “What you ought to say is, “If the Lord wants us to, we will live and do this or that.” Seeking God’s will first is what levels the terrain we’re learning to ride your bicycle on. Who knows what He has in store for our lives tomorrow. Maybe He wants us to be a missionary. Maybe He wants us to help the elderly neighbor next door. Maybe He wants us to speak to the youth group. Or sing a song in church. Or write a book or play. Or befriend a new kid in class. Or….you get the point. Our life is a vapor, but with God, the opportunities are beyond our imagination. Why would we want to limit them with our own minds, when His is so infinitely greater?

I don’t know how many times in my life someone has said to me, “Follow your heart.” However, I can tell you how many times I have taken their advice. Zero. That’s right, I said zero. Of all the decisions that I’ve made over the course of my 37 years, not once have I abandoned all logic and just did what I felt in my heart. I’m an analyzer, a weigher-of-consequences. I can’t make a simple decision without thinking through what might happen.

For the most part, I’ve been okay with this. It keeps me out of a lot of trouble. When it comes to being happy with where I am in life, however, it doesn’t do much for me. Oh sure, I faked it for a while when I chose to major in Education even though I had NEVER wanted to be a teacher. It was, or so I thought, a safe choice. There would always be jobs in the education field. When my job got eliminated last spring, I had to figure out where I would go from there. I tossed around thoughts of going back to school for something in the medical field. After all, if there is job security anywhere, it is in the medical field, right? But no matter how much I tried to convince myself that it was the right thing to do, I just couldn’t stay excited about it. I had to do something, though, because my unemployment was running out quickly.

Currently, I am in an entry-level job that any teenager with no experience or education could do. I work a horrible shift and often daydream of the day I can move onto something better. Something I enjoy. Something that I love. I hadn’t given the “Follow your heart” advice much thought until a few days ago when I read a friend’s status on Facebook. It said, “To find where your heart is, look to where you mind ends up when it wanders.” Hmmm. The quote caught my attention immediately, but I dismissed it just as quickly. The quote has come back to my mind several times over the past couple days.

Now honestly, the first place my mind usually wanders to is laundry. It’s not where my heart is, it’s just the thing that seems to take up most of my time. So I had to go deeper than that. God, family? Yes, yes, but let’s go farther. If someone asked me, “What is your dream career?” What would I say? The answer to this question has been the same since I was a kid. The answer has always been “A writer.”

So there’s my heart and now I have to follow it. I have no idea where to even begin, other than I thought blogging might exercise my writing muscles a bit. It’s probably not a safe choice. It’s most likely not going to pay any bills for a long time, if ever. But, it’s what I’ve always wanted to do.

It’s funny, after years of trying to make safe choices, career-wise, I still ended up in the same place I would have if I’d have majored in Creative Writing in college. I should have just followed my heart.

“Ask and it shall be given to you; Seek and you will find; Knock and the door shall be open unto you.” (Matthew 7:7)

God answers prayers. It’s true. Sometimes the answers are not what we had hoped for, but no prayer goes unanswered. Sometimes we ask for things that are not God’s will for our lives. I have found, though, that the one thing we can ask for that He will always give us, is more of Him. When we sincerely ask Him to reveal who He is and who we are in Him, He does it.

That’s where I’ve been this past week. It all started with the church service last Sunday and something Brenda said to me after she had prayed with me. She asked me if I believed that I deserved to have God heal my eyes. I had to be honest and say, “No.” Do I believe that God heals? Sure. Do I think He heals other people? Absolutely. Do I believe that I deserve it? No. How could I deserve it? And then Brenda says, “You’re His baby girl. He WANTS you to see!” Oh boy. Insert awkward feeling here. It was at this moment that I realized, somewhat ashamedly, that my relationship with God was lacking. Right then I started praying for God to show me who He was and who I am to Him, and I continued to pray that throughout this past week. He has answered it over and over again.

If you want to know who you are in God, just ask Him. He’ll be happy to show you how much He loves you, too!

“Can a woman forget her nursing child,  And not have compassion on the son of her womb?  Surely they may forget, Yet I will not forget you. See, I have inscribed you on the palms of My hands;” (Isaiah 49:15-16 NKJV)

I have always wanted to say that. I have no reason for saying it, except that I have always wanted to. It is my blog, I will do what I want.

If you read my “about me” then you know that I have writer’s block. It’s true. I’ve had it for several years now. Recently, however, I have gone bloody blogging mad by signing up for more blogs than I can probably keep up with. Why? Why else…to shock my system into writing again. It’s cheap therapy.

That’s all for now. It is almost 3am, after all.