the reality of it

1 Corinthians 15:58

So, my dear brothers & sisters,

     be strong & steady,

     always enthusiastic about the Lord's work,

     for you know that nothing you do for the Lord is ever useless.



"...nothing you do for the Lord is ever useless."

It's been a hard lesson to accept that.

We have such a success orientation about everything in our lives.

And that includes what we do in our lives as an extension of our following Jesus.

As we prepared to leave Macon in 2010, I had certain concepts as to what our time here in Blairsville would look like & entail.

3 1/2 years later, it hasn't turned out quite as I had thought it would.

(understatement of the century!)

Back in 2010 I told people we were coming to NE GA to be who we are, & to love people with the love of Jesus.

And that's what we've done.

But the how, the places, & the ways we've been given to be & do that were not how we had conceptualized them.

So, I guess one (of many) things that got refined early on from our lives & thinking here in Blairsville was the success orientation to discipleship.

(I've come to believe that a life of obedience & discipleship to Jesus & a success orientation are mutually exclusive & incompatible - but that's a different conversation...)

Now, I hope you don't think that in this refining that I have been a meek, humble, & joyfully compliant servant.

I had a few questions of the Lord as to what was going on.

(another understatement of the century!)

So, where am I now in all this?

I know we are supposed to be here.

I know that everything we do here, every contact / connection we make, every opportunity we have to share the love of Jesus, is directly dependent upon one thing...

...the favor of God.

And another thing I've learned is that I'm not responsible for the who, what, where, when, & how of what we're being & doing - God is - and God is very creative.

     Our job is to be obedient to what He tells us to be & do with the who, what, where, when, & how He gives us.

Once more I've seen the enormous truth in the statement, "anyone who says, 'all I want to be is a servant of the Lord' has never been one."

If we truly are servants, sometimes we won't understand why we're being & doing what He tells us to be & do.

     sometimes we won't see a lot of results, or maybe any.

     sometimes all we know is to be obedient and to trust Him.

I've learned a whale of a lot about trust these last 3 1/2 year - mostly because I haven't had any other choice!

It's easy to trust Him when everything makes sense, there's oodles of success as the world sees it, as well as our friends & authenticators see it.

It's another thing to trust Him when it doesn't make sense & 99% of your friends & authenticators think your crazy.

And I know I have lots & lots of hard lessons that I'm still learning, & have yet to learn.

Please don't think I'm turning into some sort of super Christian - those of you who know me, know better.

I'm just trying to remain obedient here, not mess things up, & stay out of the way of God working in us & through us...


...and trust Him that nothing we are or do for Him is useless.