Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Why doing your part matters more than you know: Part Two

If you are interested in reading Part One on this topic, you can do that here.

In my post yesterday I told you about an awesome friend of mine who reaches tons of people just by being who she is. She was struggling through an episode of self-doubt and insecurity. This, in itself, is not always a bad thing. For one thing, we are not supposed to have confidence in ourselves apart from God, so when (in life) we struggle through a time of self-doubt it can be a renewing time of getting us back to the point, which is that any good in us, and done through us, is all for God's glory and not our own. I believe that as humans we are all prone to put ourselves higher and lower on the scale of worth than we really belong. Life has a way of building us up and knocking us back down again, doesn't it? If we really knew all the good we did for the Lord, we might be tempted to give ourselves the glory, or we might be tempted to get scared and overwhelmed, and possibly even give up. Sometimes it is probably all for the best that we not to know everything, isn't it? What we see, feel, and experience is not all that there is, so we can trust God even on our bad days. I believe it works like this:

1. God gives you a sort of mental picture of something grand He could do with you.
2. It's big, and it gets you excited, and you wonder, "God, is that you? Are you calling me to this thing? Because, if it's you God, I'll do it."
3. Prayer time, seeking time, and waiting on God, to see if the nudge you had was really God speaking to your heart, or just a sugar high. ;)
4. You put yourself out there. You take the first baby step of faith, saying, "God, if this is you, I will set one foot in front of the other and trust you to be at work"
5. It feels good at first, especially when you start to see God blessing the very thing He told you to do.
6. Something happens to make you doubt. "Hmmm...wait a minute. Was that really God?"
7. Stop right here.

Yes. It was God. He's not done. God is thinking bigger picture. It's not about this one solitary moment in time to God. "Do not doubt in the dark, what God tells you in the light." -Susie Larson. Check out this little clip from Susie Larson on what she calls the "valley of preparation".

2 comments:

Jen Crane said...

oh my gravy. how awesome is susie larson? "the depths of the dealing always corresponds with the height of the calling" THANK YOU my lovely friend for sharing this... your friendship is a treasure to me. and now on to part 3... :) i love you girl.

Margo said...

Thanks so much for sharing this. It is timely, right before the launch of something 12 years in the making.