We made a commitment to God to make our farm a place for a mission, a place to Glorify God and teach people about Christ. Our mission statement is "But my life is worth nothing to me unless I use it for finishing the work assigned me by the Lord Jesus. Acts 20:24. We had an assignment and that assignment was to provide and prepare a place for the Journey to Bethlehem. He laid it on my heart to do this and then He gave other people an assignment and then sent them my way. God didn't give me this assignment and say "hey good luck with that!" He gave me an assignment, a handbook with instructions and sent like minded people my way! GOD HAD A PLAN!
This years Journey to Bethlehem has been way more stressful for me than last year. You would think last year would have been more stressful and challenging but that is so not the case. Last year I was excited and knew that it was going to be a huge success. God took everything out of our hands and ran with it, He made it even bigger than we all imagined. Don't get me wrong there were stressful days last year, especially when we got 5 inches of ran on Friday night and that pretty much took out our parking area. And the wind was so bad a tree fell on our fence. But after I wiped the tears, said a prayer, I knew God was in control and it was going to be alright. And it was! Over 800 people came through last year and heard the Gospel! I followed the assignment and GOD HAD A PLAN!
This year however, I have felt way more stressed. It's not even that anything has gone wrong, per say, its more of things just not turning out like you envisioned, or things you were counting on happening aren't happening, and your getting down to the wire. It's feeling like I'm hitting a wall every turn I make. Then I start stressing about how big this is going to be and what if people are upset about the parking arrangements again, what if people are disappointed because there are so many people and they couldn't enjoy Bethlehem. What if we don't have enough workers/actors, what if we run out of food or giveaways. Then I start having conversations with myself in my head, These conversations are me telling me all the reasons God doesn't want me to do this, that God is shutting it down. These conversations are also me telling me that Satan doesn't want this to happen because he knows something big is going to happen! He knows that seeing is understanding and believing, where kids and adults alike are concerned. And then the conversation with myself goes back to God doesn't want you to do this, because you've done this, that or the other. Your being to prideful, you've sinned in this way or that way this year, your worrying to much about the cost of everything, and God is angry with you. All this time I'm praying to God to give me the answers, to get me off this struggle bus I put myself on. I'm asking Him to give me peace about the whole thing. I'm telling Him I'm giving this to Him. And I feel peace for a while and then, I GO AND GET BACK ON THAT STRUGGLE BUS! I get stressed all over again, I fight back anxiety attacks, I fight back tears of frustration. I have to wonder how often God looks down at me and shakes His head in frustration at my nonsense. The struggle is real! I lost track of my assignment, BUT GOD HAD A PLAN!
Last night, I was watching a program about a family of pastors, that had forgotten their assignment. They put themselves through unnecessary struggles and stresses because of it but their peace was restored when they remembered the assignment. I'm not gonna lie, I cried a little when as I watched a fictional character on TV get saved. I remembered my assignment, and a peace, like I've not felt before, came over me. A peace that has stuck with me, even as I worked on things for the Journey this morning, things that would normally give me anxiety and send me back to the struggle bus. As I worked on these things my heart started to race with worry, but then something happened, NOTHING, there was no struggle in my brain that pulls me down into negativity, the pounding in my heart went right away, my peace was restored! I remembered my assignment and GOD HAS A PLAN!
So as we get closer to the Journey to Bethlehem and through out the year I'm going to remember I have an assignment to open my home up and prepare it so people can hear the gospel. So they can experience what it may have been like the night Christ was born. To understand the love that God has for them that he sent his Son to earth to redeem us from our sins. I have an assignment because GOD HAS A PLAN!
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