Walking with Abraham

Lately I've been feeling like Abraham. It isn't that I've watched a nephew's city burn to the ground. It isn't that I'm 100+ years old. It isn't that I want to sacrifice my son. When I think of Abraham, I think of a man who knew God was in control, yet still had no real idea exactly where he was going and what he was going to do. Abraham has always seemed like a man who very greatly wanted to seek and serve God, but, as we all do, had questions and thoughts about when God was going to completely come through. He knew God would be true to His word, but it is clear that Abraham still had his doubts and worries. In moments of questioning, Abraham did thinks I doubt he was proud of. By the end of Abraham's life though, it seemed that these moments had tempered him and molded him into a stronger person with more trust in God than when he began his journey.

I can only pray that the same happens to me. Lately my life has been a confusing swirl of events. Unlike Abraham, I don't have God actually speaking to me, and guiding me, but I do have His promises that He will take care of me and will open doors. I really have a hard time believing that Abraham would have put up his son for sacrifice if he had received Isaac two or three years into his journey. Abraham had many things to experience and learn before he could reach that moment. While I had made plans to get into secular work instead of going back into preaching, it doesn't seem like that is God's desire. If I really wanted to, I could stay out of preaching for the rest of my life, but I told God that I would go through the doors He opened, and while some doors seemed to close as soon as I was going to go through them, preaching was not one of them.

There are things I would not have learned had I gone right back into preaching and not explored my options. My first preaching work left me with a bad taste in my mouth for the preaching life. There wasn't any reason you could name to make me want to get back into that life. If I had gone back into preaching as soon as I could I wouldn't want to do it. I might be providing for my family, but I would end up forsaking the Lord, if not in action, at least in heart. This time has allowed me to grow closer to my family. Many marital problems arise from financial worries, and when you're unemployed and living back with your parents/in-laws, marital stress does not follow far behind. I'd like to say that I was the victim, but instead I was criminal. I really do hate what my wife had to endure because of my emotions, but I do believe it only helped in the end once I realized how I was acting.

In the end, it has really been a humbling experience. I'm sure I could think up many more things I have learned, but overall they fall into the area of trusting God and knowing He is in control. It isn't always fun to endure as long as we are willing to remember the Controller and seek His guidance, how can we go wrong?

You Have But Little Power

Okay, so it's 12:05 a.m. which technically makes this Monday, but I'm still new to the life of a blogger so I'm more entitled to mess up and get away with it.

I enjoy Sundays. Okay, I love Sundays. They're the most exhausting day of the week, but I love them. It isn't because I get to stand before a group of people and chastise them, mainly because I don't. Well, there is the occasional sermon that involves a rebuke, but that's a different blog post. I enjoy Sundays because I get to learn more. Yes, I am the one that stands before everyone and teaches the Bible Study class, but I am blessed to be working with a congregation that teaches me back...except they get to do it while sitting down. Fort Valley is great about discussing that which are studying, no matter what it might be.

We've been studying Revelation on Sunday mornings and are slowly making our way through the seven churches in chapter two and three. This morning we finished looking at Sardis and started into Philadelphia. Philadelphia was the congregation that I've really enjoyed studying because it reminds me a lot of the congregation where I preach, and that was what we discussed at the end of class this morning. The following is the segment we studied this morning:

"And to the angel of the church in Philadelphia write: 'The words of the holy one,the true one, who has the key of David, who opens and no one will shut, who shuts and no one opens.I know your works. Behold, I have set before you an open door, which no one is able to shut. I know that you have but little power, and yet you have kept my word and have not denied my name' (Rev. 3:7-8)."

Fort Valley is a small congregation, though our numbers have been rising. We usually see between 40-50 for worship on Sunday morning. We also have a good number of older members who can't always be as physically active in the work of the church. It can be a discouragement. Not just to me, but to all of us here. We would love to have more youth at the moment to help. These two verses reminded me of something though. Christ said they had but little power. Maybe they were small in number, maybe they were from the lower class or maybe they didn't have all of the money to use as they would have liked. In the end, that didn't matter. Christ said He had set a open door before them. Sure, we might not be able to out number denominations or out spend them, but that's not important. The strength of the pure Gospel wasn't determined by number or money or social status, it was strong because Christ was behind it. Whatever the situation might have been, if those in Philadelphia were willing to do the work, Christ was going to be there to give them opportunities to do it.

It's easy for any Christian, preacher included, to get discouraged when he looks at the situation from the view of the world. In the world, number, power and money get you everywhere and everything. It's not the same for a life viewed from the Christian point of few.

Love you all,

Carl