A Busy Week
I’m a day late for the blog series I was calling “Teaching Tuesday” but it has been an exceptionally busy week here at All Things New. I will hit the highlights of the week and then I will move on to what GOD has been showing me recently.
- Rain, rain, rain. It has been raining a lot this week and rain is a real game-changer here.
- We have had a wonderful team from the University of Florida CCH (Christian Campus House) spending their afternoons with our kids…Thanks Christianville for sharing your team with us!
- Wednesday we will be meeting with all of our House Moms and re-signing contracts.
- Thursday we will have our Job Creation/Economic Development meeting with all of the local organizations in the Gressier/Leogane area gathering together to discuss how we can change our community.
- Friday, fingers crossed, we will be purchasing our new truck!
- Saturday we will be taking our “chefs” (which means leaders) to a local restaurant which will also be our first trip in the new truck.
With that said, I am going to briefly share what GOD has been teaching me. I was listening to a sermon recently about the power of prayer. The base text was Acts 2:42-47 along with Acts 12:3-19. At the same time, I have been teaching through the book of James with the kids and we are studying the passage that tells us not to be just hearers of the Word but also doers. I am also reading Romans 5 and have just gotten through verse 11 there. All of that to say this:
I rely on my own knowledge and strength way too much.
I know I probably shouldn’t write that, but it is really true. It is true in my life, it is true in the life of many others, it is true all too often in many churches, and it makes absolutely no sense. What is it about us that makes us want to rely on ourselves? We go to leadership conferences where they tell us to “focus on our strengths” and let other people cover our weakness. From the time we are born we are told to rely on ourselves and our own strength and knowledge to accomplish whatever dreams we have. Many of us are scared to step out of the comfort zone we have created for ourselves with our friends, our jobs, our family, our house, our status, etc. and to leave those things that have become “our strength.” But what if that is not what GOD wants for us? What if He has something much bigger than our strength? In fact, what if GOD actually wants to use our weakness so that, when good things happen, everyone will know it is GOD and has nothing to do with us?
When we first really started realizing it was time for a new truck (it really hit us when we arrived in Haiti back in March and both of our trucks went down simultaneously at the same time a team was arriving the next day) we moved into action. We wanted to create this event, ask this organization, do a social media blitz, etc. and none of these things were wrong. But why was my first instinct to do these things rather than to fall to my knees and admit to my GOD that I needed Him? Now, the great thing about GOD is that He provided anyway and He has taught me this lesson anyway. In fact, throughout our move to Haiti, our 2 adoptions, and figuring out how to raise 20 kids in another country and culture, I have no idea how I still want to rely on myself. I could not have even started the process of any of those things in my own strength much less completed them. It just does not make sense, but that tendency is still there. That small voice inside my head that keeps telling me to rely on my strength, my knowledge, and my wisdom when the Omnipotent Creator GOD is just waiting to use my weakness. Guess what, I have a lot more weakness and foolishness in me than I do wisdom and strength. So please take the time to read this passage, and join me in praying that GOD would teach all of us what it means to rely on Him…
Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength. Brothers and sisters, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him. It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption.
1 Corinthians 1:22-30