The first and most difficult lesson I've had to contend with in the last few months was how to deal with the shame and guilt in my life in the wake of leaving the youth ministry I worked for in California, which was a time marked by poor leadership on my part. Truthfully, I needed to step up and meet my responsibilities and didn't. I'm probably over dramatizing the situation, but I left feeling like a failure, and it shook my world to the core. Since I was a senior in high school I knew that I was called to a vocational life of youth ministry, and in my own understanding decided that this could only mean congregational youth pastor positions. I point this out not to say that I shouldn't have worked in congregational youth ministry or that I never will. But the point is that in my own way I refused to let God open my mind to the other possibilities and in a way forced this path upon myself. What happens when we do things on our own? ultimately, they fail. I am incapable of migrating through life without Christ as the guide.
What's hard is that these feelings still linger, but I'm beginning to understand that God is bigger than me, bigger than my successes, bigger even than my failures. I may have not stepped up to the plate when I was in ministry in California, but the lessons I've learned from that experience have had a transformative result on my life and my ability to lead. I've spent a lot of time over the past year or two seriously reflecting on what I could improve. I'm still not perfect, never will be, but I'm making significant improvements, and learning more about what it means to be a leader.
The other strong lesson that this experience has taught me is that I am not nearly as strong in my faith as I once believed I was. Such profound feelings of guilt, shame, and feeling like you let God down are definitely places where satan chooses to attack us, poking, prodding, and causing us to focus on how bad we are rather than understanding that the Jesus of scripture loves us unconditionally in all of our life experiences and I believe that this is especially true when we feel that we aren't good enough, that we are less than. The heart of the Savior breaks for us.
This summer has been a turning point for me, and what has probably been most beneficial is my near complete lack of a social life. Not to say that having a social life is bad, I love being with friends and having the opportunity to be apart of their lives. But it has been helpful for me to spend time in self reflection, reading scripture, and reading other books. I've been reading "Searching for God Knows What" by Donald Miller lately, and in his book he discusses the relational nature of scripture. Making faith more about a relationship with the Divine creator of the universe, His Son, and His Spirit than about trying to create a formula to get what we want. I've realized that I need to fall in love with God again. I think one of the most profound thoughts that Miller presents in his book is when he discusses the story of Hosea. Hosea was instructed by God to marry and have children with a prostitute. Hosea remained faithful to her and steadfast in his love for her. Even, and especially when she turned from him and turned to other men. This story becomes even more profound to us when we understand that we are the prostitute and God is Hosea. God loves us completely, faithfully, and unreservedly even and most especially when we turn from Him to other false loves.
I've been falling in love with God again, and what I've discovered is a reconnection to my calling to ministry to students. The difference between myself before and now is that I've started to understand that I am incapable of understanding where God is leading me, but that I need to trust him, ACTUALLY trust him. Lessons are often learned the hard way, and growth seems to never be easy, but it's worth it. It seems that for now I've found a niche in youth ministry where I can be effective, working as a hall director. I don't think that this is the end all be all for my life, but I definitely feel that God has brought me to this place for a reason. I have a heart for students who are broken, undervalued, and feel that no one cares for them. Everyone deserves to know that they have value, and that they should celebrate that they are loved. My biggest prayer and hope is not that I be the best hall director of all time (I used to want to be the best youth pastor), but instead just to love students To engage myself in their life. And reflect a small portion of the love, grace, and mercy to them that God has shined on me.
Looking to the future I'm a bit confused about where I'm going or what is going to to me when I graduate in June of 2010, but this time I'm going to lay it in God's hands, be honest with myself and with my abilities, and move from there. Maybe God has a place for me again working as a youth pastor in a church, maybe it's to continue as a hall director. All I really know right now is that I shouldn't worry about it because there's a plan for my life. Rather than focusing on what might happen, I just need to continue to focus on falling in love with God again, and the rest will fall into place.
I'll leave you with a quote from "Searching for God Knows What" then a song by Tenth Avenue North:
"The lifeboat system of redemption seems so ugly in comparison to the love of God. We can trust our fate to a jury of peers in the lifeboat, we can work to accumulate wealth, buy beauty under a surgeon's knife, panic for our identities under the fickle freiendship of culture, and still die in separation from the one voice we really needed to hear.
To me, It is more beautiful to trust Christ, deny our fathers and refuse our names, die to ourselves and live again in Him, raised up in the wave of His resurrection, baptized and made new in the purity of His righteousness. I hope you will join me in clinging to Him." - Donald Miller
0 comments:
Post a Comment