Church Planting

It's a really beautiful day outside. 68 degrees and sunny. Perfection. Chris has the day off. My dad is here just to hang out and there are 7 extra kids at my house. The two neighbor boys walked up and are playing catch in the front yard. Kristine spent the night with Gracie and the Hill kids are here while Kim and Quinn go to Virginia's dad's funeral.

Darrin, Brandon, Steven and Nate came up this morning and met Chris and I at the church plant's building. We made a list of things that need to be done and then they stayed to cut the grass. It looks so much better already. I'm so thankful for these guys!

Church planting has been described as "intense" and I would have to agree. To a certain extent, all ministry is intense. Any time you take your family into a situation where you are attempting to bring the gospel into an area where it has been absent is fraught with danger. People are suspicious and resistant. Churches get competitive. And your own heart gets frightened. I've heard planters talk about the frustration, the fear and the attacks. I've talked with one godly woman, who I thought was already so humble, who talked about the process of being broken. During one period of time, I looked around and asked what in the world we were doing. Why would I stay in a place where God is pealing back the layers of my flesh. That hurts.

I have an artist friend, Michelle. She painted this one particular canvas that has become God's word picture to my heart. The painting is of a girl with a jeweled tiara. The words on the canvas are, "Like any good princess, she laid down her life for the kingdom." My superficial happiness is distinctly unimportant. This short life is not what I'm living for. There is a King and a kingdom, and I am His princess and I lay down my life for him. He already gave his life for me. It's a beautiful truth. He died so I could live. He gave everything so I could have fellowship.

For me to give up temporary pleasure or my idols of comfort can feel like a huge sacrifice sometimes. But looking at it from the other side, it is NO sacrifice.

"He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose." - Jim Elliot

There is always a cross we are to take up. For some, it is to be a martyr. For others, it is to raise their children, day in and day out, in the way they should go, even when they fear their children will not like them. In the face of fear and anger, or misunderstanding and condemnation, to follow Christ takes on a very different tone.

A friend asked me this week, in utter defeat, what to do about a child who throws tantrums all day long. What does she do to "fix" that problem? Another friend talked to me about the pain of never seeing her husband because he's ministering to other people. How does she get his attention? I could go on and on. The common thread there seems to be wanting to make the problem go away. Surely if we're following God, things will go well for us.

But maybe God has something else in mind. Maybe he's bigger and more complicated than that. Maybe his primary goal is NOT our comfort and happiness. Maybe he wants us to trust him, no matter what. Even when we are misunderstood, or judged, or reviled, or ignored. That may mean that we hold our ground with a stubborn child and discipline ten times a day for years before we see a heart change. It may mean that we continue to tell our spouse what our heart needs over and over again, feeling the hurt of that until they finally understand, no matter how long it takes. It may mean keeping our hearts soft towards someone who hurts us even when everything in us screams to cover up, give up, harden ourselves.

God is so good to us. He strips us bare so that we can finally behold him as he really is, not as we want him to be. He speaks the truth into our hearts, even though it hurts, because he knows the truth will set us free. He loves us with a furious, relentless love. Oh how I pray for love to be able to love him back.