Being useful

It's funny, how God gives different callings to different saints for different kinds of ministries.

My mom has been in the nursing field since she was 18, and now she is 58. Her nursing skills always come in handy for situatons that come about outside the hospital. Just a couple of days ago she was talking to me on the phone, recounting an event in the recent past where there was a car accident and she got out of her car to help someone, and right in the middle of telling me this story, she said, "Oh, no. Something's happened here, there's an accident, and that woman is going to need help. I'll let you go." She told me later that a woman had whiplash, and my mom told her to not move her neck, and she was too stressed to listen, so my mom told her that she was going to help hold her head still, and she did, till the paramedics arrived.

She said to me, "Don't you ever get involved like that, Michele (that's my name), because if you're not certified, you can get into all kinds of trouble. The paramedics asked me, 'Are you a nurse?' and I said, 'Yes I am,' and they said, 'Alright, we'll take it from here.'"

I thought to myself afterwards, well, I've never been put in that kind of situation, when my mom has, over and over. How incredible can it be, that she is telling me her story of helping with a car accident and then getting interrupted to do the same kind of service!!

Then later that day I went to pick up Grace from preschool. I had driven by an unkempt man on my way. Lo, and behold, there he appeared a couple minutes later, I found out, a homeless man who was lost and hungry. I had just bought a huge sandwich at safeway as a back-up for Liz's fussiness, debating whether or not I should have wasted my money, but now I knew the real reason why I purchased it. The man was trying to get help from the woman in the office of the church, and she wasn't helping him very much, so I took over, and drew him a map and talked to him for as long as he was interested.

It just happens to be that I happen to be at the right place at the right time when it comes to women who are experiencing issues with pregnancy, too, beyond what I think would be normal.

Can that be coincidence? Well, I knew that pregnant-women were a population God has used me for, but I am only now starting to get the idea that the homeless are another group God is preparing me and pointing me to. There have been a couple of other times when similar things have happened recently. I noticed this morning especially how there were more homeless-looking types, across the street from the church, some even digging through the garbage cans. Hmm. Well, the reason why I am here in the middle of Salem instead of close to home is because my church's preschool was full, and I had to find another. Now I know why God allowed me to find this preschool. After all, all I've heard from everyone is "Why go all the way over there?" and I didn't have an answer for them, kinda felt like I was impulsive in my selection.

It just struck me, too, that those were the needs I had, when I was growing up. I lived out of my car, went to the churches, looking for help with a place to stay.

God has made me useful, and I get jealous when I hear the stories of what my mom has been able to do. I wanted to be a nurse, so bad. I still do. I want to have the so incredibly useful knowledge of how to care for physical concerns. But God has closed that door, by the principles the bible have taught me are His will for my life.

But seeing how God has made me useful for other kinds of needs, I am at peace with His choices for my life.

Do you love me, Lord?

I have been wanting God to just let me go, for a month or so now. Hands off, is the jist.

One day kinda turns into the next, I have no distinguishing hope in the midst of crises, I have little interest in calling out when I'm hurt. I'm just accepting the good with the bad. I get tired, you know, of being so up.

It is exhilirating, to have a life filled with moments of God-given meaning. I love it, but it's almost too stimulating to handle, sometimes.

Kinda what it's like to achieve greatness all day long by rising up at the alarm clock and being on time to work and listening to everything everyone says and doing well at your tasks. By the end of the day, you get home, and all you want to do is sit down and turn on a movie.

So that's where I've been. I've been dreaming and entertaining myself with whatever meager (worldy) things are appealing in the moment. But they'll run out. And then when my entertainment runs dry it will change to nervousness. And then pacing. Of course, I am talking about my spiritual realm:

"In the spring, at the time when kings go off to war, David sent Joab out with the king's men and the whole Israelite army. They destryed the Ammonites and beseiged Rabbah. But David remained in Jerusalem. One evening David got up from his bed and walked around on the roof of the palace." 2 sam 11:1-2

So I'll re-write that in terms of my personal state of affairs:

"In what Sanc likes to call "My Time," when everyone else is excited about doing the will of God, Sanc watches others go out and do the work she knows she herself once did. The Christians around her wage war on dark spiritual strongholds, and mightily win souls for His name. Sanc, however, is content to find her own activities. In the twighlight of "My Time," when Sanc is willing and open to being led by a forlorn whisper, she wanders around, waiting for peril to strike in her heart."

He satisfies, but I don't choose satisfaction because that means "relationship" and I don't want to face Him. He gives meaning, but I don't want to live-out meaning. He gives zeal, but I just want to sort things out in a low-key kinda way.

Did David somehow alter the course of his eternal destiny through sinning against the Lord? No. The Lord still loved Him, didn't revoke His promise to make him the King. God is faithful. David was not. "Against you, and you alone, O Lord, have I sinned." David, I imagine, got tired of the awesome but stressful things he had seen fighting the battles God told him to fight. He said he wanted a day off. I don't blame him. But here we are, wandering around, idle, just ripe for trouble to come knocking.

The cure for idleness is love. "We love because He first loved us." 1 john 4:19

My love-bank is running low on funds. But why, I've been asking myself, would I need -His- love? Why would I turn to Him for help, when I have so many other choices to call upon, including my own inner strength to survive?

Think about the teenager (who never wants to be told what to do), trusted to stick to the rules of conduct when going to someone else's house, but another kid introduces a new experience and before you know it, damage has been done. Does that teenager really want to call their dad, first?? No. They call mom, they try and clean it up themselves, they ask their friends, anyone, except dad. But for the biggest messes in life, only the Father knows how to make things right.

It's a humbling pick, one I'm not all that excited about, because as soon as I ask for help, He's going to ask me to rearrange a few of my choices, a few of my priorities, and that's not stellar, in my current sight. So the cycle of avoidance continues. I'm plainly, on the outside. I can feel the cold cement barrier. I'm not sure if I am cold enough to want to come in yet. I'm doing it to myself. God is patient enough to let me inflict this.

So yes, I am headed for a major 'down.' Either that, or else I break free now and stop short of the trouble coming.

Here is what I said above: "He gives zeal, but I just want to sort things out in a low-key kinda way." There is no such thing as a "low-key kinda way." Low-key = Disintegration key. I will never abide in peace of mind or any other good thing playing the doubting one, sitting on the fence of life. All I will reap is more and more falling apart, of all I hold dear.

"You are either for me or against me." -Jesus

And if I know that there is no such thing as a middle-road, only the opposing paths of peace and destruction, maybe tomorrow morning I will finally get back on track and choose the path of peace. Maybe being semi-chilled instead of frozen, is enough to kill my abayence this time.

When I come back to Him the first thing I will ask is, "Do you still love me, Lord?"