This year has been a real struggle for me in my social life as well as my ministerial life. I have dealt with a lot of internal issues, and if you know me, I tend to keep those to myself and struggle with them on my own. I have been in a state of confusion, a state of brokenness and pain. I haven't been myself. I haven't been Austin.
This year in the Christian Leadership Center we are grappling with the problems and struggles of the world. We are assessing ourselves and looking withing to find our gifts and passions. We want to figure out how those gifts and passions can unite with the needs and struggles of the world to bring about change. We want to take away the problems, hurt, strife, and pain of this world and replace it with the Kingdom of God that is within us to glorify God and make his name known to this ENTIRE WORLD.
This has been a struggle for me....
My Senior year of High School was an amazing year for me because I gave my entire self over to God and asked him to use me for His glory. I acknowledged that God placed a calling upon my life to pursue a career sharing His Word and making His Name known. I praise and thank God for this amazing burden he has placed upon my life. Notice that I called it a burden....
When we live in union with Christ as a believer of His Word and His Spirit, we are sacrificing our life and giving ourselves as a living sacrifice to Him. God did not promise us a smooth ride upon the road of life. This road that we chose is not smooth, it has a lot of bumps, a lot of twists and turns, and a lot of ups and downs.
I find myself in a rut, I find myself in a valley.
Lately, I have struggled with my calling from God. Not in a sense of "am I called," but more along the lines of where am I called. I always thought that God graced me with certain gifts that would lead me to pastoral ministry, but I'm starting to question that. This Tuesday at our student led worship service our campus minister said this, "Maybe sometimes a leader who has always led from the front needs to step back, and the ones who have led from the back needs to step forward." This got me thinking...
Am I on the right road? Did God call me to this type of ministry?
I couldn't help to relate my life in this moment to the life of Jonah. Jonah, in my interpretation, was in a place of darkness, a place of uncertainty. God called Jonah, Jonah did not want to listen. He wanted to go this route, much like the route that I am on. I think this is where I am called. But is it? Jonah then, as we know, get swallowed by the whale. Thats where I am finding myself, in the whale. I too am in the darkness, I am in the brokenness, I am in the strife. Maybe I don't want to listen...maybe I don't know what my Nineveh is?
I found hope and truth tonight in one statement. "..its in the brokenness where we find truth and salvation." PRAISE GOD! I know that when I come to the table of the Lord, when I come to feast at Communion, God will reveal himself to me in the brokenness. God will reveal himself to me in the whale. God will reveal himself to me in the darkness.
I am no longer afraid....
