Home is the place to start

   Did you know that the words instrumentality, agent, and means are synonyms for the word ministry?  Ministry is really all about what God is doing in and through each of our lives, in the context of our current situation.  "Ministry" will not begin to happen once I become a pastor's wife.  It began the day I yielded to the lordship of Christ.  I became an instrument for his use.  A means through which he would love others and make the truths of his word fully known.  Each of us has a unique ministry.

   For some of us, this does not always happen in a church ministry function.  In fact, if we're not careful, church functions can actually hinder the ministry we have to our families.  I know that many women, like myself, are concerned about that.  I think sometimes we just long to be "doing" something.  To be a part of a ministry.  We want to feel like we're doing something important and useful.  Is it possible for us to have the wrong motivation sometimes?  

   God certainly opens doors and closes them.  As we are prayerful over opportunities that present themselves, he leads and guides.  If I said yes to every opportunity that has been presented, I would have no time to be a wife and mother!  There are times we will have to decline opportunities.  This is not always easy to do, and sadly sometimes we do it too easily, without prayerful consideration.

   With all that said, the questions that my daughter and I began considering yesterday were  "Are we considering ministry as being involved in a church function?  Are we seeing it mainly as doing something for God outside and away from the home?"  While these are both ways in which God uses his people to minister to others, my concern is our tendency to see these as the more important ways to minister to others and it can cause us to overlook the enormous responsibility we have to minister to those that are within our sphere of influence day in day out.  

   Have you considered how you can minister more to your family?  Paul said in Colossians 1:28-29

Him we proclaim (Christ), warning everyone

and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may 

present everyone mature in Christ.

For this I toil,

struggling with all his energy that he 

powerfully works within me.

   Is this our burden as mothers and fathers of our children?  Is this the burden of an older sister whom God wants to use each and every day, not just outside the walls of our home, but most certainly within them?  How can we serve God more effectively in our homes?  It starts there.  I understand it doesn't end there, but it has to start there.  

   We shouldn't seek to be involved in a ministry outside our homes because we want recognition or to be in the spotlight.  Serving Christ within your home will not be something everyone notices.  But God does, and it is him that we should aim to please, not other people.

   Another consideration is how we minister within the walls of our church.  Do we overlook the people that God places in our path week after week?  Sometimes we can just be so excited about giving the gospel to those who haven't heard or loving others to the Lord that we neglect to live out the gospel with fellow believers.  How are we doing at loving one another?  How can we talk about loving and ministering to people in some far away city or foreign land when we don't even have the heart to reach out to those all around us?  All people are needy in some way and all Christians are called to minister...right where God has placed us in the here and now...

...For I want you to know how great a struggle I have for you

and for those at Laodicea and for all who have not seen me face to face, 

that their hearts may be encouraged, 

being knit together in love,

to reach all the riches of 

full assurance of understanding and the knowledge

of God's mystery, which is Christ, in whom are hidden

all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge...

Colossians 2:1-3

   Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that ministry outside our homes and beyond is something we shouldn't be involved in.  I'm just challenging our tendency to view this as more important or more significant than ministering Christ to our families.  When we pray about how God would have us serve and what he would have us do, the home is definitely the place to start.

   Today has been a day full of pointing my children to Christ, teaching them to love with their words and their actions.  I feel mentally exhausted.  I have struggled and toiled for them, I yearn to see Christ formed in them. I want them to see how God's wisdom applies to their relationships.  I have made his word known to them, I have told them that God's grace and strength are available to them.  That God expects obedience.  That Jesus said "By this will people know you are my disciples, if you have love for one another."  How we are treating each other matters a great deal to God.  Every moment of every day.

   I prayed with my children, asking God to help us, give us strength to do his will, to honor him., and to truly love as he has told us we must.  This was my ministry today.  Just here, at home...teaching my children God's ways.  There will be opportunities to minister outside these walls...but I have no doubt that what has taken place here today was ministry, and it's God given, and by his grace I'm going to give it all I've got.

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   Today actually worked out to be a better day than yesterday to make our gingerbread houses.  It was an interesting "first" experience with it.  I decided that I would construct them and the children would decorate them.  One fell apart once.  The other threatened to cave in but I caught it just in time.  We made a mess with all the icing.  A project like this is not for the faint of heart. : )  I decided to just let the kids go at it and decorate however they wanted to.  I think that worked out well.  One positive thing about making a mess with the icing is that you can just pretend it's snow!  Works for me!

   Jav and Amera were gone most of the day at a two hour choir practice and a lunch date afterwards.  Jav and I are both trying to get our date time with the kids before baby Isabel comes.  He and I have one last date planned with each other before my C-section on Friday.  I can't wait to meet her, but I know I won't be doing much for a little while.  : ) Wow!  I "think" I'm ready for this...