I had a wonderful lunch today with a friend who is serving the Lord in a hard place in this world. There’s just no other way to say it, since I can’t tell you her name or where she serves. I’ll let your imagination work on that.
Anyway, it was just a joy to see the smile on her face and peace she displayed after just a short time in her home country. Rest is a blessing, and I could tell she’d been granted it; though, as she said, “Not in the way I imagined.”
Our conversation was all over the place about life, ministry, becoming a stranger in your homeland, and the beauty of it all. She has such a desire to glorify God in all she does, and that just encourages me, as someone who’s officially “older” now, to see.
Having time in the States to reflect and then just talk, she realized there are so many areas she’d love to pour into. When she sees injustice or need, her instinct is to just jump in and help, so we talked a while about choosing best over good, and asking the Lord first, so we don’t get spread too thin.
That’s when a thought came to me, and I said, “There is always going to be more need than me.”
We both sat back and chewed on that a minute.
“I need to write that down,” I said!
“Me too,” she agreed.
We both pulled out our phones to capture the thought: MORE NEED THAN ME.
If you’re not feeling the impact, let me unpack it for a minute.
There will always be more needs in this world than I can fulfill as one person. God is not asking me to meet every need; he’s only asking for me to meet those he’s telling me to.
As adults, we can get pulled in so many “good” directions, trying to help here, serve there, contribute money to this cause or that. We’re so good at that, we lose sight of what God is asking us to focus on. That’s going to be the place where my gifts are best used, where his Spirit and my energy is going to fuel my excitement—it’s where I won’t burn out.
That’s when she said, “We really do have to be like children. It’s so simple, really, right? When someone asks us to do something, we just look up at our Father and ask, ‘Is it OK with you?’”
Are you feeling the battle waging with the needs of this world? Are you trying to put intellectual, emotional, physical, and spiritual energy into everything that pulls at your heart?
There will ALWAYS be more need than thee.
Maybe it’s time to step back and let God show you where he wants you to invest your time and energy. When you do, he’ll get the glory and you’ll get the…
Grace and Peace