I’ve spent a lot of time praying lately, but the same few things on my heart on repeat to God. I’m not flowery in wording, not excessive in time, just super often repeated the same things I’m asking God to do in and around me.
That as my family faces so many unknowns, and seemingly the next couple years could take us in very divergent paths, would our hearts remain His, would we love God with all we’ve got and follow and trust Him no matter where He takes us.
Would His leadership be clear- the right path evident. I’m so afraid there will be a moral moment, and time to choose between things that would have a good, right, Godly perspective that I’d just miss and fail to put God first in it. So I’m begging that God would lead clearly in what path to take.
That he would continue to provide- he always has, often in spite of ourselves, provided for us, but I’m asking for the gift of my hard work being able to allow my wife to continue to be a stay-at-home mom for as long as it’s the right thing- that our kid would grow up knowing me and Natalie well, being loved and knowing she’s loved, because I spent more time with her than chasing dollars. I recognize in this time in history, to be able to provide for a family and a home with one income is incredibly rare and fortunate. But I’m asking for it anyway- I don’t want to have to do three or even two jobs again, I want one career level job that allows us to live simple, humble, lives- chasing after Jesus not dollars, but that requires a certain level of dollars to not have to spend so much time thinking of them.
I pray that his timing would be kind- that if I’m meant to step away from Morning Star, that it could be after my teeth are all squared away. Since I doubt I’d be able to apply or find a job when I look like a toothless crack addict. So despite not feeling like there’s much for me left here, I’m praying that there would be enough to make it through these next months of recovery physically.
And I pray for this place! That Morning Star would be what God means for it to be, that it could grow and thrive and carry out the mission that God made it for, but that we’ve become dangerous disobedient in. We’ve made communism the chief enemy, not sin. We’ve made the godless our enemy, not those to love. I see flashes of brilliance and hope in this place, and feel a sense of swelling optimism that God can certainly use this place for good good things. I just don’t know if I’ll have a role to play in it. I’m not angry, not hurt, not upset with anyone- I’ve come to the peaceful place of sadness for what could have been, and what was. Seeing the oasis mirage of me being an online pastor- having some dreams of what that could be, believing with my whole heart that it’s a thing not being done well by any church, and that we have the capacity to do it in a truly God glorifying way. But with each step I’d take to get closer to it, I’d see the mirage fade, be reminded we aren’t looking for me to lead really. I was a really good church IT guy, but I’m a hamstrung online pastor, a mediocre communications director (for as long as I’m not being asked to manage, but just carry out details). So I just look and think that if I was running this place, looking not at what I can do, or want to do, but at what I’m actually doing- I’m a waste of payroll.
So I’m just sad, just let down. That I see so much more for this place than we’re ready to be yet. I see a revival possible, but not invited. I see flashes of hope, leadership and power- dimmed so often by making sure the next Sunday looks like the last Sunday. As though God was glorified by a process, more than a constantly willing to change, obedient heart.
So I truly don’t know what comes next, what God has in store for me. I don’t know if I’ll prosper, or if I’m meant for a season of lying fallow. But more than whatever I get, whatever I hope for- I want to trust Him in it. I want to put him first in the easy or the hard. I’ve learned to be content whatever my situation- not because I get what I want, but because whatever God has in store for me must be exactly what my soul needs to grow and learn and change to look more like my savior. And I trust Him for that.