The HOME...the hardest place to minister...

I listened today to C.J.Mahaney's sermon from Phillipians 1

"I thank my God upon every remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine making request for you all with joy...being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ...for God is my witness, how greatly I long for you all with the affection of Jesus Christ."

He said that Paul's distinctives in terms of ministry were the following:

• expressing gratefulness to God and to those around him...which leads to joy (a spirit of complaining kills joy)
• confidence and faith in the One who authors and finishes faith because of His promises
• expressing a "theologically informed" affection to those he ministered to...knowing the price Christ paid for them

I confess that I was discouraged these past few days as I analyzed my mistakes in training the children, the excuses I gave myself for failing to "stand in the gap" when the need arose along the years and the awareness that I did not like the harvest I was currently reaping...

I was encouraged by the Spirit of God through the use of His humble servant (who has a tendency to compare himself with others...but who above all desires to be pleasing to God in private before addressing a congregation).

I realized that in my discouragement I had forgotten that "without faith it is impossible to please Him".

"I'll stay where You've put me; I'll work, dear Lord,

Though the field be narrow and small,

And the ground be fallow, and the stones lie thick,

And there seems to be no life at all.

The field is Thine own, only give me the seed,

I'll sow it with never a fear;

I'll till the dry soil while I wait for the rain,

And rejoice when the green blades appear;

I'll work where You've put me."

poem in the devotional Streams in the Desert

Resolved:

To minister in the strength of the Lord within my own family...for His greater glory...until He makes the passage in Phillipians 1 a reality for me as I relate to my husband and each one of my children!

"Say to my soul: I AM your salvation." (Ps. 35:3b)