"Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ." Col. 3:23, 24
This past week I was in Dallas for our first church group of the summer. To tell you the truth, it's kind of surreal being there now as a missionary, instead of an intern. It's exciting, but it's also intimidating. There's a new level of involvement and responsibility. So I find myself easily wanting to prove to myself and to others that I can handle it and do well in it. It can become a chase for approval. It's tiring and exhausting, because that's not how it's supposed to be.
I started out my week that way, wanting to have the approval of others and focusing too much on that. It quickly wore me down and my focus was off-track. But when I re-focused back to who I was working to please, the God who has brought me to work with TIME Ministries and who gives me the abilities to be effective, the striving to please others faded away. Yes, it's still there as a struggle not to fall into that trap, but when I remind myself of whom I'm working for, the approval of others just doesn't matter as much.
And so how did the week go with this group from Arkansas? Being that it's at a site that hasn't been used for week-long groups in a while, it went well. The group worked on painting a black gated-fence. It took longer than expected, but it also made the church's presence more visible with people out there working, and with a fence that looked new, it shows that the church is occupied and present in the community. The VBS that they did went quite well too. It wasn't a very big group of kids, but still a good amount, around 20 kids. The encouraging part to the VBS was that, according to the pastor, there were many there from the community that had not come to the church before. It was good to see God working that week and to be a part of it. My reward in serving the Lord Christ is far above the approval of others.
