Thought's From My Quiet Time

"...while the remaining nine were to stay in their own towns..." (From Nehemiah 11:1)

Cities cannot provide for themselves. Even in Biblical times, and more recent times when everyone had animals and fruit trees, the fact of the matter is that food is shipped in from the country to feed those in the city.

We tend to see only the people up front, and not those supporting from behind the scenes. Yet they are 9 out of the 10.

Am I willing to be one of the faceless, nameless nine, who is willing to sacrifice for and support those up front, in th elimelight - even if no one else (aside from God) credits me for it?

I pray so.

The Problem Is Not Numbers

There is enough food to feed everyone on the planet. But the food is not distributed well (due to lots of reasons). When these are sorted out, then people can start complaining about over-population to me.

Do something about it - sponsor a child or at least click to give.

Ministry and Marriage

I've heard a lot of people making comments aboiut how we should all delay marraige because marriage "gets in the way of ministry". I've always found those comments to be annoying and inaccurate. If your marriage is getting in the way of your ministry, then something is wrong (and in almost certainly isn't your marriage!)

But I was thinking a bit more about this recently, because it's an opinion that is effecting me at the moment. (Boy I like has expressed it - not to me, to a mutual friend.) And while the friend corrected him with many of the more common points (marriage is biblical, marriage won't necessarily get in the way of ministry, marriage can help ministry, etc) I've been thinking a bit about it.

You see, HE'S RIGHT.

Get married anyway. :P

Seriously though; marriage is a picture of the relationship between Christ and His church. And there are LOTS of times where Jesus could achieve far more WITHOUT the church. But He uses the church anyway, because she's His bride, and He loves her.

There will be times when even the most organised, well-balanced, Godly men need to choose between ministry and marriage. Circumstances are beyond their control. And Biblically speaking, they need to choose their marriage. And sometime, that means that their "ministry" will suffer.

But not their service to God.

Because to the world they will be representing the Lord Jesus, and His perfect, self-sacrificial love for His bride.

Lara's Servant Heart

So, I was at work and putting out all of the beds and getting ready for lunch. It's a tight schedule, one that easily can delay lunch, and then we have 20 hungry, tired, GRUMPY todlers on our hands.

We also had Hey-De-Ho (a visiting music program).

And Lara wanted to stay inside to "help".

The thing is, Lara loves Hey-De-Ho. She's a fanatic. She'll go around singing the songs all day. But she wouldn't go out onto the verranda to join in. Because she wanted to help.

Lara has the heart of a servant. It's amazing how many two-year-olds do. There's nothing they like ore than helping. And we like to send them away, and not let them, when really, these children are our spiritul betters in many ways, because they want to help.

"And he said: "I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven." (Matthew 18:3)

A Servant's Heart

I've written before about how I find it quite difficult to develop the heart and attitude of a servant, to really look about me and do things that need doing even when I haven't been asked. Well, I am working on it.

For me, a really big thing has been to see some of my work collegues as instruments in God's hands, even when they are non-Christian. I try to see the most annoying, lazy, and incompetant people (and especially if they are all three) as especially sent by God to fashion my character. (Which, of course, they are. And Ale, if you're reading, this is definitely NOT YOU!)

So today, while some people were being lazy and not cleaning (and not really patting the children off to sleep either) I cleaned the bathroom. And as I did I thanked God for giving me this opportunity to develop a servant's heart. And thanking Him for this opportunity really made it so much better. He gave me joy as I thanked Him for it.

So thank God when you have a hard task ahead of you, and while the task may still be less than appealing, God, who is always faithful, will give you joy as you do it!