Well, its about that time again. Time to update all of you, my readers, on the escapades of the past weekend and all the awesome things God is doing in my life! Funny how it always seems to come at this time... you know, Tuesdays, at work, when there is nothing to do but homework... hmm.
Anyways, last Friday Rebekah and I made a mad dash home, skipping out on class and work (I was excused) to pack up and hit the road with the family for Calvert City, Kentucky, where we spent the weekend with the people of Faith Apostolic Church. My grandparents have been going there on the second weekend of November every year for four years now, and we have joined them for the past two. Every year, on Friday night, they have a special service for the ladies and my grandmama speaks. Then on Saturday night and Sunday morning, my Granddad speaks. On Saturday morning, we get up and go shopping, and they always have good food.
So that's basically the run-down of events.
However, this year was a little different. This year, they asked ME to speak along with my grandmama. She recently had a pretty serious surgery and was afraid she wouldn't be able to do the whole thing on her own, so she asked me to help out. I was honored, and nervous. I never, ever get nervous about speaking in front of people, but it has happened twice that I have been asked to speak at a "ladies conference" and it terrifies me. I mean, preparing for it, I just think to myself, "I'm only twenty years old. I'm not married, I've never had kids... what do I have to offer these women?" I should know by now that God has his ways of making us trust him more. Moreover, the topic they had chosen was the Proverbs 31 woman. WHAT? That whole proverb is about a married woman, one who takes care of her husband and her children and provides for them and all that stuff. I know nothing about it. But again, there is God, teaching me to trust him more.
I studied and studied and studied. I think I know the woman in Proverbs 31 as well as my best friend. She and I are tight now. The more I read about her, the more I realized that its not that hard to be like her. All she does is work hard, right? I mean, she goes out of her way to provide food for her family, she wakes up before the crack of dawn to make sure that they are prepared for the day ahead. She makes sure her husband looks good, she dresses her family in warm clothing, etc. She isn't lazy. However, the more I read about this woman, the more I realized that there is much more to her than a to-do list. Yeah, she's a hard worker, but there is motivation behind all of her work.
The thing about my friend in Proverbs 31 is that she realizes she is more than just a woman. She is a wife. She is a bride. There is so much more to a relationship than a checklist of things to do. There has to be love, there has to be intimacy. And that is the part that hit home for me. Jeremiah 2:32 says "Does a maiden forget her jewelry, a bride her wedding ornaments? Yet my people have forgotten me days without number." Because if we are the bride of Christ, then our relationship to Jesus should look like the relationship of the Proverbs 31 woman to her husband. It has become easy for us to do work for the Lord, but we have forgotten for whom we do the work: Jesus.
Revelation chapter 3 tells us of the church at Ephesus, who had forgotten their first love. In his letter to the church, God tells them to go back to their first love. To repent and do what they did in the beginning. Some of us have spent so long working for God, that we have forgotten when we fell in love with him. This happens in marriages too. That's why so many marriages fail, because people forget when and how they fell in love. There is a movie out and one of the characters says that part of making a marriage work is falling in love again every day. That goes for our relationship with God. We have to fall in love with him everyday. I mean, I'm guilty, I'm the worst. I was raised in church. I cut my teeth on the pews, I was taught to love God. I work hard for him. I have taught Sunday School, led youth groups, led praise and worship, played the piano, directed children's church, and everything else, but that means nothing if I'm not in love with Jesus. And sometimes I forget what that feels like.
I encouraged the ladies in Calvert City this weekend to remember what it felt like to fall in love. Now I encourage you to remember as well.
No comments:
Post a Comment