Weakness and Fear vs. Strength and Courage
I turned 55 a few weeks ago. Let me recount some things – 22+ years as a pastor, in the same place; 26+ years married; 25+years living in the same place. Wow – I’m struggling a bit thinking – man, I haven’t come very far. Things seem more fragile to me than I thought they would be. Things don’t seem as certain as I hoped they would be. I wonder have I done all that God wanted me to do (at least so far)? Have I been faithful?
I can’t tell you how deeply Joshua 1:1-9 has effected me. That passage of scripture just will not leave me alone. I keep thinking – God is gracious, he makes grand promises, he takes the initiative – yet there is no mistaking that He exhorts us ‘Be strong and courageous‘. What does that mean for me – a 55 year old pastor? What does it mean to you who might be reading this?
Over the course of last few weeks it seemed to me like Joshua 1:1-9 was all I could think about. Here was a man, several years older than me, preparing for the biggest deal of his entire life. He spent 40 years serving an apprenticeship which brought him to that moment. He was chosen as a 20 year old to be part of the group who first investigates the Promised Land. He then waits 40 years to finally arrive at the place where he could enter the land. 40 years to come to the place where he would embark on his life’s great purpose. I wonder… how should I judge myself? Have I arrived at the place where I am fit to used to do something really significant? If Joshua took 40 years, who am I to think that my time of formation should be any less? I find myself thinking – I want to think about these things in ways that are realistic, true and biblical. All around me the world is frantic – a woman reaches her 40’s and if she happens to be an actress she is almost certainly near the end of her career. A person who loses their job in their 50’s finds it much harder to find a job, because he or she is thought to be ‘limited’ by their so-called ‘advancing’ years. Yet this is not the way God tells time. God’s economy can include really long periods of preparation.
I could have never thought or grasped these things when I was in my 30’s or even my 40’s. I am beginning to learn that some things just can’t be done without a long, slow development. I think that God has given me a vision of a Biblical counseling center. I can see a place that is multiracial, crossing socio-economic lines and reaching into some of the most broken places in our culture. Ah – but how to get there? I have my own experience, the training I received in graduate school, the things I have learned over the past 20+ years and the hundreds and hundreds of hours of counseling experience from which to draw. These things will help – but this is so much bigger than anything I can do by myself. But like the young lad Jesus called upon when he fed the 5000 (Luke 9:10-17) – I have my two fishes and five loaves and I am prepared offer them.
One of the things which I am delighted to find at 55 is this – I don’t really care about being ‘credited’ or gaining recognition. I no longer feel as though I have something I need to prove. I think God had to work on me for a long time to liberate me from the hunger for this kind of approval. I’m not entirely free from it, but it exercises less and less influence as the years pass. I can work comfortably ‘behind’ the scenes. I feel okay about being a ‘facilitator’ rather than the one out front. I hope that God is freer to mold and shape me to his contours. I wish that I heard God’s voice more clearly.
I want to understand as best as I possibly can what it means to be ’strong and courageous’ as it relates to leading Lamb of God. I see things – not mystically, but in my mind’s eye and in my heart. I see possibilities that feel very much like things that we as a body can accomplish if we will pull together. We can build an alliance with other congregations in this area. These years of praying have helped to lay a foundation for ministry and unity. Jesus prayed his most passionate prayers about these very things (John 17). There is a great opportunity with the Good Will Rescue Mission. It is very much like what God said to Joshua: ‘Wherever you set foot, you will be on land I have given you’. I really believe that the relationship God has given us with Jim Benton (Executive Director of GWRM) and the fact that Kevin Houk is the program director are significant sign posts to us that God has given us the land, so to speak. But like Joshua, and the people we must be strong and very courageous. I recognize that a certain amount of this may fall on me – but I believe that we will not succeed unless this reflects something we embrace as a body. Recognize that it means different things to different people in the church. For all of us it means we pray for the mission. Also, for all of us we go out of our way to welcome the men who come from the mission to Lamb of God. For some of us it means we give money. For some of us it will mean that we will donate time to finding ways to become involved with the GWRM. What I think it means for us as a church is that we decide to embrace that God has opened the door to ministry in and with the GWRM and we are going to be faithful to whatever that means.
We have a great beginning in our partnership with the Padley’s and the work in Brazil. This is now 6 years old. The work in the Amazon is entering its 3rd. year. But this is something that will go on for decades. I ask myself – ‘what does it mean to ‘be strong and courageous’ regarding this work? For me it means that I must continue to go to Brazil. I need to put my feet on that soil, I need to reconnect regularly with brothers and sisters in the work down there. It also means that I need to encourage others to go and touch and see how God has given us an open door. I also need to carry the torch for raising continued support financially for the work. But we must continue to embrace it as a work of Lamb of God. That means that we pray regularly for Brazil. It also means that we give as generously as we can. I think it also means that we get into the habit of investing personally in knowing who and what is going on down there. That is something that email, and cheap phone service makes possible for all of us who want to connect more personally. It could also mean that we go for short term mission visits. Be aware that it is my intention to take a group down to the Amazon next summer. Pray about coming along!
We have the opportunity to be a part of helping to send our first missionaries out of this church. Troy and Noelle have done wonderful work already among our children as youth leaders. They have opened their hearts, they have opened their home (and now the Polyniak home) to minister to and encourage our kids. They have given so much of themselves to form Christ in our young people. Now they sense a calling to go and to work alongside a very worthwhile ministry in Belfast, Ireland. We have a chance to partner with them and to extend our church’s influence to yet another place in the world. This will require strength and courage on the part of the Rhodes and it requires that we as a body pray and work together to try and bring this about. Is it not a reasonable thing to sacrifice for the sake of our dear brother and sister?
Finally, at least for this post, I believe we have a task to accomplish as a body regarding securing a place to meet and to do the things we want to do as a congregation. We have always been a sojourning church. God has always provided for us. We have been many different places and have placed very little emphasis on ‘owning’ a space. I’m not necessarily saying that we should now change this and look for something permanent. What I am saying is that we as a congregation need to take on this issue together and see what God has for us. As I mentioned on Sunday This past Sunday we began a 60 day period of prayer and fasting to seek God’s will regarding our future space. Will you commit yourself to this season of prayer?