Tag: ministry

Rest is Hard

I am discovering that I am not good at resting. Resting feels like a guilty pleasure. Sinful. Lazy. Slothful. Not industrious. Not pulling your own weight. Slacking off. 

I’m in a weird in-between place right now. Our foster daughter went home after three years with us. I am finding that all the insanity of the last three years has not been processed and it is suddenly jumping up and down in my head. And I’m not just talking about fostering (which I’m going to say is the hardest thing I have ever done). How about a pandemic, family members being sick, big streak of violence in our neighborhood that turned my kids high school into a war zone, craziness in my little kids’ schools, someone close to me dealing with severe depression, discovering that one of my kids has some neurological differences, one of my kids growing up and leaving home, another one joining the army. And then quite a few other things that I’m not going to write about.

The past three years have been about surviving each blow and then running on to the next catastrophe. This is not to say I’ve been walking around in a horrible state of mind for three years. God is gracious and I have felt his love and peace with me throughout everything. But at some point in time you have to stop moving for a minute and just acknowledge that these things happened, allow yourself some time to work through the emotions, and then be able to lay it down and move forward. 

I feel like that is the place that God has put me in right now. And I don’t like it. It feels wrong. I’m not doing anything extra. Yeah, I’m taking care of my family, but nothing else. 

That “something else” is a tricky thing. We are saved by grace, not by works. But it’s really easy to fall into that “Grace Plus” mentality. I think I’ve written about this before. Probably because it’s one of the easiest traps for me to fall into. I’m saved by Grace PLUS I do this other ministry. I’m saved by Grace PLUS I’m a really moral, self-disciplined person. I’m saved by Grace PLUS I make no mistakes. I’m saved by Grace PLUS…you get the idea. 

When I reach these places where my ministry is over, some kind of transition has happened, I’m no longer doing all the things, I feel panicky. I can’t be pleasing to God when I’m just sitting here. God only likes me if I’m working. God only likes me if I’m producing. God only likes me if I’m doing all the extra stuff. 

I was in a church service several weeks ago and the minister said something about service to God and I cried out to God in my mind, Lord, what do you want me to do?? And he answered me. I’ll let you know when you need to know. Right now, just rest.

So, here I am trying to rest. And I’m not very good at it. I know that I am on empty right now. I really don’t have anything to give anyone at the moment. I’m trying to slowly rebuild habits of taking care of my body and mind and soul. Habits I used to have but which got thrown overboard when the storms of life got too crazy. 

And the hardest part is looking up at heaven and saying, Are you ok with this? I’m not doing anything. Are you sure this is ok? 

So, I grow in faith again.  Saved by grace. Not by works. It’s ok to rest. 

Some People are Not Worthy

Some people are not worthy of our help. Or at least, that’s what we profess with our actions and attitudes. Let me throw out some hard words for you. Registered Sex Offender. Mentally ill. Homeless. Drug addicts.

Registered sex offenders deserve the death penalty. The mentally ill need to be in some kind of institution. Homeless, well, they’re homeless because they won’t work and be productive. Drug addicts? No help for them, they just want a handout so they can get more drugs.

Believe it or not, I am not going to stand on some higher moral ground and point fingers at everyone below me. These are sentiments that I subconsciously hold. Sentiments that stare me in the face every once in a while and challenge me.

I’m going to tell you a story. 

Several years ago my husband’s company moved their workshop into a new location. It happened to be in a rougher part of town. One of the first problems my husband ran into was homeless people camping out behind his shop. Somehow, in the way my husband has, he got to know one of the couples that were camping out there. He was an ex-convict, a registered sex offender, his girlfriend was ex-military and was pregnant with twins. She was somewhere around the age of forty and was having difficulty with her pregnancy. They were sleeping in a tent.

Andy gave him some work and he proved to be a decent worker. Housing was a much bigger problem. As a registered sex offender he could not live anywhere near children. There was not any cheap housing that fit into the requirements and so they ended up moving into a hotel room. $200 a week. No stoves allowed.

They got married. She lost the babies in a miscarriage. I met them a couple times. She was not mentally stable and I felt very uncomfortable and unsafe around her. Registered Sex Offender, nope, you can’t come near my family. All outreaches to this couple were through my husband.

The man spent the next couple years going in and out of jail. My husband tried to help Her when he could. Some grocery money. Help with rent on occasion. He would talk to me about their problems and I would commiserate, but I really didn’t feel like there was much I could do. My ministry to people is always done in the context of my family, and this couple was not family-friendly.

While He has been in jail, Her health went downhill. She had a stroke. Had some kind of surgery. She was renting a room in a house with lots of roommates. My husband visited her and said she could hardly get around, he didn’t know how she was going to take care of herself. He had asked and she said she was working with a social worker to get help.

We found out today that at the age of forty-two, she has died. Possibly on Wednesday. People noticed they hadn’t seen her. Called the police. Her body was found on Friday.

The end.

And now I analyze. Could I have done more? Should I have done more? Are there people that you just simply can’t help? Their choices have led them down a path of no return? I possibly could have helped Her, but she had married Him and so I felt like that door was closed. I have to protect my family first.

But she was a fellow human being. Once upon a time she was an adorable little baby, and perhaps people cooed over her and said, how lovely! You’re going to grow up to be a wonderful woman! And perhaps she never had that. Perhaps right now there are people who would mourn if they knew she had died. And perhaps not. What I do know is that no matter what choices she made, God loved her. I don’t know where her relationship with God was, but I do know that he loved her.

I want to share with you all the tiny sliver of her story that I know. I want to say to the world at large, this woman lived. And now she has died. Let us at least give her a moment of contemplation in honor of her life. It is all I can do for her now.

And perhaps I can issue a challenge to myself and my readers to just think about this issue for a moment…how do you help the “unworthy” ?  What can we, as a society, do to help this segment of our population that we are reluctant to interact with? Do we have any responsibility towards them? How do we be responsible and safe but still have charity for those in need?