What does ministry in the Church look like in 2010?.....

For some that know me this may be a brutally honest post for you. You may wonder "What is going on in Kim's mind these days?" Well so be it. I have been contemplating many things about ministry within a local body for sometime now and am feeling compelled to write about it.

Questions:

• What do you think ministry looks like within your local church body?
  
• Is it the same as it was years ago?
  
• Do you find people rise up to the challenges placed in front of them to serve, or do you find that it is harder to fill volunteer positions?
• Is the church providing to many ministry opportunities?
• Has times changed so much that ministries within the local body have become obsolete?
  

I am the Director of Children's Ministries in our local body. Questions I think about a lot are:

• Are all the ministries we used to have still utilized?
• Do people still think they are important?
• If there were no longer there, would people care?
• What do people want? What do they feel are important?
• Are we just to busy, or do we need to rethink what we are doing?
• Are we holding on to things because it has always been done, or are they truly important to the faith of our children?
• Would our children be O.K., if one or two of the programs we offer, were no longer available?
• DO PEOPLE CARE?

These I do not have answers for, and it burdens me. I want what Christ wants for our kids. Simply I believe that is to know Him. To be a follower of Christ. To Love Christ and Love Others.

I look at the church (and in particular the local body I attend) and wonder. Is this what Christ meant by the Church. We are so caught up in programs, and procedure, and recruiting volunteers, and following this lovely book called the BCO (Book of Church Order; that even sounds awful to me!) It seems the leadership gets so caught up in following this book of man made rules and procedures that it just weights down anything Christ could be doing within the church. I often find myself saying "What does Christ think of that: overture, motion, vote, liturgy, process, etc.....? Sometimes I just want to scream!!!!!

Following Christ is so simple really, but we make it so much more complicated!

So where does that leave me? Who knows! Do I step down because I'm not comfortable with church government? Do I speak out against man made government, and ask "Really, is this important in Christ's eyes? Do I remain silent and just minister to the children? So many questions, and so much business that I find I am not listening to God so I can't hear him speak to me!

I don't know if this post made since or not, but I feel better having gotten if off my chest. Please pray that God will open my ears and eyes to His will! When he gave me this call, he gave me this verse:

Isaiah 30:21
Whether you turn to the right or to the left,
your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying,
"This is the way; walk in it."

I pray that I will hear him regarding my future work for him now.

A Small Decorating Job!

We just did a little decorating job in our front living room. I thought I would share a couple of pictures! I took these pictures of the kids this summer. My sister told me I should put them over the couch, but in order to do that we need to patch holes and repaint. I have been wanting one of the walls in the living room an Olive color, so I thought this was the perfect time to do it.

The words above the pictures say "Children, are a blessing from the Lord."

Another Treasure from my Bible

Dear Child,

Before you open my Word this morning, stop and consider what you are holding in your hands. It is more then paper and ink, more then words and sentences. You are holding in your hands the very essence of who I AM! My Word is my nature, my wisdom, my guidance, my love distilled into letter form. You are holding health and life, truth and healing. Keep my Word before your eyes. Give it permission to roam the rooms of your heart - cleaning, straightening, rearranging; closing doors on some things and opening windows on others. My word can be for your heart a companion, a hearth, and a housekeeper; a gardener to weed your thoughts and a guard against intruders. And so, as you open my Word this day, read with your eyes, but listen with your life.

I want to speak to you,

God

The Sphere of Exaltation

This morning I have been going through one of my old Bibles. This Bible happens to be my NIV study Bible that I used for years. Tucked away in it's pages I am finding little treasures I left for later. This is one of them. I don't know where it came from. It looks like it was typed and photocopied, so I hope I'm not violating any copyright! It is not intentional.

The Sphere of Exaltation

"Jesus leadeth them up into a high mountain apart by themselves." Mark 9:2

We have all had times on the mount, when we have seen things from God's standpoint and have wanted to stay there; but God will never allow us to stay there. The test of our spiritual life is the power to descend; if we have power to rise only, something is wrong. It is a great thing to be on the mount with God, but a man only gets there in order that afterwards he may get down among the devil-possessed and lift them up. We are not built for the mountains and the dawns and aesthetic affinities, those are for moments of inspiration, that is all. We are built for the valley, for the ordinary stuff we are in, and that is where we have to prove our mettle. Spiritual selfishness always wants repeated moments on the mount. The times of exaltation are exceptional, they have their meaning in our life with God, but we must beware lest our spiritual selfishness want to make them the only time.

2 men, 2000 Demons and a herd of pigs

Before I begin, I feel I have to state the main reason I blog. It is to share what God is showing me in scripture, and I hope that it blesses the hearts of anyone who may stop by. I do not wax eloquent. I am not a writer. They are my thoughts pure and simple. They may not even make sense, but when I see something in scripture that I may have read many times over my lifetime, or a story I've known since childhood, and God shows me something new I rejoice and want to share!

Such is the case with Matthew 8:28-34. This is where Jesus crosses the Sea of Galilee and encounters 2 demon possessed men. It said they were "so fierce no one could pass by". Immediately the demons speak to Jesus. They know who he is. This of course is no surprise to us, we have have known that is part of this story. One thing that I thought about during this portion is, it comes right after the doubt of the disciples in the boat during a storm. The demons had NO doubt he Jesus was. They were shaking in their little demon boots! HE was here! The one they knew about. They knew their time was not yet up, but what was he going to do to them now?

There was a herd of pigs. Now this is where I begin to really be amazed. It says in Mark 5 that this herd numbered about 2000. Did you get that 2000! It also says in Mark that the demons named themselves as Legion, which means many. Probably nothing new to you, right. But here is what got me anew this morning.

2 men, 2000 demons!

Could you imagine the torment?!!! How can this many demons be in just 2 men! Yet they did not stand a chance against the Son of God! The power of evil, wiped out by the ALL SURPASSING POWER OF GOD!!! I wonder what these men did next? I wonder at the freedom they must have felt? I also wonder if you had someone with that kind of power in your region, why you would ask them to leave (Matthew 8:34)?

Discipleship Tools for 2010 and Beyond!

I stopped by Iris' today and she had a link to Kathy Howard's Discipleship tools. Since I desire to be a better disciple and have pledge to share anything I find with you all, I thought I would stop in really quick and tell you about it. I will also have the link in my sidebar if you need it in the future.

In the small group that I am in we are doing a Precept's study on Counting the cost of Discipleship. We have been going over passages in Matthew that discuss what Christ is calling us to, and out of. Being a disciple is not easy, Christ never said it would be, but it is worth every step that we walk with Him.

God Bless and have a wonderful Saturday and wonderful beginning to 2o1o! Doesn't it seem weird to be saying that?!

Happy New Year!

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