Ordinary for the Lord

I had intended to write this the Monday after coming home from the Women of Joy Conference in Branson; but with all that happened in Virginia that Monday this didn't seem appropriate. I had come home with such joy and a vision of God moving, only to have it in a certain way stripped away. It was hard to write about the joy of the Lord in the midst of what was going on. I know that we shouldn't allow Satan to steal our joy though and what the Lord showed me is true. So I am pulling this out for draft mode, dusting it off a little, and putting it on my blog where it belongs.

The Women of Joy conference in Branson was wonderful. Believe it or not there were people there from as far away as Indiana and Texas. Imagine 2000 women getting together to worship, learn and praise the Lord; it was awesome. All of the women in our group plan to go back again next year and several more that didn't go this time want to go with us next time.

The thing that the Lord kept saying to me time after time through speaker after speaker was how much he loves us. Lisa Harper came out and spoke on a topic I hadn't heard since I was a young child. Years ago they use to talk about the Song of Solomon as an allegory of God's love for the church, but recently most people speak of it as just a husband's and wife's love for each other. I guess we have become to sophisticated to spiritualize it. Anyway as a pastor I had once would say "Sometimes the Bible is not this or that. Sometimes it's this and that." I think that is true of the Song of Solomon.

Lisa Harper spoke of how, while on this earth it is wrong for a woman to pursue a man, God is absolutely pleased with us pursuing Him. He is absolutely Knocked out by us and nothing gives us more pleasure than our worship and praise. Think about it, when you praise your husband doesn't he just beam with pleasure? For days he's walking in the clouds. Well that's God only more so. While our love and praise is God's due, just as our love and respect is our husbands' due, it gives him great joy when we search for ways to please Him. He loves us that much.

Another speaker that touched me deeply was Angela Thomas. Lately I've been down in the dumps because I am getting older and my life is nothing like I planned it to be. You know the old adage, "Man proposes, God disposes." I had planned to do something important, to rock the world; and here I sit, just a simple mother and housewife. Yes, I know that other old adage "The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world," but that can be hard to remember as all the women around you answer "Oh that's nice" when you answer the question of "So what do you do" with "I a housewife." I know what I am doing is God's will and that I shouldn't let others rule my self image but it's hard when even your own mother is disappointed that you didn't do more with you life. I guess that's why Angela touched me so deeply.

At one point in Angela's talk she told about going to speak in South Africa. She hadn't really wanted to go but they were so persistant that she felt that maybe the Lord was in it. She tried to pack as much in as she could for the few days that she was there and in the end was exausted. The woman who had hosted the event took her out to eat before taking her to the airport and while they were eating she said to Mz Harper, "Angela I think I have a word from the Lord for you." Well her first thought was "No, Lord not now, I'm so exausted. I can't give any more." But the woman went on and what she had to say was important to Mz Harper and me as well because it gave me a new perspective.

She said her slightly British, South African accent "I have prayed over and over 'Lord, what is it about Angela? Why is it that everyone loves her?' And what He showed me is that it is because you are to Ooordinary." Angela said that, that made her smile. It was the best compliment that she could have recieved because she realized that everyday she got up out of her ooordinary bed, took her ooordinary shower, put on her oooordinary clothes, brushed her oooordinary teeth and hair, got in her oooordinary car, drove out to her ordinary life filled with ordinary people, and was able to allow an Extraordinary God reach all those other ordinary people through her.

The Lord showed me that that was like me. I am a simple housewife in a small town, in the backwoods of Oklahoma, at the foothills of the Ozark Mountains, surounded by quite a number of people in great need both spiritually and financially. Suddenly I realized I had it all wrong. I would have never said it but by my thoughts and actions it was as if I was just marking time trying to work for Him where I was at until I He managed to find me where I was at.

How wrong is that?! It's not like I wondered off someplace and the Lord didn't know where I was. I'm exactly where He wants me and I'm exactly the boring, ordinary person He needs to serve Him where I'm at. If I were anybody other than who I am; if I were a vice president of some bank like my cousin, if I had married money or made money, I would never be usable here. And I know this is where He wants me because I never intended to come back here again and yet after traveling the world, here I am. I didn't intend to be here, He put me here. This is my mission field and if I were anyone else I wouldn't be able to understand these people and even if I could they would never believe that I could and they wouldn't trust me.

The bible says to praise God in all things. Sometimes it's hard when we can't see the silver lining in the cloud. We can't understand what God is doing. A month ago I would never have thought to praise God for allowing me to be ordinary. If I bothered to think about it at all I would have sighed in frustration for disappointing so many family members. Once in a while though God pulls back the veil a tiny bit and we are allowed to catch a glimpse of what God is doing. Today I can praise God for my ordinary life, with my ordinary husband and ordinary kids, in our ordinary house, worshiping in our ordinary church, with our ordinary friends, as we work to reach others with the help of an extraordinary God.

How much better would it have been if I had been less like Thomas and trusted in the fact that a loving God knew what He was about?