Are You Sure?

Faith is being sure of what we hope for..... Hebrews 11:1a

Possible implication: Can we be NOT sure what we are hoping for?  Personally, I had hoped I wouldn’t have to be involved in deaf ministry.  Not that I have ANYTHING against the deaf...I have a deaf daughter for crying out loud.  It's just such a visible ministry.  And I don't like to be visible.  However, over time, God began revealing to me that just MAYBE I would like it.  Fine.  I will do it.  But I have conditions.  I will only interpret the sermon.  Hopefully God will send someone else to do the worship part...every time.  That’s just too vulnerable of a position for me to be in.  And because I am hoping in faith, surely it will be so.

Back story.  I have always been too afraid, too insecure to lift my hands during worship...although I felt compelled to do so, I simply could not.  People might look at me.  They might think I am weird (and I am...different story.)

I can’t say with any certainty why God allowed the deaf ministry to fold for a time at our home church...there were so many more people affected than just our family.  But with reasonable assurance I am beginning to understand what He has worked out in me ... “for the good of those who love Him” ... of which I am one... “who have been called according to His purpose”  Romans 8:28 .... that purpose which is becoming a little less mud-like and a little more clear. 

When we left our church to attend one that has a very strong deaf ministry, the church that God led us to has a culture of very expressive worship.  It is awesome.  Literally.  It was there that God began untying the chains that kept my hands at my side during worship.  And it had almost literally felt just like that...I wanted desperately to raise my hands but COULD NOT.  During the three year stay at that church I was freed....freed to worship with abandon.

Through a series of what I now believe to have been providential events, we have returned to our former church.  Our church home.  When we got there, there was still no deaf ministry in place but due to a season of slight rebellion in our family member who is deaf, that wasn’t really an issue for the time being.  And we have another family member who had remained VERY connected even while we were attending the other church.  And for reasons only known to God, my husband and I could not for the life of us, find our place there.  So after much prayer and discussion, we went back.  Home.

God began calling me....and I didn’t want to.  Looking back, He had been calling me for quite a while.  Finally, out of obedience only, I responded and just a few conversations took place with leadership and before I knew it, deaf ministry was back up and running.  And I whined a lot.

There came a moment where I sensed God saying in my spirit...’you know, you MIGHT like this!’  I likened it to a parent telling their child ‘just try it!  You are going to like it!'  And if we, mere human parents, would only tell our child that out of love and human foreknowledge, how much more can God be trusted? 'If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask Him!'  Matthew 7:11  And for a very long time I HAD been asking about what my calling is.  Everyone has one!  What is mine??

And so I allowed God to begin working on my attitude.  Big of me, wasn't it?

The first two weeks I interpreted the sermon while others interpreted the worship portion of the service.  It was very difficult for me,  but I really was just glad to not be doing worship...you know...that vulnerable place where people might look at me and think I am weird?

This past week, week number three, there was no one to interpret worship but me.  And I was NERVOUS!  I prepared and I practiced.  And what an amazing thing to spend so many hours being saturated in worship!  But during practice and preparation, I was alone and I still didn’t really want to do that.  Not in front of people.

And Sunday came.  I decided that I was simply going to worship God.  In sign language.  Which really is the point of interpreting the worship service.  Leading the deaf congregants in worship, in their language.  And so I worshipped.  And I was nervous.  And dare I say that I liked it.

So it turns out that God was right.  He knows what we will like. And He knows what we SHOULD hope for because it will be good.  So that we CAN have faith in what we should be hoping for.  I think in order to have faith in what we should be hoping for, we have to let God in.  Allow Him freedom to introduce us to ourselves as who we really are...who we were created to be.  He is the only one who really knows since He is the one who created us...on purpose, with a plan for our lives.

We would do well to NOT listen to the chatter of the enemy whose very goal is to lead us astray.  Because he knows if we live out our calling, it is only there we will find true joy.  And then we just might tell people about the One who is responsible for that joy.  Because it would be selfish not to.

He can let YOU know what it is exactly you should be hoping for, thereby having faith in that very hope.   And He will. 

He is faithful.