How to Serve God Right Where You Are may 23, 2013 by melanie caldicott 3 comments 3 Share3 Share Share1 Share Share Many of us nowadays are overloaded with responsibilities – we are wives, mothers, friends, employees, homemakers, etc, etc. And then as Christians we know we should be serving God as well. How can we possibly add anything else in to our already overloaded schedules? How can I serve God when I’m so busy already? Christians always seem to be such busy people, someone once commented to me. They’re always rushing about running their homes, families, jobs and then on top of all of that they have church duties to fulfil as well. I don’t know how you keep everything going! It made me stop and think. Is this the impression we really want to give non-Christians? Jesus-followers are busy? That committing your life to God brings on a whole new load of tasks and responsibilities we have to take on in life? I’m not sure that this is such a great witness. Yet she was right. Christians very often have lives filled with busyness. Rushing about doing the “Lord’s work”. Committees, groups, rot as… church life can often demand so much of us. If we’re not careful then we can get so caught up in serving that we lose sight of the Gospel. We are so busy “doing” that we forget about the “being”. The fact that our faith is built around a relationship, not a job description. So, therefore can we forget about all this added work, serving God and being part of the ministry of our church. Well, I’m not exactly saying that. Contributing to church ministry is important. We are supposed to be part of the body of Christ, using our gifts to work together with others to serve God and help people. The collected efforts of people working together in our churches can achieve great and wonderful things and it’s important if we are part of a church that we contribute to its ministry. However, we need to have a far more holistic view of what serving God and using our gifts means. As each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. 1 Peter 4:8 Serving God is not about making us busy. It’s about showing God’s grace. It’s about understanding the gifts God has given us and sharing them with others in the name of God. Often we can easily compartmentalise everything in life. Serving God is what we do at church. Our home life and work life is separate to that. I know that’s how I felt for a long time. Of course I knew that I could serve God wherever I was, but I tended to only feel like I was really serving Him when I was doing church work. I undervalued the other areas of my life feeling like they didn’t count as serious mission and calling. I think that this was a problem compounded by the fact that I worked for five years in full-time church ministry. So, after I gave this up to have children I felt that I lost my identity and didn’t know where I fitted in to church life any more. Added to this was that it took me a long time to regard motherhood as a calling and ministry in itself. I know – I’m terribly thick when it comes to the obvious things in my life sometimes! Serving God is something we can apply to every area of our lives. We serve God when we sort out the argument which has erupted between two of our kids. We serve God when we clean the sink. We serve God when we take care to remember our colleague’s birthday and buy them a cake. We serve God when we check in on our neighbour to see if they need anything from the shops when the weather is bad. We serve God when we support the mum at the school gate who has reached the end of her tether with discipline problems with her kids. God has put us where we are for a reason and wants us to serve Him in that place, right where we are. It is our mission field and calling and we can be part of bringing about God’s kingdom in our families, communities and workplaces. Serving God doesn’t need to become another responsibility added on to a life already filled with work, caring for our families and being part of our communities. It becomes incorporated into those things. As we go about our daily tasks there are millions of opportunities to serve God through the normal things we do. Being part of bigger church activities is great but God needs people on the ground serving Him where He has placed them.
Posted on: Fri, 16 Aug 2013 20:05:46 +0000
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