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I am altogether rubbish at Map Reading. I was out of the room looking for cheese or something when God handed out skill in that area. My new friend at the school gate is a cartographer with an exotic name. She drew the area in Salford Quays that my Jon will one day work in… I suspect she and I would want very different things for our birthdays!
You know how when you are out somewhere new, sometimes you come across those illustrated maps with a big red arrow saying YOU ARE HERE…? Clearly these three words are less of an existential statement and more of a geographical one. But what if they were the other way round? What if they were a prophetically accurate guide to what you were doing at that given moment?
I have been talking to God recently about what is next for me… what roads I should walk down… what my ministry is to look like for this next stage… who I should be walking with…. and who I should not. Should I tour the album? Should I write a book? Should I be on the creche rota? Should I mentor yet another amazing person?
God has been fairly quiet on most of this, (or maybe the times I have asked Him, life has been fairly loud??) except occasionally giving me a small sense in the wheel of my spirit that I am turning the wrong way and needing to make a slight angle-adjustment.
A friend sent me a text this week by the wonderful Elisabeth Elliot. It got me interested in her writings and sent me searching for more. From what I have read, I think I would get on with her…
One quote I came across made me smile. And think. It was this:
“The fact that I am a woman does not make me a different kind of christian, but the fact that I am a christian does make me a different kind of woman.”
I too am a woman. (Sorry that won’t be revelatory to most of you!) but I don’t feel my calling comes from my gender. I don’t ever feel that just because I am female means that I am called only to speak to women, or Mums, or ladies-that-lunch…
I sometimes feel that my place in the kingdom is somehow rather genderless in character. I seek to protect and proclaim, guide and guard, warn and win, rescue and release others. None of this is BECAUSE I am female. I’m sure some of it is helped by that fact though. I am a child of God who happens to be of the girlie variety. That’s all.
One thing is VERY clear to me though. I do not need to even leave my house in order to minister. God is bringing people to my door, people to work in the house, and of course, my gorgeous family, to love and to bless. It is a gift of God to be able to be available to others at this time. One of the truly beautiful things that I have been given this week is the chance to speak into the lives of the guys building my kitchen. There have been four of them. All Christians and all of them open to what God is saying to them. Pure joy my friends! A captive audience… there ain’t notin’ better!
The main builder, (plumber, tiler, plasterer, decorator, joiner, children’s pastor, actor and wondrous human being) Keith – was recommended to us and I could not imagine how I would begin to try to redeem this house without his multitudinous skills and bitingly hilarious Boltonese wit. He is a God-send. Literally. The children adore him. Esther coos at him and screeches with delight every time she sees him. The boys just want to BE him. They put pencils behind their ears, turn their caps backward and demand ‘measure-tapes’ to go off and ‘look busy’ around the house… He has begun to make himself at home in our hearts, as well as our house.
Each of these guys, in their own way are ‘setting their course’ in a certain direction and I am absolutely certain that I am meant to help. As I have prayed for them and over them in the last week or so, fresh words have come to me for them, new places of opportunity and a glimpse of their future dreams. I am SURE that my house is broken so that THEY can fix it and that in that process I can be here for them in the needs they have right now. Take Mikey for instance… he is a gentle, strong young man with a real heart to see his past mess become his future message… I am so up for helping! (Mate… it takes team work to make a dream work!)
Praise God for not having to leave my four walls to pray for people! Praise God that I can be challenged by these lovely people in my own kitchen! (The word ‘kitchen’ is a strong word for what I have right now… but work with me!) Praise God for the gift of boomerangesque-hospitality. In making a meal or a thirteenth cuppa for Keith (no hyperbole) I find blessing.
So this is my ministry right now. Not platforms but plumbers. Not microphones but meatball sandwiches. I would not be anywhere else. I am right here. And I love it.
Where do you find yourself? Ever asked why?