Your greatest ministry
4 [He]who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God. 5 For just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ, so also our comfort abounds through Christ.
2 Corinthians 1:4-5
I began to read over on my journal entries from the past five years today. It is both amazing and painful at the same time to reflect upon.
August 2020 – “Why do I think I am not allowed to have good things? Or deserve good things? I'm scared of wanting what I want because I feel like this is the life I was handed and I should just accept it as it is. What right do I have to complain? I feel obligated to be content all the time. I feel like as though I don’t deserve good things because I have had so much taken away.”
October 2020 – “Perhaps I’ve compartmentalized a lot of the hurt just so I could function”
Feb 2021 – “God didn’t make me to be perfect, so I can’t ask that of myself either. My every step of my story, which is a part of God’s story, was designed with me in mind. My love was never meant to be drained or disrespected like this.”
March 2021-“I get it now. It was all to propel me into exactly where I am right now.”
I don’t share this to pull your heart strings or make you sad about my story. I share it because even within the heartbreak and tears I see the hope the Lord sprinkled into my life.
I have known for a long time what my calling was but I was too scared to take hold of it to pursue it as I should have been this whole time. Fear and anxiety had gripped me so tightly my voice was being silenced slowly year by year.
I have the gift of encouragement and the calling to write. My deepest sorrows and darkest times were meant to suppress those things so that the message of overcoming, hope and peace would not prevail.
However, we serve a God who has already won every single battle. We are meant to lean into the Lord for His strength, provision, wisdom and peacefulness.
Let me tell you reader right now that your greatest ministry is going to come out of your greatest pain!
And let me tell you why. Because people want to hear the real raw testimony so they can relate to it and see that Jesus was not a fairytale story. He is real, present and alive forevermore to give them hope and offer redemption.
Your tears and testimony are not going to be wasted as long as you allow Him to make them into something beautiful.
The lies you were fed and the curses you are breaking are going to propel you to the next level. I promise you this.
Do not give up sweet reader. You’re closer than you think and I encourage you to keep praying until your Jericho walls fall and you move into a city that was delivered to you by a God that loves you!
