When you can’t find your one thing

Photo Credit: Mrs. Logic (Creative Commons)

I got out of the bed this morning full of self-pity. Not just self-pity but self-righteous self-pity. Let me explain.

Our new life is as comfortable as a newborn swaddled in a hand-made quilt. The home provided by our new church is nicer than any parsonage I’ve seen. The kids love their schools, the community is safe, people are friendly, and we’ve not been here long enough to experience much conflict. We’re able to save a little money each month and we’re settling into new routines. All in all, it’s ministry bliss.

But in a strange way, all this comfort makes me uncomfortable.

In our last church, we were in a low-income urban area. Needy people were everywhere. One day, a neighbor overdosed on heroin in his front yard just around the block. My husband prayed with his family and invited them to church.  He recovered. They came.

A few weeks later, an intoxicated single mom knocked on our door after dark with a beer in one hand and three kids trailing behind her. We talked, snuggled her kids, and made sure they got home safe and sound. The neighborhood wasn’t the best place to raise our children and our mothers really worried about us, but it felt like we were doing ministry for real, in a hard place.

For lots of reasons — most of which involved us bringing the people I just described to church — it didn’t work out.  Now, we’ve moved to Mayberry by comparison. it’s great! Truly.

But here’s the rub. Everyone we know here are church people. I don’t mean to say they’re perfect. They’re not. I’m sure there are skeletons in the closet: rocky marriages, financial problems, pornography addictions, and substance abuse. But right now the skeletons are well hidden. They’ve got food on the table, children are well cared for, and no one uses bad language. No. One.

Kristen, the founder of The Mercy House, talks about finding your one thing and I want to, I really do. But for the life of me, I don’t know what it is. I’m a pastor’s wife, a mom, an employee. But what’s the one thing that makes my heart burn to get out and do something? How do I manage my current responsibilities and do that one thing with passion? I don’t know.

For a time we worked with folks who struggle with addiction. I loved it, but that time has come to an end. We provided hurricane relief after Katrina in Gulfport, Mississippi. We still visit every few years and enjoy lifelong friendships with folks on the coast. My husband has taken several mission trips to South America and has another one scheduled in March. He loved it — but those trips are one week a year and do not a lifetime of ministry make.

And all of these things are good. But this morning I was a little frustrated with myself and God because I don’t have any idea what I’m supposed to be doing here. As I drove down the road and listened to my worship music and complained to God about how great things are and how I don’t know what I’m supposed to be doing with all this greatness, God told me — I am being selfish.

Selfish, because all of my concerns are about me, where I fit, what I’m supposed to be doing. And then he spoke with his Word. “No one should think more highly of himself than he ought.” Ouch!

“Jesus came not to be served but to serve.”

“But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place …. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

Is that what I had been doing? Seeking a place of honor trying finding the one great thing I am supposed to do with my life?

And I realized, maybe for now, this is my one thing. Don’t think more highly of myself than I ought. Take the lowest place. Don’t seek the places of honor. Encourage my co-workers. Love my family. Stop measuring my ministry success by the books I’ve read or the blogs I visit. Stop looking for my one thing and love and serve the people right in front of me — today.

What about you? Have you found your one thing?

For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. (Romans 12:3 ESV)

It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave, even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Matthew 20:26-28 ESV)

But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when your host comes he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”
(Luke 14:10-11 ESV)