I Have Overcome the World

1 John 4:4: “Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world.” God must be using me again. I find myself on my hubby’s laptop in the middle of the day, on vacation with our family, in Germany. He, God- not my hubby, keeps nudging me to get to it. I, in my selfishness, make excuses. Maybe I am a little disenchanted with my infirmities and have felt sorry for myself. Maybe because of my health, I am having trouble with the thoughts and putting it into words. I really don’t know. God will fill me in later. But one thing that I do know, He keeps sending me messages through others. This time, through the movie “Father Stu.” Thanks Father Stu and Mark Wahlberg for following His calling. You done good. You readers should watch the movie before reading this. It will help in your understanding of what it is like to fight for something when it feels like so many people are against you. For those of us who are little more colorful but have a lot more to share, it is worth it as a reminder of what God has done in our lives and the lives of others. The movie is not boring. In fact, I failed to see how it was going to get from the harsh reality of life to the salvation of ‘Father Stu’ but it did and quite wonderfully. (It is a true story, by the way) I should add, for those of you who refuse to watch movies that have swear words and negative content, sometimes it helps to get real if you want to learn how to reach people in this dark world. This is an honest depiction of one man fighting himself and others to serve the Lord. Most of us weren’t born with a bible in our hands and pure motives in our lives. Some of us were beat down, abused and lied to in the darkest corners of your world. We are the ones that you should be reaching out to. You won’t find us in a pew in your church on Sunday but we are begging to be found. Lord knows He didn’t find me there. But He never gave up. I want to talk about the ways in which we sabotage ourselves and others, sometimes on purpose and sometimes totally oblivious. You see, it is no secret to those of us who want to serve the Lord, that there WILL be obstacles. There will be people who tell you that you are wrong. There will be so many viable but worldly reasons why it is not the easy or well sought after road. There will be very pious, successful and seemingly well meaning Christians that will block your way, make you feel small and unworthy, and act as if you will never be good enough for ‘fill in the blanks’ when you desire with all your heart to serve Him. There will be hurdles. There will be long lines of others ahead of you and seemingly ‘more Christian’ than you. There will be stacks of paperwork and red tape to cut through. Trust me, there will be a great deal of cost involved too. You will try so hard to put on your Sunday best and fit in. But inside, you feel like the dress or suit is one size too small and you have dirt on your knees from the streets that you come from. It will be hard work, on this earth. Because, ultimately, people usually get it wrong and make it harder than it should be. There is one God and only one way to serve Him. No where in the bible does it say to be someone that you aren’t, to wear what everyone expects you too, to worship how others do or to reach others in exactly the way they tell you to. Trust God to work through you and you do you! Just like Stu. SPOILER ALERT: One of my favorite parts of that movie was the time that he spoke up in the prison scene to reach those who didn’t even know they needed reaching. Deeper still, how his more ‘religious’ seminary brother was relieved that Stu spoke up in his way to reach the prisoners. Had Stu put on airs, God’s word would have fallen on deaf ears. He was real. He worked with what God gave him. He was comfortable in his own skin and that is who God called. So many times in the movie, he spoke out to proclaim it. So many times in our lives, in conforming to fit someone else’s view, we actually disengage with those that God wants us to connect with. Don’t do that. He called YOU. 1 Cor. 9:19-23: “Though I am free and belong to no one, I have made myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law. To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law),so as to win those not having the law. To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some. I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings.” I have felt like an orphan since I was small. Home was never MY home. I have loved the Lord since I was a wee child. I have no idea how I knew that He was up there. We didn’t go to church. But at about five(?) years old, I would lay in the grass at the bottom of our massive yard and talk to Him. It was too long ago to remember what I said. But He has always, even in my darkest days, chased me down. I still have no idea why. Except, like Stu, I believe in reaching people where they are and not putting on airs. The hardest thing that I have done so far was the fight to be a licensed minister. First, I am a woman in a board of males viewpoint. I am not the first. But I asked myself so many times if it was worth it. I had to tell my story to a bunch of older men who had no idea what my life was like… or more importantly, what my heart was like. I remember in one of the final meetings where it was being decided if I was good enough and if my husband would indeed go to bat for me despite his not yet being a Christian, two young people in that meeting spent their time on their cell phones as I spilled my heartfelt desire to follow God. I could feel the tension from my husband who was there solely for me. He would have stopped that meeting right then and asked them if they had something better to do had it not been my ultimate goal to be a part of this organization. He was livid that they had no respect or decorum for the procedure that they forced me to go through. He was even more upset that none of the elder board members recognized or stopped it. Secondly, I am a sinner in a world of people who forget that they are too. I was in my 50’s when I started the process. That is a lot of worldliness to cover in 50 years. I was as speckled with sin as my ANA lab report. What’s more, it isn’t necessarily what we do but our whole way of thinking that needs to change when we serve the Lord. I was at a point where I was analyzing every thought and word and trying to take it captive. That is 50 long years of rehabbing my thoughts and actions. Unfortunately, I think that when people find the Lord early, and God bless them for it, they stop looking for their internal flaws and forget they ever had any sin. It is the false “I have made it!’ syndrome. It felt like they were sitting in judgment of me; as if they are past that sin thing now and I should be too, at my age. Unfortunately, I was just getting started. And mostly, I was too honest and was supposed to color my sin with a blurred brush so as not to sound nonredeemable to the powers that be. There is more to it but essentially, I was being judged by people who forgot about those that Jesus called to follow Him and how He did it. My sins were great. So were the disciples. I didn’t murder anyone but I bet my words did a million times over. I am amazed that the Lord found any Light at all left in my heart. Of course, if you ask my kids they would argue the point. But try being totally honest with others about everything you failed at in life and see how ‘worthy’ you would be. Trouble is, I was being judged by people who may have stopped analyzing their own thoughts and actions because they thought that they were finished. Newsflash. We are human and terribly flawed. We are never ‘finished.’ At 62, (almost) I am still trying to monitor and police my thoughts and actions. I am a lot like Stu. Jesus called me. Of this there is no doubt. But humans put up the rules of what that should look like. They didn’t accept me for who I was or believe that I was really called. I argued and fought for my right to be called pastor because He told me to. Ultimately, they acquiesced. But the battle continues within myself. Maybe that is as it should be? I mean, my kids have great hearts but they have the same sense of ‘not good enough’ that I have. I didn’t do them any favors with that, I know. But we talk about it from time to time and I come to this thinking… maybe, it is because we always feel ‘less than’ that we can better recognize and reach others who feel the same… like Father Stu. Col 3:23-24: “Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.” Too often, someone comes into your life and tries to tell you who and how you should be. Or maybe, just by them being present, you question your worthiness and direction. But ultimately, if you are reaching God’s people and helping saves souls, you are doing what God intended. Let Him deal with HOW you do it when you meet Him.