I can't sleep... I think I will start there. I am blown away at what God did in me tonight and I feel like I have to write about it so that I do not forget.
For you to really understand what I am going to say, I think I need to share with you a little background. When I was growing up, I did not really have a strong sense that I was listened to or did I think that I mattered to people. I knew that my parents loved me very much, but I felt very much like I did not get the attention that a child should get. If I look back (my wife helped me see this tonight for the first time) I would say this is where my "wound" stems from. This is a place of great pain. When we have wounds, we tend to compensate where we are hurt, and that tends to not be in healthy ways usually. With that said, I have had one of the most busy scheduals I have ever had in this past 2 weeks when it comes to ministry.
- Friend Died and I drove to sacramento to be with his family when they pulled the plug.
- flew down to speak at a winter retreat and ministered to an awesome group of teens!
- spoke at friends funeral at the church I grew up in *pasadena nazarene
- night two (tonight) of our series, "Killers of the Heart- Sex, $ and power"
I tell you my schedual for one reason and that is because with everything on this list, I was in the lime light in every place. I was a camp speaker, looked up to in front of about 1,300 people at a place where they used to look down on me because I was young, but now a leader, doing cutting edge things in ministry (told by many friends in ministry). My wound became temptation for me this last two weeks. The temptation to say, look at me... They were looking at me and I was taking credit for things that only God deserved! I am understanding that what feeds my wound from my childhood is being seen by people. The temptation is to put myself in the line of the praise that is intended for God. I KNOW that I was taking what God should have owned. I was sinned and wow, I am totally wrong for that. I was sharing this all with my very patient wife and something amazing happened, and for this I want to praise God for what HE did. On top of all the busy schedual, I got home from camp and was in the house for 15 min when I ended up hitting my head really hard and got a really bad concussion and lost memory, and speech was all messed up, but it eventually came back over about 2 days. What never went away was my SCREAMING Heacache!!! Here is what I want to praise God for... Out loud to my wife, I confessed my SIN of taking God's praise and asking Him to be the leader in my life in a new way. I want God to get all the praise. I want to become less and Him to become greater! When I said Amen, I opened my eyes and my headache was GONE! It was completly gone! I shared this with Amy, and out of no where, God popped in my mind this, ( Had to look up text later) James 5:16 "Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other SO THAT YOU MAY BE HEALED." I cannot tell you the emotion that went through me, but I was a total mess- in a good way. I have never seen personally God work in a way like this before. I have seen Him do some pretty crazy things, dont get me wrong, but this just floored me! My heart is in praise and worship to a God that says, "Joel, I forgive you, and I want to show you even greater things, but remember, it is I who does the great things, it is I who changed the lives of those kids at camp, and it is I that will change you if you let me!" We (pastors, I am saying this to you if any pastors read my blog) need to be careful in thinking any Kingdom work is our doing. It is Him and His Spirit that does it ALL!
So, that is my story.... My question to you is, when something great happens, or you get a complement, where does your mind go? What happens in your heart? Do you long for power that God deserves? Where or who is getting the Glory? Are you stealing something that was intended to be God's all along like I did? Any thoughts?
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