This has been a long week. So it feels good to be sitting at home for a bit. Ministry is a never ending balancing act. I’m pretty convinced that I struggle to keep my priorities straight. It’s so easy to get sideways, listen to the critics and spend the majority of my week dealing with issues that won’t impact the city of Austin.
One of the biggest fears I have is allowing ministry to become about me. I want my church to grow for my sake, I want a bigger budget so I can have bigger ministry toys, etc. Its very easy to be motivated for personal gain. I keep asking God to crush me for those who are far from him. I want to run to the brokenness of our world with the story of Jesus, I deeply desire to be apart of a community that deeply desires to become the “hands & feet” of Jesus. Yet I truly feel like sometimes ministry can get in the way of progress-Christians can get in the way of Christ-Church can get in the way of mission.
So we always have to reevaluate how we manage our lives, we must keep ourselves pure, walk in humility and be desperate to see shalom breakthrough in our generation.
Brother, this is the big tension isn’t it! Praise God that He is faithful to call us to Himself. When I was up at the Village, we would seek a certain rhythm that helped us to be mindful of these truths. A rhythm of redirection and rest. We had a full day once a month called Restore. Each month was different but intentional in connecting us back to the Lord and to His mission. At first it was a hassle that was in the way of getting stuff done, but once my internal Achiever got over himself it was a real blessing. Again, praise God for bringing us back to Himself.