Our Team Journal today comes from our Tech and Design Coordinator, Mindy Braun.
“There comes a time in the life of every believer and of every church where the voice inside us simply asks, Now what?” This is the same question I struggled with for a long time. And it wasn't until recently that I've felt like I understood the answer.
For a few years now, I’ve had an itch; a yearning for something more. I felt like there had to be more to this life as Christian. I wanted to experience God in more ways, that the life of a Christian had to go beyond what I’d experienced in my own life. But I just kept telling myself to ignore it; the feeling was just the enemy telling me that my life wasn’t good enough. I told myself I was just discontent and I needed to work through it. It wasn’t until last year with IF:Dayton when I started reading the book Just Courage by Gary Haugen that I started to understand it. We read it as a book study; but instead of digging in and learning, I treated this book like homework and skimmed it. But, God (oh, He's so good!) works even when we are skimming. There was a part within it that stuck out to me and forever changed my view on my life, on the cries of my heart and the work God has for me.
Gary had a name for what I was feeling: divine restlessness, a holy yearning for more. “It’s the moment in which we can see all the work that God has been doing in our lives and in the life of the church is not an end in itself; rather, the work he has been doing in us is a powerful means to a grander purpose beyond ourselves. This is the supernatural moment when the rescued enter their divine destiny as rescuers.” Our rescue was never the end result; there is more to it. We are rescued and redeemed for an even bigger, better purpose.
Throughout the New Testament, Jesus is constantly teaching and asking his disciples to look beyond themselves, to see the world lost and desperate for a Savior. He wants his disciples look beyond their own desires, beyond what their eyes could see and their hearts could imagine and take in the greatness of their calling. He was showing them that they were each important characters in God’s grand plan, that their true calling was far greater than they ever imagined.
“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.”
The rescued become the rescuers. The restored become the restorers. The equipped become the equippers. We were brought out of darkness so that through Jesus, we can be the light of the world. We are the ones through whom God works out his plan to rescue the world.
This world we live in is a dark and scary place. It’s lost and hurting. God, the Creator of all things, has one plan to bring light to it through Christ. We are that plan. How amazing it is that we get to be a part of that redemption story! Through grace, we get to be a part of the story that forever changed the world. It's so much bigger than us, goes beyond what we can imagine. As small and insignificant as we may feel, He chose us to be a part of it. He chose us to keep the momentum going.
Could it be done with out us? Yep. But that's that beauty of it. He chose to bring us along for the ride to see His beautiful story play out. So are we taking him up on this offer? Are we hopping in and joining the ride?
Mindy Braun is an Ohio-born-and-raised, small town girl who has grown to love the city of Dayton. Her family resides in East Dayton. While she's not being mama to her two kids, she and her husband run a photography business out of their home. Mindy has a love for deep friendships, fried chicken, sleeping in, the outdoors, serving the Church, and Oreos after bedtime.
