A long time ago a seed was planted in my life, and over many years it has been watered and nurtured, whispered to and loved. That seed has grown, and there have been times when the branches have felt deadened and needed cutting back. Similarly, there have been times when beautiful, fragrant flowers have blossomed and bloomed.
Along the way, I have deviated from the path. Many times, in fact, I have chosen to ignore the way this seed wished to grow. And for a long time, I believed that deviation discounted me from getting back to the original plan.
“Moses said to the Lord, ‘Pardon your servant, Lord. I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue.’
The Lord said to him, ‘Who gave human beings their mouths? Who makes them deaf or mute? Who gives them sight or makes them blind? Is it not I, the Lord? Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.’
But Moses said, ‘Pardon your servant, Lord. Please send someone else.'”
This little excerpt from Moses’ struggle to accept God’s call on his life, found in the book of Exodus in the Bible, resonates with me and how I felt up until around 5 years ago. At that point someone took me aside and very plainly told me that my life experiences or wandering from the path did not discount me at all from following God’s call. Though Moses felt his lack of speaking skill discounted him, God told him in no uncertain terms that it didn’t matter: he would equip him.
And so, I started back along a very long, sometimes painful, but mostly wonderful path. Along the way I have learned so much about myself, and about God… I’m almost at the point where the result doesn’t matter. It’s irrelevant, because I’m closer to being who God made me to be whether I get a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’.
I hope it’s a ‘yes’ though.
A New Mission 