Decieved by God

Jeremiah 20:7

O Lord, you have deceived me,
and I was deceived;
you are stronger than I,
and you have prevailed.

I love these words of Jeremiah's, because I can relate. I'm not sure I'd have signed on for this job if I knew how frustrated and sad it would so often make me. I hear about the bad stuff going on in people's lives, and I hear about people making choices to do bad things even though they would be so much happier if they did good stuff. I look at that and I think, "It would be better if you would just . . ." and they nod and smile and then they just go ahead with whatever. If I didn't care, it wouldn't hurt so badly.

I think of myself when I was new at this job. I came into it thinking I could save the world (I never would have worked for Bethel Grove if I hadn’t believed that). I think God even encouraged my idealism to help me head this direction - he wanted me in this job, and he let me fool myself some.

I also think, "okay, we can get this church on mission. We can focus it. I can do it. I can help us discover a sense of purpose and drive. My work will make a difference." and then I wonder if I am getting anything done or getting anywhere besides frustrated. Sometimes, it seemed I worked so hard to accomplish so little.

I've learned now - I can't save the world. I can't save anyone. I can't fix anyone. I can't save or fix a church. I can't even help anyone. Not even myself. No, I can't even fix myself.

I cannot do God's job.

I can do what He expects me to do - point people to Him. I cannot do more than that really.

I think he let me fool myself so that He could work through my feble efforts. He is stronger than I am, and he can do what I cannot.

Thank God, He prevails over me. I stay in this job because of Him. Even when I’d rather not. Especially when I’d rather not. Of course, there are people and things that I love, but I think if I were to stay in it for them and those things, I wouldn’t stay long. Nor would they stick with me long. It is God who draws us into this thing. He draws me. He prevails over me.

Perhaps He even prevails through me? Could it be that He directs some of my steps and causes me to actually accomplish something sometimes? I hope so. I so want my life to be a significant one.

When ministry frustrates me, I think of Jeremiah shaking his fist at heaven and shouting - "You never told me it would be like this! I thought it would be different from this. You fooled me. You deceived me. You made a fool of me!"

I can hear him laugh when he says that this is the only life he can live - that if he tries to do something else, the fire inside him takes over and he cannot get away.

And I hear him sigh a little after his rant is over. No matter that God does sometimes use us and work through us against our will and no matter that He fools us into this life of ministry – even though he does all that, you can’t hate God. Not and be sane. God is just so good, being his fool is better than being my own wise man. You cannot hate someone who loves you so much, and is so very good. Frustrated you can get, but He overcomes even that.

Praise God that he overcomes us. He fools us. And in making us fools, makes us alive.

And in fooling us, he gives us a life worth living.

Even if it is frustrating sometimes.