Ministry of Rest

We sit in the blessed air conditioning during the heat wave and talk about ministry.  She confesses how she snuck off the last time they were at her house… She opens her house up to different organizations… so they had come with staff to handle their visit.. but still it was wearing her down…she  had snuck off and went to bed.  Not her bed… but a guest room bed..so everyone would be less likely to find her.  I laugh out loud….loving it a bit too much.  I mean, we have all been there.

“Did they still get their day out of their normal surroundings?  Did they get to forget their problems for a few hours?  Were they served?” I ask her while my baby eyes me with one eye and yawns, her little fist reaching and twitching as she stretches.

“Well yes,” she says quietly not wanting to wake the baby. My little lavender bundle has very little concern with our conversation…she already learned this lesson… She only left heaven recently, she knows the best ways we have long forgotten.

“Ministry isn’t one sided… He didn’t need you to serve them… ministry is circular…that is the only way it works. He wants us all to be in relationship with Him and out of the overflow of that, we are ministered to… and we can minister to others.  He wants you to know; You rested and everyone was served.  The guilt and condemnation wasn’t Him… it was the enemy knowing you would receive the guilt right then… a lifetime of people telling you to work harder for them has made you susceptible to it… but He is telling you…Rest.  Rest and everyone will be ministered to , including yourself.  Open your life to His rest… and in His service there is rest.”

Tiny little baby elephant noises squeak as my newborn nuzzles a nod of approval while drifting deep into sleep.

~Ministry is everywhere… Don’t discount the ministry  of being ministered to… Knowing His love deeply and profoundly often happens when your mind rests…and you have little to distract you.  From there you are filled…  do not discount what happens when you sit and listen….May you be filled to a place that burbles over and you have so much from Resting and Hearing that you have to pour it out to others…  May you sit and rest…May you Hear how much He loves you… How much He enjoys you just as you are… just sitting there waiting on Him.  That is the good works found in you…the filling up on a daily Bread which you didn’t knead and mix…one you were given freely.~