yes and no
it's funny how God works.
it's so true. God works in ways we don't understand. for a while now i've had two dreams. the earliest of the two started in 2005 when i started this job of "student minister". since then i've wanted to go to seminary in order to improve my capacity and ability to minister. the second dream began last summer as my roommate, craig, and i were sitting in our living room talking about missions--we thought it would be great to organize a missions trip that was open to the entire church body. both of those dreams have been growing since they were born. today God answered them both.
i got home from the gym this morning and checked my mail. i was really hoping to get my IRS economic stimulus check...no dice. i only got one letter and it wasn't from the IRS. at first i wasn't too moved by the letter. i looked at who it was from "The Cornerstone Seminary." huh. (does your mind ever do those double-takes?) wait a minute!? the Cornerstone Seminary?!? This is the letter I'd been praying about and hoping would come! Would they say I could go? Would I get accepted? Or is this a letter saying, "sorry, you didn't make the cut." I felt the envelope, there was definitely more than one page in there...it only takes one page to say "nope." but if there's more than one page...it was probably a "yes" and the other pages were to let me know what to do from here! I was too excited to open it right away. I took it inside and prayed that my attitude would be right no matter what. "God, where You lead I will follow" was my prayer. I opened it up..."Dear Matthew, I am delighted to tell you that you have been accepted into the Master of Divinity program at The Cornerstone Seminary. We are privileged to have you in our student body and egley elgheyroue alehg..." the rest of the words were a blur through my tears and excitement. I read that first sentence about three times and then cried, shouted for joy and laughed all at the same time. I was so excited!
After celebrating a bit more, finishing the rest of the letter and letting people know, I went about the rest of my day.
Then Craig gave me a call and said he needed to talk about Belarus. He came back to the apartment where I was also. Craig is the one who is heading up the trip...the one we had brainstormed about together last summer. He said that my funds weren't coming in and basically I needed to make a decision today: am I going to Belarus or not? Wow. Let me look at my list of "to do's" today...nope, that wasn't on it. The quick version of my decision process: I prayed, asked God to give me peace no matter what. Earlier I had prayed "God, where You lead I will follow" regarding Seminary. I prayed the same about Belarus. I called many people trying to see if God would provide financially and keep the doors open for me to go. He didn't. He closed the doors. He said "yes" to Seminary..."no" to Belarus.
It's funny how God works.
it's so true. God works in ways we don't understand. for a while now i've had two dreams. the earliest of the two started in 2005 when i started this job of "student minister". since then i've wanted to go to seminary in order to improve my capacity and ability to minister. the second dream began last summer as my roommate, craig, and i were sitting in our living room talking about missions--we thought it would be great to organize a missions trip that was open to the entire church body. both of those dreams have been growing since they were born. today God answered them both.
i got home from the gym this morning and checked my mail. i was really hoping to get my IRS economic stimulus check...no dice. i only got one letter and it wasn't from the IRS. at first i wasn't too moved by the letter. i looked at who it was from "The Cornerstone Seminary." huh. (does your mind ever do those double-takes?) wait a minute!? the Cornerstone Seminary?!? This is the letter I'd been praying about and hoping would come! Would they say I could go? Would I get accepted? Or is this a letter saying, "sorry, you didn't make the cut." I felt the envelope, there was definitely more than one page in there...it only takes one page to say "nope." but if there's more than one page...it was probably a "yes" and the other pages were to let me know what to do from here! I was too excited to open it right away. I took it inside and prayed that my attitude would be right no matter what. "God, where You lead I will follow" was my prayer. I opened it up..."Dear Matthew, I am delighted to tell you that you have been accepted into the Master of Divinity program at The Cornerstone Seminary. We are privileged to have you in our student body and egley elgheyroue alehg..." the rest of the words were a blur through my tears and excitement. I read that first sentence about three times and then cried, shouted for joy and laughed all at the same time. I was so excited!
After celebrating a bit more, finishing the rest of the letter and letting people know, I went about the rest of my day.
Then Craig gave me a call and said he needed to talk about Belarus. He came back to the apartment where I was also. Craig is the one who is heading up the trip...the one we had brainstormed about together last summer. He said that my funds weren't coming in and basically I needed to make a decision today: am I going to Belarus or not? Wow. Let me look at my list of "to do's" today...nope, that wasn't on it. The quick version of my decision process: I prayed, asked God to give me peace no matter what. Earlier I had prayed "God, where You lead I will follow" regarding Seminary. I prayed the same about Belarus. I called many people trying to see if God would provide financially and keep the doors open for me to go. He didn't. He closed the doors. He said "yes" to Seminary..."no" to Belarus.
It's funny how God works.
posted by Elias at 23:05
3 Comments:
Some of my favorite words in scripture are "but God". He ALWAYS answers prayer, "but God". We have a dilemma and we learn from those times when He moves, and we see His hand. "But God" said yes to this and no to that. Praise God that He is SOVEREIGN!
just fyi, that last comment was from mom.
e, i totally understand that it's funny how God works. and i just want to say, "are we thrilled that He has all the answers?!" i mean, His answer was no for belarus, but that is the best thing BECAUSE it's His answer. that is really hard to grasp (or even want to grasp) when something has been taken away. but rest assured, His ways are higher than ours!
i'm so glad that you got accepted to Cornerstone! i'm sure your time there will be such an amazing learning experience.
i know this Belarus trip was something you were looking forward to, but like your mom and sister said, God is sovereign and His ways are higher!! God doesn't just tell us "no" simply because He doesn't want to give us something we want...His answers are always for a reason. (which of course, we usually don't see the reasons ourselves until later!) and there is reason to have joy in staying home from Belarus, because it is in God's perfect plan and will ultimately bring the most glory to Him!
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