Five Words I Never Thought I’d Say

Life has been really interesting lately. Where we are now, I would have never imagined nine, or six, or even three months ago. I certainly never would have imagined this a few years ago. But God tends to work things out how HE sees fit, right?

Four years ago, God drew my husband back into church with us after ten years of staying home while I took the kids without him. {God first led my husband to take us to a nearby church his brother attends and we were there for a while before God then led my husband to bring us to the church that is currently our family and home. Both of those churches would soon become important to us.}

After ten years, God answered my prayers, my husband was going to church with us again, and leading us to a good one as a spiritual leader should do. But God didn’t stop there.

God went above and beyond anything I ever dared to ask for. 

Because God never does things halfway, and because he is “able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think.” (Ephesians 3:30) 

• Immediately upon attending this church, my husband began serving in the church (by helping with the sound and audio.)
• Within a month, we joined the church and soon after my husband started a men’s Bible study.
• Shortly after that, our pastor encouraged my husband to pick up guitar again, practice more and join the worship team.  (Later my husband even stepped out of his comfort zone to become the worship leader.)
• My husband read through the Bible in 90 Days, TWICE, and has continued a Bible study habit that amazes me
• About two years ago, my husband started attending a seminary program that was being offered through that first church that we attended together.
• That man now knows more about what the Bible says, and where to find it and how to apply it than I ever saw coming.
• About a year and a half ago, God placed a desire on my husband’s heart to focus on church planting in his seminary classes.
• Over the past year or so, my husband has had the opportunity to preach a few times, and also speak at a local youth event. I am so proud of him.

So in the space of a few years God transformed my husband from a man who was fighting God with all he had to a man that is boldly proclaiming Christ and willingly saying, “Here I am, Lord!” and following a call on his heart to be a planting pastor. 

Isn’t God amazing??

But that’s old news. I’ve known for a year and a half or so that we would leave our church family at the end of James’ seminary classwork to pursue church planting, and only God knew where.

I told my husband from the beginning, I’m IN. I will follow James wherever God calls, I only have two “requirements.”

1. That James KNOWS God is calling him (I’m not following whims.)
2. That God gives me what I need to know that, too. Because I have no doubt that if God calls James somewhere, He’s going to prepare me for it, too, and I will have a peace about it.

Don’t get me wrong, I might need a moment to adjust but I’m committed to going where God calls! 

I’m beginning to ramble. I’ll get to the point.

The point is, that even when we think we know where things are going… we probably don’t. 

• Last year our church “lost” a pastor. We didn’t technically LOSE him; he happily found love again and remarried after being widowed and they moved to do ministry together and we were very very happy for him!  
• Last November, we called a new pastor with a sweet family we came to love.
• And last month, the unexpected happened when that pastor (bi-vocational) was transferred six hours away (and had to step down as pastor – and all parties were satisfied that God’s hand was evident in that move.)

Not only did our church lose our new pastor, but we had already set the stage to leave as well, planning to pursue James’ final training in church planting. To boot, our remaining leadership team stepped down as well. Our church body was pastorless, leaderless, and more than a little concerned about the future of the church. Over the past month there has been much meeting, much planning and MUCH MUCH praying. (There has been much prayer on our part, too!)

I’ll skip to the end of all that and say that last week our church body officially called James to be the interim pastor for a time, and He willingly accepted.

Let me just take a moment to GIVE GOD ALL THE GLORY. Isn’t it incredible what God can do in a person’s life? My husband’s heart now desires nothing but GOD’S WILL and he seeks to serve Him in all that he does. What a change from the man who wanted to do what HE wanted to do and who accused God of not listening to him or helping him with what HE thought he needed! 

It was said by one of our interim leaders that perhaps God put the call of ministry on James’ heart so he could begin here. A leaderless church is much like a church plant. Indeed, his planting mentor has said something similar (and is still a present mentor and teacher in this – it’s not a change of plans as much a change of locale.) As I said in the beginning, God tends to work things out as HE sees fit. 

A few years ago I never would have imagined my husband being called to church planting, or being called as a pastor. A few months ago, I never would have imagined it would be so soon. I knew it was coming, but actual pastoring was still a ways off.

And also, I still had time before I ever had to consider saying these five words:

“Hello, I’m the pastor’s wife.”

Whaaaaat?

No, really, that realization didn’t even set in at first.

Seriously, y’all. I’m IN. I AM. But am I ready? I’m a mess!! I’m thankful that my “pastor’s wife” status can begin with family, with people who love me. And I pray that I am humble and gracious and sweet-mannered and all the things a good pastor’s wife should be. (Not that they are perfect, I know they aren’t. But I’m just so excessively… messy. I fret about that a lot more than I probably should do.) I hope and pray that God can work on ME, mold me and make me and change me and fill me. I pray he takes this messy, forgetful, ball-dropping, overwhelmed, tardy, talky, short-tempered, absent-minded momma and uses her for HIS glory.

So if you feel inclined, pray for me, y’all??

And now you know why I have been steadily more and more absent as the year as progressed, and why I have been especially absent the past month. (And why I am likely to be fairly sporadic for a while.) In fact, I’m making some changes around here already. I’m UN-signing up for a lot of things. I cutting ties and partnerships to things that make me feel like I *have* to blog about something. I’m refusing further blog reviews (have been for a while, really,) and I’m just letting some stuff go. And in a weird way, I feel freer to actually WRITE. Like, real writing. Not like professional blogger writing. Know what I mean? 

It’s kind of surreal all that God has done really. But I really do give Him all the credit. It’s not me, it’s not my husband. I know that we are still very imperfect, but I also know that God is even still working on us. He is always working, we are never (on this side of Heaven) fully perfected.

I never imagined this or even saw it coming. But God knew, didn’t He? =) 

Credit: Public Domain Image by George Hodan