Bringing Him Glory?

Today I was driving and listening to one of my billion podcast and sermons I listen to every week. God has an amazing way of speaking to me in that way and I enjoy listening to other people. As I was driving and listening to a guy named JR Vassar. The sermon I was listening to was titled "Freedom From the Fear of Man." His point was how we spend so much of our time trying to please man and we become needy people in some way shape or form. This really opened up my eyes to an issue that I have. Many times I will miss the calling of God because of the fear of looking like an idiot. Now the catch is that I have no problem with telling people about my faith. In-fact it is a gift of mine. My fear is with people who are above me and who have some type of control over my life. Mine has more to do with the fact that at times I feel that people really don't see all that I do for the kingdom of God. I am not the type of person who likes the spot light and in-fact I spend allot of time staying out of it because I believe that God has another calling on my life. I tend to have more of a personal relationship with people instead of just knowing them.

A year and half ago my church youth group started growing in numbers and in-fact it tripled in numbers. Students were giving their life to Christ left and right and I must admit it was nice and I felt like God was moving and he was. But in December that stopped and I started seeing God taking us down a new path with new I ideas. A student that I had from an early age started talking about leaving and a few months later he did. I was amazed with how I felt and others felt. Today I believe it was a sinful way of thinking because here was this young man knowing that God was calling him to serve some where else. Because he was my star student, and to be honest with you I loved him allot and put allot of time into him. People would complement how he was and I found it to be awesome that I was the person who told the youth pastor at the time to give him shot in serving. Then he leaves! I become upset and hurt...let me honest I have had kids come in and out and cared but not like this.

 I owe God more with my life and ministry for many reasons. For the first time in a while my family is better then it had been for well over 12 years. My family was in church and a lady from a small baptist church reached her and I am seeing God change her heart. God had answered my prayers and here I was shaking my fist at God.

Because I wanted people to notice what I was doing for God I became so concerned with the glory of Nick and not the glory of a king. It was unfair to me, God, and his flock. Things became weird because God was doing something new. I was fighting it and I knew God wanted me to go to the cross, but lets face it when things tumble down and numbers aren't as good, you look like you are not doing your job. But through his grace and through only what God could do this started changing.

December of 2009 I knew it was time to deal with my heart and I knew it wasn't talking with a bunch of people or even a cry fest. I needed to spend time alone and begging God to show me his heart and to change my heart to see the beauty of what God had giving to me. How selfish of me and anyone else who would think that God only moves through our numbers. To think if I am just creative enough people will come and worship and we will see God move. I started seeing that God didn't need any help bring people to him, it was simple he had so much love for us he wanted to include us in it.

I compare it to when my father was teaching me how to keep the yard cut. My dad included me by taking the lawn mower and making a square and telling me to stay with in that square. Now when I look at it, i was in the way and really not helping. Even when I was five or six with my bubble mower, he put me behind him and just encouraged me by telling me I mowed all that myself. The reality was I was following his path that he already started. I was in his way and it took him a little longer.

How awesome is it that God uses us and wants us to simply follow him and join in on what he is doing. However God is different from my father, he doesn't want me to pretend that I did something that he was responsible for. God knows what you and I need,  and that is to be rescued from our way of thinking.

Now there are only three main focus points in our youth group:

• Honoring God in all we do
• Serving our God in all we do
• Worshiping God in all we do

At this point all we do is small groups. I believe this will change sooner then later because I see God bringing up a new group of students. I believe we have healthy relationships with these students and because of that we can do some more group stuff soon. But I must admit it's nice, because I no longer have that burden on me. At the same time we must maintain a healthy learning environment and having students follow rules has become easier. It's simple I am not worried about if they like me or not. We have three simple rules and I expect them to follow those rules: Respect God, Respect others, and Respect yourself. It's amazing they get it now. We allow not sexual talk or dirty joke in our youth group not because it is sinful, but because it takes away from what God is doing. The freedom is awesome in that and I found that students have really opened up to that. My point is that I don't believe I need to do anything but follow God to make it attractive.

 ^{Titus 2} Similarly, encourage the young men to be self-controlled. In everything set them an example by doing what is good. In your teaching show integrity, seriousness and soundness of speech that cannot be condemned, so that those who oppose you may be ashamed because they have nothing bad to say about us.
 Teach slaves to be subject to their masters in everything, to try to please them, not to talk back to them, ¹and not to steal from them, but to show that they can be fully trusted, so that in every way they will make the teaching about God our Savior attractive.

  My prayer: God save me from my selfish way of thinking, help me bring honor to you in all that I do.