Alaska Adventures: Avoiding the Trap

Usefulness.
It's a tricky thing because sometimes we feel productive when we really are unproductive and sometimes we feel unproductive when we really are productive.
Either situation: it's a trap from the enemy.

Our morning mission at times this week has seemed this way.
Under the big yellow striped tent, we have done a lot of work, but also, a lot of waiting.
And waiting can often feel like doing nothing...but waiting takes trust and waiting takes patience, and those things, my friend, do not come that easily.
So as we longed to be doing more than the waiting, we were often lured into the trap of asking "why?".

Why am I in this place instead of that?
Why am I with this person and not that one?
Why, why, why?

But what we need to be asking is simply: how?
How can You use me in this situation?
How can I make You obvious under this tent, with this person, in this...in this...waiting?
How do You want to change me?How do you want to shape me?

And all of the sudden, in the dreary rain of selfishness, we begin to see the light of self sacrifice break through the clouds, bringing the warm light of truth that lights the path of our days.

We SEE needs.
We MEET needs.
We LOVE because we are loved, not to BE loved.

And we remember the little 6 year old girl carrying all that worry, fighting through tears,
"I know my mama won't die."

We hear the woman say, "Really? I can have this? It's free? This was just what I needed!"

We hear, in that waiting, the far fetched dream of a 13 year old to own a guitar, then see it realized through Holy Spirit inspired generosity and obedience.

Yes, we feel the stretching of our lives as they're placed in God's hands and we allow Him to make us and call us useful...useful for His purposes, useful in His timing.

Useful.
Be that.
Not according to you, not for you.
For Him.
That's HOW He loves...through our available lives being used.

And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, "Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" Then I said, "Here am I! Send me."
Isaiah 6:8 ESV

We love because he first loved us.
1 John 4:19 ESV

You turn things upside down!
Shall the potter be regarded as the clay,that the thing made should say of its maker,"He did not make me";
or the thing formed say of him who formed it,"He has no understanding"?
Isaiah 29:16 ESV

But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. 2 Corinthians 4:7 ESV

And the Lord came and stood, calling as at other times, "Samuel! Samuel!" And Samuel said, "Speak, for your servant hears."
1 Samuel 3:10 ESV