"Just Give Me Jesus"

These few days I have been questioning what is it that has me sad about my serving. Am I not happy with what I do? Have I lost the joy of serving? I thought for awhile about those two questions and my answer is "NO". I'm not unhappy with what I do. I like what I do and I do it joyfully. I actually rejoice when I have to go and pick someone coming out of prison who is going to be part of our transitional house. Weeks before their release date, toiletries baskets are prepared, messages sent to volunteers to be ready, activities and places to go are planned. So, what is it?

Then this morning I felt the need to watch this video which is a part of a 6-lesson series. I have watched it before but somehow I needed to go back and watch the last session. I really do not remember what it covers; all I know is that I have to watch it. God knows what we need. This session presented a lady who was serving food to the homeless at a shelter her father had opened. She had a bad attitude and was complaining about a girl at the shelter. Her father asks her: "Do you know her name? Have you care to ask her that?" Then he tells his daughter to leave. She says she wants to stay. When asked why? She replies, "Because this is what we are supposed to do, right? We are supposed to feed the hungry and help the poor." The father says, "No. I do it because I love the Lord and therefore I do it out of love for HIS creation not because I'm supposed to do it." Then in the video I'm reminded that to love the Lord and follow HIM, is going to cost me something. The guy in the movie has left his job to open the shelter and moved his family to a smaller house. I stopped to think, "Maybe that's it. The sadness comes from something I have lost. What is it that I'm crying about?" And then, I knew.

I have lost and I'm missing my privacy. Even though, that has been obvious to me all these years and to others, I thought I have accepted it. But after almost a year of having back to back guests, and attending to their needs day in and day out, and putting up with so much ungratefulness, I realized how much I miss my privacy. I finally put the finger on my sadness. Talking to a friend and volunteer at the house, I tell her, "The things I miss the most are the little things. Like reading my Bible in the couch with no one looking over my shoulder and asking, "What are you reading?" or "Can you help me with the computer now?" without any consideration of my own time and needs. It is having a cup of coffee sitting in the backyard watching the bluebirds chasing the squirrels or the cat avoiding the dog. But then as I prayed and wanted to mourn the loss (I thought that's what I needed to do), Philippians 3 comes to mind. Some of the verses I have memorized and now they come to mind reminding me of the futility of my thoughts.

Paul writes: "Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of things... that I may gain Christ." (Phil 3:8). As my mind remembers that, I think how foolish I have been. How I have left the enemy to fog my mind to forget momentarily --- well almost for a week --- that I have gained so much more, I have GAINED CHRIST! Yes, I have lost privacy but "for the excellence of the knowledge of Jesus"! See, the blinders come down immediately with the Scriptures. There is nothing this world can offer that would surpass the fact that I come to know HIM better; that my intimacy grows with the knowledge of knowing HIM and gaining HIM. I can be "found in HIM" like Paul continues in those verses. Whatever it is that we "suffer loss" for has no comparison to what was done for us in the cross and to what we gain. As Anne Graham Lotz says: "Just give me Jesus!"