Wednesday, May 27, 2009

3am thoughts

after a wonderful weekend back in VA with my family and friends, i came back to CA with a cold. i promised my group for a class that i would finish the paper that is due friday by last night so they could look over it in time to make changes, so i was trying to work hard on that last night. while at home, i met up with some great friends who i met through a young adults church group (called 1830) that i was on the leadership team for.

exhausted, i went to bed at 11pm PT, 2am ET, but i didn't sleep well. i had taken some cold medicine that might have wound me up. i was definitely stressed about the paper i was working on. i also was still mentally trapped between 2 worlds - VA and CA. all of these things may have had an effect on my not sleeping well.

i woke up at maybe 3am with some deep thoughts going through my head. some were for the paper i was writing, in the transformational development section, some i thought were for the paper i was writing, but they sounded a lot like the vision i had for 1830 a few years ago. it also sounded like some of the personal strengths i should have put into a paper i wrote a few weeks ago, or like part of the "personal ministry calling" section of a paper i finished a week ago. as i drifted back to sleep, i thought about how it should apply to the church as a whole, and also to oasis pasadena, in particular (my church here). i also thought that i want to be a person, no matter where i am or what churches or organizations or schools i am affiliated with, who engenders these things.

- empowering people to live the life they have reason to value

- promoting human dignity

- inviting them to join with us:
- to discover their God-given gifts
- to become equipped to use them
- to now go and serve

Lord, make me a person who speaks life instead of criticism. help me promote the gifts i see in others, even at the expense of my own fame or popularity. grant me the trust and grace to delegate to others i want to keep for myself. help me let people go to send them into new ministries.

1 comment:

Elijah Davidson said...

I'm always amazed at the quality of 3AM thoughts.