Credentials

This is a repost from a couple of years ago.  It is heartening to read now.  Good food for thought as I move into a new year. Please make sure you read the update!

My best friend has been joining me in a bit of my ministry.  This is one of my lifers who has gone with me to the monastery for the past 30 years.  The one who made me get up for 6am Easter Mass.  The one who dutifully sits through hours of saying the rosary because it is her families funeral custom.  She is the one who stays true through  a difficult marriage, through the challenge of raising a child in the light, through being the one that her whole family depends on.  In my most difficult times, she has been the one that I have called on for my strength because she can handle it….not always easily, but she can.  She has the heart of a lion.

She has been sitting in on one of the classes the past couple of weeks.  I never saw any of this coming.  Me there… her with me. Her with 7th graders. Never. HA!  And we both question if we are qualified to do what we are doing;  sharing faith with teens. Qualified.

I noticed through a text she sent me that she was really connecting with some of the kids so I asked her about it.  She replied, “Yes, this was probably part of your evil plan” (to rope her in).  I laughed, “I wish I were so smart, I think someone else is in charge of this shindig!” 

We are both getting attached to so many people, and it is wonderful.

Ministry, for the seriously non-committal, is a funny thing.  On the one hand it can appear as shackles for those of us who need freedom, but it also provides freedom to be who we really are.  My friend’s depth of understanding, wisdom and mostly, humility is her recommendation.  Only God knows just how qualified she is.  She has no training, she hasn’t taught a class but she has been trained by life itself.

We both have.

It is God’s call.

I know her well enough to know that this is God’s doing.  A gift for her.

This is what was given to me during prayer today when I read this morning’s quote:

“Our qualification comes from God, who has indeed qualified us as ministers of a new covenant not of letter, but of spirit; for the letter brings death, but the Spirit gives life.”

I think sometimes that is how it is.  You are called to do something, you are pressed to show up, you are taken by the hand and asked to trust.  It is hard to resist the insistence of your Creator when you were created to do something.  It’s all time and place.  You are created to do something at this time in this place and God knows what.

 

Trust your creator.  You were created in and for the love of Jesus Christ.

Update: Well, I must first say that I love that girl.  She has, since I wrote this, become certified through the diocese to teach these courses.  She could have continued without it but she wanted the value added for the kids.  She is teaching 8th grade and has a classroom full of very intelligent and inquisitive kids.  These kids are already searching and she is trying her best to make this as meaningful as a process as she can.  I am so grateful that she is with me.  I am so grateful that we both trusted God’s voice in the end.  Evidence that when we trust and give ourselves over to God’s plan for us beautiful things can will happen.