Why We Do What We Do

Text messages at 6:58 am are rarely good.  They usually mean that I have forgotten to do something, need to be somewhere, or deal with some unexpected (and perhaps tragic) event.

This morning, I got the most pleasant 6:58 am text message that I have ever received.  I'll let you read the original, then decipher it out of text-speak:

"Tom I just wittens to a frined and he said that he was goung to recoudment his life to jesus and i was like yessssssssss!"


Clear enough?  Let me share the edited version:

"Tom I just witnessed to a friend and he said that he was going to recommit his life to Jesus and I was like yessssss!"


I am not going to tell you who sent the message because I don't want to call them out or embarrass them. But I will tell you that it was from a student who is not a member of our church.  In fact, this student rides the bus every Wednesday night.  A few people might even refer to him as one of "those kids."

And I don't mind telling you:  This young man drives me up the wall.  He gives very little evidence that he's paying attention in Bible study, and I assumed that nothing even remotely sunk into his rather thick cranial region.  His mouth is the greatest evidence that I have of the potential to create the perpetual motion machine.  By the time he gets off the bus, my ears are ringing and begging for a period of extended rest.

Yet, this young man texted me at 6:58 am to share that he witnessed to someone, to share that he encouraged someone to change their life, to share that he had communicated the message of Christ out of concern for a friend.

And I thought that we were all wasting our breath.

How foolish and faithless I am to think that, just because this young man didn't respond to me, that the Holy Spirit was not moving in his life.  When we wonder why we are doing the ministry that we do, perhaps we all need to remember that it's not our ministry.  It belongs to a God that works well beyond the things that we can see or understand.

Doing the ministry that we do on Wednesday nights at Inman First Baptist is often a frustrating proposition.  Our lives would be much easier if we did not work with "those kids."  We rarely get the benefit of seeing how Christ is impacting the lives of students, here and now--and that sometimes leaves us wondering, "Why do we do this?"

That AM text message gives us the answer.  It's the things that happen that we don't see, the places where the Holy Spirit sinks into the hearts of students in spite of us (and them).  We do what we do because God makes great things happen when we open our hearts for Him to work.

Here's the thing:  There are no "our kids" and "those kids."  They are all God's kids, which by definition makes them all "our kids."  It doesn't matter that these youngsters may never join the church, serve on a committee or give a dime in the offering plate.  But because we have chosen to treat them as children of Christ, they are learning and growing and spreading that message to others.  And who knows how many times they do that without sending us a text message?

Keep your hearts open to all of "our kids" on Wednesday night.  And when it all seems too frustrating, remember to keep doing what God has called you to do.  Just let Him worry about the final results.