Fumbling My Way

I remember the first article that I ever wrote was about Joe leaving to Calgary. I still remember that whole time period in my life. Lauren and I had our nasty little break up and Joe had just left, Dom was planning on leaving. Darryl was leaving in a month, Phil had just left for school and Kevin, well he was hanging out with Lauren. My life seemed all messed up; all my supporters were leaving or already gone. I remember sitting on my parent’s bed, and I was crying. I don’t usually cry. I think that was the last time that I fully did cry. That was over three years ago. It was burnout, emotional breakdown and I couldn’t handle life.

I wrote then about how I needed to learn to trust God when things were messed. Especially when the control was out of my hands. I was so concerned about the youth group at the time, but God taught me in one sentence something so invaluable. “God cares more than I do.” It was that article that Relevant published and started my love for writing.

Looking back on everything, and now the tons of articles, blog entries and stories that I’ve written, I still think that is one of the most important lessons I’ve learned. I spoke at the youth group last night at my church. I walked away feeling discouraged at my ‘performance.’ I found myself fumbling around my words, not getting my point across very well, fidgeting with the music stand and possibly sweating more than usual. Something just didn’t add up in my mind about the whole night. Maybe it was the fact that I was speaking to a group of youth that I’m starting to become comfortable around and vice versa. Maybe it was the fact that I was speaking to another youth pastor’s group. Or maybe it was the Day Camp Director watching from the back, the one that gave me third place in the photo scavenger hunt even after we got a picture with Mike Bradley (the Sarnia mayor).

I’m really not sure what it was. I talked to a few people after and they said it was fine. I talked to the youth pastor and he had no night changing criticisms. It was really just me sitting there with my own attacks of discouragement. With all that said, I am learning to let God use my Moses-type speech and my Peter-screw-ups and my Jonah-heart and change that somehow to get his perfect and amazing message across. I am still learning that God cares for the youth I speak to more than I ever could, and I am still learning that it doesn’t really matter what I do up there. If God wants to move, he will move. Like Joe said, I could pee in a bucket and if God moves it will be amazing, and I could have the best sermon ever and if God wasn’t speaking through me then I would be worth nothing more than me peeing in a bucket.