I can’t believe this is my third year working in Ministry full time🤯
a quick(ish) story time:
I had just graduated high school and I was so unsure if I could hear Holy Spirit. I’d been accepted to my “dream school” and was trying to pursue something even though my life felt like it lacked any direction at all. The more I thought about leaving for school the more squirmish I got. Until one night I sat down with my mom and asked, all nervously, “mom…what if I backed out of this college thing..?” She replied, “Then you wouldn’t go…and God would still be with you whatever you do. He knows all the plans for your life, Julia”
*deep sigh of relief* (thanks, mom.)
A couple months later I couldn’t shake the idea of ministry. But I’d tell Jesus things like:
“I don’t even know what that means.” and “But what do you even want for my life?”
Eventually I just googled “missions trips” and up pops The World Race. I knew I was supposed to do it right then. In that moment. Holy Spirit was speaking so clearly but in my brain I was thinking: “I guess I just have this super intense guttural feeling that’s taking over my entire body that I should do The World Race” haha. Jesus is so patient with us. He wasn’t mad that I didn’t know it was his voice yet. He’s just like, “One step at a time, Julia.”
I do The World Race. Jesus reveals who He is more and more to me. I recognize His voice now and I realize how He’s spoken to me my ENTIRE LIFE. I see how everything is all about Him. I get healing. I get restored hope. I get freedom. And I’m left so baffled, because
I can’t understand how the one who is supposed to be getting all the glory, keeps pouring out blessings onto me? I keep giving Him everything and He keeps giving me all of Himself. What kind of love is this? I can’t understand it but here I am totally ruined by it.
I do a secondary leadership program with AIM the next year and quickly discover that there’s an undiscoverable amount of Jesus to know. I start working at Dicks Sporting Goods during the leadership school and think i’ll be there for 5 months. I work there for 3 years. EVERYTIME I start to think “surely I’m done working here because ‘doesn’t God have way cooler things for me’ (lol)” God says, “not yet- there’s more”. So I wait. I learn about what it means to love God’s people in a way that I never have before. Patience and endurance become instilled in me in new measures I didn’t recognize I would need, but God knew I would need for ministry. I make friends that mean the world to me, and I learn what deeper reliance on God really means.
Then one day I’m just driving in my car and I hear God say, “I’m releasing you from this retail job” and I couldn’t believe it! A few months later I got a call from the worship director, and now a dear friend, asking if I wanted her job. (wink wink Erika) You can’t make this stuff up, people.
Now I’ve been here for three years leading worship, training, discipling, and being a part of raising up the next generation of worshippers who will know the voice of their Heavenly Father and who will worship Him in spirit and in truth.
Life is wild.
THE END
But to be honest, more like “the beginning” Because that’s life with God and being in relationship with Him. Quite the adventure & always full of new beginnings.
Thanks for reading some of what I’ve been pondering in my second full year!
Thanks, friends.
PS. Jesus knows what is best for your life and He loves you very much. He’s patient with you as you learn the sound of His voice.
PSS. I am fully support raised in my position here at Adventures In Missions. if you would like to join my team of monthly supporters, then use this link! and please, lets connect! (816-738-4563)
