Tuesday, June 21st

I charge you…preach the word; be ready in season and out of season… 2 Timothy 4:1,2

I have disliked these verses in the past. I felt like Paul was insisting that I needed to sermonize everyone I met. I’m no preacher. My father is (though he would never use the term), and a rather excellent one I might add. I however, am no preacher.

I have tried (and failed) to preach. I think the problem was, that I was trying to teach something that I had not yet really been passionate about myself. It’s hard to have passion about something when it has not been profoundly or personally real.

If I don’t actually know what my own relationship with God means, I could spend years in seminary and be no closer to being ready to preach. I might know the page numbers of my bible, but if I don’t know God, I am not ready to tell anyone anything.

What has God done for me? What does he mean to me? For a long time, my only answer was that He had saved me from hell. While I don’t want to go to hell and while I am glad that I’m saved from such a place, this is not necessarily a very compelling message for those who are hurting. So what do I tell others now? I tell them my story and I tell them what God means to me.

While I’m not thankful for the destruction I have caused, I am thankful for what God has done for me through my destruction. I’m thankful that I have a relationship with God that means something profound to me. I can tell others in need, that I daily recognize my own need for God. I can tell them how he continues to save me from myself. He has given me this fantastic, real life where once I caused pain and misery.

So, while I’m no preacher, I am now able to tell others what God has done for me.