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"Please God, anything but ______"

Here's a snippet from the presentation I gave to my church about my journey. It's basically what's in my prayer letter, just presented differently:

In general, the ministry stories I’ve heard in my life have left the impression that God leads people to do exactly the thing they least want to do. This worried me, and made me afraid to even ask God what kind of ministry He wanted to lead me into. Well, there have always been two things I’ve been clear on as far as what I’m going to do with my life: I don’t like kids, and I’m not going to be a teacher.

However, this has not prevented me from working with kids at summer camp, volunteering with LBE, and teaching Sunday School, nor from doing one-on-one tutoring with some junior high students, getting a TESOL certificate, and teaching English for a 3-week stint in Ukraine. So, methinks the lady doth protest too much. That, and God has a sense of humour.

It's struck me recently that I have found myself if not doing, at least interested in, and passionate about another formerly "please God, don't make me do ____ " ministry . After my YWAM ministry trip to Vancouver, I said all I'd learned was I was NOT cut out for urban missions. But, while I'm in no way actually involved in urban missions now, I do live contentedly in the heart of downtown where I am intentional about transportation (walking, bussing) and consuming (avoid fast food restaurants in favour of family-run restaurants, shop at small business when possible, avoid Wal-Mart) choices. So, though you won't see me volunteering in a soup kitchen any time soon, my interest is engaged in downtown issues, and anyone who's heard any of my bus rants knows I'm a some kind of self-styled voice for the voiceless on the matter (not that my "voice" ever gets much beyond the ears of my friends).

I'm not trying to pat myself on the back here for my breadth of ministry potential - far from it; I recognize how pitifully ineffectual are my little efforts - my goal in pointing this out is to glorify God for what He can do with all the gifts He's given us in spite of our hangups and prejudices.

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