Future Ministry and Expectations and Responsibilities

I have been aware of answering these topics in past entries, just not with titles. But I wanted to focus in today on these two specifically.

FUTURE MINISTRY

Ministry as a vocation is something that through this process I've gotten more excited about, even if my future job won't be focused around an office and Sunday church services. During this internship I've been interacting much more with adults than I thought I would- I knew Drew would be around, and Charlie as co-pastor and Chelsea being in charge of basically everything- every phone call, every request, always getting it done with a smile and effectively. It's been neat to build relationships with other adults in ministry who are passionate about both sides- the planning, the preparing and the dreaming, and then the execution of these dreams and plans with students and living their lives alongside them, most intentionally on Sundays but changing their lives in ways that change the way that the student's live their lives throughout the week.

A lot of this ministry work, I'm seeing, is preparation in the form of bringing ideas to life. Not only do good ideas have to come, but you also have to get them to a level that is understood by High-Schoolers (14-18 year olds). You have to know their culture, passions, interests, etc simply to be able to reach into their world and bring the Light of Christ. ONE has an amazing ministry here. Teens are learning to see God more clearly and love him more deeply. It's hard not to get excited about that.

My ministry, God willing, will be as a counselor. Even as I type that, I realize that counseling is ministry if one is a believer, and ministry is also counseling if one is a believer. As a counselor I hope to speak into the spiritual lives of my clients, just like ministers speak God into the lives of their congregation. All of it is speaking truth. As a Christian counselor I ultimately know that healing comes from the hands of Jesus, not my own hands. Ministers know this too.

This internship has shown me that I love working with other adults, which will no doubt be a part of working most likely with other counselors in a counseling group. Through some mistakes and some victories in communication, I have learned better how to relate to those older than myself (a process that really got rolling when I started college).
I feel myself becoming more of an adult through every experience God gives me.

EXPECTATIONS AND RESPONSIBILITIES

This internship is constantly surprising me. I've learned to be a "flexible servant." I do whatever odd job needs to be done, and I can go from stuffing envelopes to sermon prep in 10 seconds flat if I have to. It's actually a gift to be able to do that- it makes it ever clearer to me that service is service- and truly no job is bigger or smaller than another, and honestly, it's all Kingdom work. I'm not going to complain because if Drew or Chelsea tells me it needs to be done, and somebody needs to do it, and that somebody is me-I can rejoice instead of grumble, because in whatever way, I'm helping them do their jobs more effectively. As they equip me to be a servant, I equip them to get to move forward in whatever other plans they have to execute. It's a good feeling to free people up to move forward in their calling.

I spend a lot of my time doing whatever Drew needs me to do- sermon prep, copying, calling parents, welcome, communion, being in charge of the welcome table, updating the website, calling students, setting up and tearing down, etc etc. That and whatever else Chelsea or Charlie needs me to do.
Nothing ever looks exactly how you've planned, but God is always working through it. I'm learning that in a major way.

As far as expectations and hopes I have for myself, I'm excited to be a part of the RUSH (Sr. High Leadership) retreat coming up next weekend. Drew and I are about to prep for that and get the students ready to learn more about themselves spiritually (assessments, tests, etc) so that they can be the best servants they can. I took my own strengths assessment just yesterday to prepare for it.

According to this assessment, my top 5 strengths are: Empathy, Input, Developer, Positivity and Adaptability. When I find out more about what those actually mean and how I hope to apply them, I'll put it up here.