S-T-R-E-T-C-H

I'm finding myself stretched almost daily. Last night Greg told me that when we start our leadership training Saturday for our new church, I'm to give my testimony. Up until now, he has referred to it as 'tell them everything about where we've been.' Easy enough. The good, the bad, the ugly. I can do that. I was thinking. . . this is information sharing. The purpose is to make sure everyone knows everything about us, so if anything ever comes up, nothing will be a surprise. Last night, however, he put it in a different light. He called it a testimony and said, "If told rightly, it will impact their hearts." He said he was even sharing verses. It felt like this was a much bigger deal than spilling my guts. I had to tell it rightly in order to impact their hearts. Verses! Yikes! And he wants me to go first! I'm feeling very threatened. All of a sudden I feel like it's a competition, and he won the toss. I'm sure it will be fine and I'll come up with something that will work, I just don't like how I got a different spin on it than I got before. At least it wasn't last minute. That was stretch #1.

Stretch #2 came in the form of a Pastoral visit. There has been a part of me that has resisted doing a 'visit'. I never liked the idea. I guess it's because I've had one and didn't appreciate it at all. It was 1986 and I had become a Christian a few months prior. I was still living somewhat of a worldly life, not dressing appropriately for a Christian woman, halter tops and too short shorts. I had visited one of the larger churches in Turlock and filled out a visitor card. One summer Sunday afternoon there was a knock on my door. I didn't have a peep hole and opened it. There stood 2 Christian men and a Christian woman from the church to visit me unannounced. Imagine my discomfort! They pretty much asked if they could come in and so we sat in my living room while they asked me questions and I asked them one question at their prompting. I wondered, "Why is it that when the choir finishes singing on Sunday morning, there is no applause, but when they finish singing on Sunday night, there is applause?" A logical question for someone trying to find out why there was an inconsistency in their worship. They replied, "Well, we feel Sunday morning is a more reverent time and applause is not appropriate then." I felt it was a weak explanation which didn't make sense to me at all, so I didn't attend there much longer. (Not to mention the unannounced and uninvited visit!).

Back to my second stretch. Greg had been wanting to visit two of the couples in our small group for some time. We had tried setting something up to see them for sometime. The men were open to it, the women not so much. (You know how us women are, we have to clean everything, which means extra work, never feel like it's good enough, and stress over it). I didn't want to put them through that.

We've done a few things for these couples the last month or two and have been by their houses because of it. We found out where this one couple lived because he and his 4 kids were at the Bible study one night (his wife was home sick with the flue and an infected root canal procedure) and he got symptoms of the flu while there. He was in no condition to drive home, with the effects coming out both ends. Greg offered to drive him and the kids home to Ceres while I followed in our car. We had to stop at our house to get my license and when I came out, he lost it in the gutter of our driveway. Anyway, that's how we knew how to get to his house. So, we set up a time to see them yesterday morning and went over. We had a great visit for about an hour, prayed for them and a friend who was there and left. I felt a little like we were intruding, but they didn't make us feel that way. I think it's because I'm kind of a private homebody and I assume others are too. Greg says that Pastors of small churches have different expectations on them than Pastors of larger churches, that's why Pastors of larger churches don't normally do home visits. It's good we went. We found out that they need 2 sets of bunk beds, as their kids don't have a place to sleep. IF YOU KNOW OF ANY BUNK BEDS OR 4 TWIN MATTRESSES OR 2 DOUBLE MATTRESSES LET ME KNOW. We'll pick up and deliver.

I continue to be stretched in this new role. Sometimes my flesh wants to fight it because these concepts are new to me, but I'm not going to let it win. There's too much at stake.

Blessings on this foggy/sunny Wednesday!