So far 2011 has been quite eventful. I spent the first two days in Bali/traveling and the came home to see a relationship end and a new school year begin. Its amazing how God can work in our lives so quickly and through such incredible ways. I would have never thought a week in a foreign land would bring so much clarity to my thoughts and so much boldness to my life.

I needed to hear this today so maybe someone else does too. Sometimes I get so caught up in my own life and I forget that I may be making an impact on those around me without even noticing. I have been following Baby Samuel’s story and it has touched my life. Today it reminded me that our impact is eternal and may never be revealed to us. But read on..

…But, amidst this routine, there are literally thousands praying. Hundreds are retweeting and reposting. People from all over the world are praying for Samuel, and this is due only to the Holy Spirit placing it upon believers’ hearts in earnest for a precious little boy. But does Samuel know it? Dare I say does he even care?

I do. Kelly does. Those closest to us do. But Samuel breathes with the help of the machine without noticing all that he is being used to do. People have shared with me over and over again that Samuel is an inspiration to them. Others have uttered prayers from previously prayerless hearts. Some are giving God a chance once again; others have never prayed so hard in their lives.

But does Samuel notice how he is being used by the Almighty God? I think not. But I think it doesn’t matter. I would argue that in our own lives, we may or may not know how much we are being used. I am not sure it matters that we know. What matters most is that God is glorified in our lives; whether by life or by death. Samuel, I believe with all my heart, is not the story. It’s God’s story affecting thousands through a life that isn’t even noticing. Why? So that God alone gets the glory.

I have to challenge myself, and you dear reader therefore, that we too have the same desire in being used by God. Sometimes we have no idea how we are being used by the Lord. Many of us seek the fame, attention, and will of our own lives. We seek comfort, security, rest, peace, financial well being, yet in our seeking, we make it about ourselves. Samuel is a special child; he has no idea how he is being used. Yet truly, we should in all humility seek to decrease in our lives as the Lord increases. Samuel has no choice in the matter; we on the other hand, do.

As many of you have encouraged me during this time, let us spur one another on in good deeds for Jesus Christ. Let me encourage you to make it your aim to decrease in your life so the Lord increases; give Him all the glory. Some of us need to be knocked out. Some of us need to be put on His life support. All of us need the love and forgiveness offered only through Jesus Christ. It is for this reason that we decrease and give God the glory in our lives. This alone is enough to praise Him in all we do.

Be blessed, rest in the arms of the Almighty tonight, and place your life again in the only capable life support available to you; Jesus Christ. Thank you all again for your prayers and I can’t wait to see God continue to move with glory through the life of a precious baby who doesn’t even notice.

To me:)

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It’s that time of year…we start thinking about what we are thankful for. It should be something we do all year, but it especially comes up around this time of year. So here goes a thank you.

SHAUNA NIEQUIST | 09 NOVEMBER 2010

You tell what you know, what you’ve earned, what you’ve learned the hard way. You watch it fall on what seem to be deaf ears, and you mutter something under your breath, something about pearls before swine. But then 10 years later, you realize one fragment of your story has now been woven into someone else’s, a very necessary thing, a bridge to a new way of understanding and living. I didn’t need proof from a theologian or a tip from a church practitioner. I needed a piece of a story, something real and full of life and blood and breath and heartache, something way more than an idea, something that someone had lived through, a piece of wisdom earned the hard way. That’s why telling our stories is so important.

There are two myths we tend to believe about our stories: the first is that they’re about us, and the second is that because they’re about us, they don’t matter. But they’re not only about us, and they matter more than ever right now. When we, any of us who have been transformed by Christ, tell our own stories, we’re telling the story of who God is. Preaching is important, certainly. But it can’t be the only way we allow God’s story to be told in our midst.

I’m less and less interested in the ruminations of a scholar and more and more compelled by stories with grit and texture and blood and guts and humanity. I’m compelled by stories from everyday people whose lives sound a lot more like mine than the stories of superstars and high achievers. I’m compelled by stories that are ugly at the beginning and then oddly beautiful, stories from around the world, stories that laugh in the faces of gender and racial and socioeconomic boundaries.

I’m not interested in talking heads discussing war and poverty from behind a desk or from behind a pulpit. I want someone to look me in the eye and tell me they’re scared too, sometimes, about the mess we’ve made around the world and the violence both around us and within us. And then I want that person to invite me down on my knees right next to them, shoulders brushing, listening to one another breathing in and breathing out.

The biggest, most beautiful story in the world deserves better than to be told by the same voices over and over again. The story really is actually being told through our little stories, and by sharing our lives, not just our sermons, we’re telling God’s story in as reverent and divine ways as it has ever been told.

When I worked at a church a few years ago, it was my job to help people tell their stories on Sunday mornings at our gatherings. And a funny thing happened. When we were at the coffee shop, when it was just me and them and their story, their story came out in fits and starts, unvarnished and raw. We cried and laughed, and every time I was amazed at what God had done in this person’s life.

And then almost every time, when they arrived on Sunday, they looked a little less like themselves. They were kind of a distant, polished, fancy version of themselves, and more remarkably, when they walked up on that stage, they sounded a lot less like themselves. They stopped believing their story was enough, and they started saying all the phrases and quoting all the verses we’ve all heard a thousand times, turning them from sacred songs into platitudes and cliches. They did it because we as a community have trained them and have been trained ourselves to believe a story isn’t enough.

I could not disagree more. Let’s resist the temptation to hide behind theology the way a bad professor hides behind theorems and formulas. We dilute the beauty of the Gospel story when we divorce it from our lives, our worlds, the words and images God is writing right now on our souls.

And let’s stop acting as if religious professionals are the only ones who have a right and a responsibility to tell God’s story. If you are a person of faith, it is your responsibility to tell God’s story, in every way you can, every form, every medium, every moment. Tell the stories of love and redemption and forgiveness every time you experience them. Tell the stories of reconciliation and surprise and new life wherever you find them.

My life is not a story about me. And your life’s not a story about you. My life is a story about who God is and what He does in a human heart. There’s nothing small or inconsequential about our stories. There is, in fact, nothing bigger. And when we tell the truth about our lives—the broken parts, the secret parts, the beautiful parts—then the Gospel comes to life, an actual story about redemption, instead of abstraction and theory and things you learn in Sunday school.

If I could ask you to do just one thing, it’s this: consider that your own silence may be a part of the problem. If you want your community to be marked by radical honesty, by risky, terrifying, ultimately redemptive truth-telling, you must start telling your truth first.

If we allow the Gospel to be told only on Sundays, only in sanctuaries, that life-changing story will lose its ability to change lives. When Christ walked among us, He entrusted the Gospel to regular people—not religious professionals. If you have been transformed by the grace of God, then you have within you all you need to write your manifesto, your poem, your song, your battle cry, your love letter to a beautiful and broken world.

-I love this article! I pray that my life may be marked by honestly and openness and that my story may be used in powerful and mighty ways. Keep telling yours too!!

(You get two today! and a promise I will pick up the blog pace!)