One difficulty we experience in our lives is the discouragement we sometimes feel when we can’t see what God is doing in our lives. Has that ever happened to you?
I remember one time early in the ministry of Campus Crusade for Christ when I felt like giving up. My involvement in the ministry had started out so positive. When Bill began working on the campus of UCLA, I was teaching school in Los Angeles. I decided that to share Bill’s vision to reach others for Christ I needed to quit my job and work full time alongside him. He agreed enthusiastically. So that’s what I did, and we saw tremendous fruit. He worked with the male coeds and I worked with the women. That first year, I saw fifty women come to faith in Jesus Christ. I helped to train them to share their faith with others and to grow in their Christian walk. The experience was one of the most fulfilling I ever had.
Then Bill and I, moved into the Bel Air mansion of Dr. Henrietta Mears, who was Christian Education Director at Hollywood Presbyterian Church. We were just minutes from the UCLA campus. This allowed us to expand our ministry to college students, and the traffic in the house mushroomed. How glorious to see all those young people meeting in our home, praying, singing, learning, and enthusiastic about Jesus Christ!
But I didn’t count on all the work that would become my responsibility. I had to clean the house, cook the food, and clean up after the students left. Our Moorish “castle” was a huge place! And there were so many meetings. I went from being the one who trained the women to the one who was stuck in the kitchen. Bill kindly questioned how much time I had spent in Bible Study that day. I reacted inwardly, “That’s not my problem – I’m tired.”
Ultimately, Bill suggested that we hire a housekeeper to help with the work; so we did. Still, I was not finding the same fulfillment that I had experienced when working on campus. Trying to determine each day whether I would go to campus to minister or stay at home was a constant battle for me. In my frustration, I knew that I wasn’t doing an adequate job with either.
Then came the children. First Zac, our beautiful baby son. For awhile I found it fun to be at home, free from the meetings, playing a role as wife and mother. But after a few months, my opinion changed when I discovered that my “freedom” was really just a further round of responsibilities.
Then we were blessed with a second son, Brad. What a joyful event! But about the same time, our housekeeper left without notice. Because of the students who were living with us and the many who were in and out of our home constantly, she found the housework too strenuous.
With each week that passed, I found myself more physically and emotionally drained. I was becoming a dissatisfied, critical, grumpy person. Repeatedly, I said to Bill, “Honey, we’ve got to move. I can’t stand this house any longer. All day long I clean, cook, and watch the children, and I can’t take it anymore.” Soon my husband, my children, Miss Mears, and the students were as irritating to me as the house itself.
A lovely house. A successful husband. An effective ministry. Two beautiful sons. Wasn’t this everything I’d dreamed and worked for? This wasn’t fulfillment. Where was the confidence that my faith should give me? Why was I struggling?
I knew if I didn’t find a solution, I was going to be a dissatisfied woman for a long time. Then one day God showed me that the problem was with my attitude. Almost every woman in ministry struggles with the same problems that I had with the responsibilities of family and ministry. I read John 10:10 where Jesus says, “My purpose is to give life in all its fullness.” This meant that He wanted me to have the most fulfilling life possible. He had a solution to my problem, but it wasn’t going to be to give me the easy life.
Miss Mears explained to me to think of all my cares resting in the palm of my left hand, weighing me down and robbing me of all my joy even to the security of my relationship with God. She suggested that I think of God as my right hand and physically put all of the cares in my left hand into my right hand as a gift to God. Just turn loose and let Him carry the burdens.
He wanted me to cast all my cares on Him, to let Him satisfy my needs and to care for me (1 Peter 5:7).
Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about what happens to you.
This was a new attitude for me! Instead of solving my problems myself by “working smarter and harder,” I could trust God with everything and let Him work it all out. God began to give me solutions, such as allowing some of the students to help me prepare food or clean up after a meal. Most were more than willing to help. Little by little, God turned my situation around as I turned my problems over to Him.
Amazingly, then He led me to begin sharing with women’s groups, particularly pastors’ wives, about my own search concerning my lack of fulfillment. I openly admitted the problems and defeats that I had experienced, and most important, the solutions He had given me. How satisfying to hear other women say, “Thank you for admitting your weaknesses and sharing the answers God gave you. I am struggling with the same problems.” From this response, I began to realize that sharing these solutions made my difficult experiences seem even more worthwhile. I was able to encourage other women!
What happened to me during that time is what I like to call “a moment of faith.” This is a time—it could be an instantaneous realization or a more gradual recognition—when a person sees what God is doing in her life. What I saw at that moment was that God was stretching my faith and asking me to place my situation in His hands. He was using and molding me, but I needed to be willing and pliable. My responsibility was to give up some of my “rights” to allow God to work for my greater good and the good of others. It wasn’t that God was doing more or less at that moment in time, but that I finally saw His purposes.
Think of your “moments of faith” and thank God for them!
“Our souls were made to ‘mount up with wings,’and they can never be satisfied with anything short of flying.Our souls chafe and fret, and cry out for freedom.” --Hannah Whitall Smith
By Vonette Bright
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