Submissive Faith. by K. Chavez.

A new year is at our doorstep. A new time God has allowed us to enjoy with our family, our church, our friends. It's that kind of year when God is calling many of us to take a step into a new level of faith, the type of faith that requires total submission to God. There have been many times in my life when God has called me to do the unexpected; in ministry, in my family life, and in my personal life. I’d like to share with you a time when the Holy Spirit made his will sweet in my life. 

About 6 years ago, I was a blessed to be part of a wonderful church. There were many talented musicians and singers. Unfortunately, all of a sudden some of the musicians moved, others left the church and slowly we began to lose all the talented people in the worship band. It was no longer a band as there was only one musician, the drummer.  

My pastor asked me to join the worship group but I didn’t feel that I could sing very well and I didn’t play any instruments. However, I obeyed the pastor and joined the group. The group didn’t have a leader and nobody volunteered to lead it, so after a couple of months, the pastor asked me to become the leader. I was hesitant to do this because after all, I had no music knowledge. How can I lead them? But in submission to God, I accepted.

I became the leader of a group of people who wanted to worship God through music but had no training and little talent. I was not too encouraged. I didn’t want to be a leader of a group like this and I didn’t have the training to get things going. I cried every night and prayed that God would send musicians and singers to the band, but nothing happened. So I prayed and waited.

Later that year, my mother-in-law gave my oldest son an electric piano for Christmas because she wanted him to begin taking piano lessons. When I saw the electric piano I felt the Lord speak to my heart and tell me “You will worship me with this instrument”. I thought… “I don’t know how to play the piano; I will make a fool of myself. How can I possible think that I can stand up in front of the congregation, play an instrument and lead worship? I’m not called for that” I put God's calling aside and continue to rehearse the worship team with prerecorded tracks on a CD. 

During one of those rehearsals, one of the team members suggested that we do one day of prayer and fasting. She felt we needed it, we were practically putting people to sleep during services! So we did it, we got together and prayed.  That day as we were reading God's Word, a passage spoke to my heart. It read “But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9). I understood that He had chosen me for such time as this. God chose me to lead this group of people and He would glorify Himself through us. 

I got home and took the keyboard and prayed. I asked the Lord to help me learn how to play this instrument. I didn’t have any money for piano lessons, so I took my computer and searched for free piano lessons. I came across various videos on YouTube with mini lessons and I began to use them. I started to practice every single day. To make a long story short; God helped me to learn chords rather quickly. I began to play the piano and sing at the same time in just a couple of months. And every time I did it, it was as if I was someone else. God would take over and use me like I never imagined He could. In less than 4 months I was leading worship at the church and the presence of God was felt during every service. 

About a year later a friend and a professional guitar player, came to visit. He went to one of our practices and couldn’t believe what God was doing with our group. I told him the testimony and he was in awe. He told me how playing an instrument and singing at the same time was not a simple task and required much practice, and was amazed how I could do it without any trouble. The most amazing thing was that I didn’t even take real lessons. It was all God at work. 

I never thought that at my age I would be able to learn to play an instrument so quickly and without much assistance. But God honored my faithful submission to His call and glorified Himself in my life. I never saw myself as a musician, but God had other plans for my life. I allowed God to take control and He showed me that he can "chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things--and the things that are not--to nullify the things that are" (1 Corinthians 1:28). He chose me, a grown woman, mother of three, without any previous knowledge of music, to be the leader of a band and worship Him through music. Praise God for His perfect plans.

Yup! that's me on the keyboard.

“Do not think that loving submission to God in consecration does away with your personhood. Far from it; loving submission is the way to find your true personhood, your true self.” (Tracy 89). I had to put my fears and own plans aside and faithfully submitted to God’s plans for my life. I found out that I had this musical ability that I would have never noticed if I wouldn’t have allowed God to take control of my life. I am so thankful that God used my pastor to lead me into God’s purpose for my life. I am happy that I chose to submit rather than rebel against His will for my life. 

My dear woman of God. This year a challenge you to take the step of faith God has called you to make. To submit to His will and calling. To rest in His arms and know that He's in control and His plans are perfect for your life. 

The Importance of Church Outreach in the Local Community - by Karen Chavez

As soon as the Church realizes how important it is to offer Outreach Programs to the local community, it will begin to see the positive impact Outreach will have in the church and neighborhood.  Church Outreach is a vital part of the congregation’s growth; without it, there is little hope of advancement.  Churches need to implement Outreach Programs in their local communities as an act of obedience to God’s command, to lead others to the Lord, and to promote church growth 

To establish Outreach Programs is to act in obedience to the Lord. When Jesus gave the disciples specific instructions through the Great Commission, he was telling them to go out into the world. They needed to get out of their comfort zones. For churches, this is accomplished when outreach is done. Missionaries are a great example of people who have chosen to live what the Great Commission demands. Many of them leave the comfort of home to live in a foreign place, preach the Gospel, and provide services to the community where they have settled.  Today, the local community is the mission field of the Church. This is the “land” the Lord wants the Church to conquer. It is the job of the Christians to get out of the comfort zone and begin to obey the instructions given by Christ himself.

Leading others to the Lord is one of the main reasons for Church Outreach. Through the established programs the Church can show the love of God to the people being served. When a food pantry or a clothing closet is offered to the community, the Church is doing exactly what the Lord expects. Matthew 5:35-40 says “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat… I needed clothes and you clothed me…I was in prison and you came to visit me... ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’ ” Programs can be designed in various ways that will allow an evangelistic message to be shared with the folks. A great idea is to give New Testaments or devotionals with the goods that are being distributed. Outreach creates a number of opportunities to share the message of Salvation to more people in a practical way.

 

A major benefit of Outreach Programs is church growth.  If the Church utilizes its building as the main location for the Outreach events, the people that attend will become familiar with its facilities. When people start feeling comfortable with going to the church building to participate of an Outreach Program, it will become easier to invite the community to the worship services. Once the folks continue to attend worship services on a regular basis, the next step would be to begin a Newcomers Program.  This type of program will familiarize the people with the church in another level, preparing them for a possible commitment to live a Godly life.

 

 

As long as the Church gives importance to the needs of the local community, outreach programs will continue to benefit both the church and the surrounding neighborhood.  It is a blessing to obey God’s command, lead others to Christ, and see the church grow as a result of establishing Church Outreach Programs in the local community.  Outreach is a great way for the Church to show a glimpse of God’s love the surrounding communities.

Solitude and Silence, a daily practice. By Karen Chavez

Recently, through my experience with an ectopic pregnancy (see last post), I was confronted by the Holy Spirit who led me to admit that I lacked in certain areas of spiritual disciplines. My spiritual life took a turn that changed my daily devotions with God and helped me to get closer to Him. 

This summer I was reading a book called Invitation to a Journey: A Road Map for Spiritual Formation by M. Robert Mulholland. In it I found out a lot of things about my current spiritual habits and those that were missing from my life. One of the Spiritual disciplines it spoke of was Solitude and Silence. I had never before tried to be in solitude and silence before the Lord as a daily discipline. This is embarrassing for me because I have been a Christian most of my life, yet it was not a discipline I possessed. “This is what solitude is: in the silence of releasing control of our relationship with God to God, coming face to face with the kind of person we are in the depths of our being…facing brokenness…acknowledging our bondages…and naming ourselves to God as this kind of person.” (Mulholland 140). 

Solitude is the place where it is just you and God. It is completed by silence. When you practice solitude what’s most important is that you do nothing. Yes, nothing! There’s no Bible studying or music playing; it is a chance to focus on your Intimacy with Jesus, to disengage from your daily tasks and the people you interact with, in order to concentrate on the Lord alone. In solitude we don’t try to make anything happen. We just bring our naked self to the Lord to be with him.

As I read through the book, God began to speak to my life. He was leading me in a direction I never thought I would take. “But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.” (Matthew 6:6). God took me to a quiet place where I would learn to be in solitude and silence with Him. Learning this new spiritual discipline was challenging, but being in the medical situation I was facing, I didn’t have many excuses not to try. The first time I tried it I only lasted about 3 minutes before my mind began to wander off to my daily to do list. I felt a little bit frustrated but understood that the reason why it is a discipline and not something we can just do one day out of the blue. To be disciplined at something requires practice and I knew that I would have to do this daily in order to remain in an attitude of complete silence before the Lord.

I can’t say I have become an expert at it. I can’t say that I last hours in silence and solitude. But what I can say is that when you begin to practice this discipline every day something supernatural begins to happen to us. When we go into God’s presence in solitude and silence, we release control to the Lord and He is then able to show us what’s inside our heart. “For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence, for my hope is from him.” (Psalm 62:5).  He can show us things that we’ll never see when we are distracted with everything else going on around us; this is why we all need time of solitude and silence with God.

Ectopic Pregnancy Experience. By Karen Chavez

On May 28^th of this year I found out I was pregnant. It completely took me by surprise for many reasons, but mostly because I had been using Mirena, an intrauterine device which is a form of long term birth control said to be 99% effective.  I immediate made an appointment with my doctor and a few days and blood tests later the pregnancy was confirmed. However, when a sonogram was done to remove the IUD, the pregnancy was missing from my uterus. I was immediately diagnosed with an ectopic pregnancy and after a few more tests, it was found in my left fallopian tube. 

An ectopic pregnancy is extremely dangerous and cannot grow, therefore it must be terminated. The most common way to treat an ectopic pregnancy is with a drug called Methotrexate. I was immediately injected with this powerful drug and then the roller coaster ride began for my life. The doctor told me that because of the size of the pregnancy I was at risk of it rupturing, and this could cause very negative side effects in my body and even lead to death.   Can you imagine how I felt? My emotions were a mess, from surprise, to joy, to confusion, and to uncertainty, I was a total wreck. I could remember all of God’s promises in His Word, but I was uncertain if they would come true in my life. On June 4^th I was put on bed rest and this began a journey that would change me inside and out.

For the entire month of June I struggled with physical pain, emotional anguish, and spiritual anger. But through it all God was always there. Physically, it felt as if I was going into labor almost every single day. I had contractions so strong that I would have to stop everything I was doing and throw myself on the bed and try to contain the pain. Sometimes the pain I felt was so bad, I would scream and cry. I don’t wish the side effects of Methotrexate on anybody!  Because of these horrible side effects, I couldn’t drive, work, or go anywhere. I was like a prisoner in my own home. It wasn’t much fun. 

Through my health struggle, I was reading books on spiritual formation and spiritual disciplines. These books along with the Bible were speaking to my life every single day.  I began to understand that God was in control of my situation and through it my life would be radically changed. One of the things the books taught me was to be in silence and solitude with God. This is something that I could never do before because I never had time to do it, or so I thought. Now, in bed, without a place to go and without “things” to do, God had taken me to a quiet “place” to teach me how to be in silence and solitude in His presence and listen to His voice. 

Unfortunately on June 25^th, regardless of all the efforts, the pregnancy burst in my left fallopian tube causing it to rupture and brought along internal bleeding. I was home when it happened. I felt sick and headed to the ER. I passed out while at the ER and the doctors panicked. They performed various tests which confirmed that the pregnancy had burst and my life was in danger. I was rushed to the operating room but before entering, I was allowed to be with my family for a few minutes, so we prayed. Everyone was very scared, as if it was my last day on earth. When the nurses were taking me into the operating room I began to think about the Lord. I didn’t know what to say, or how to pray, I was scared. 

I was lying down on the stretcher, looking up at the ceiling and the only words that came to mind were the words of Psalm 23. I know the Psalm by heart, but never did it mean so much than on that evening. I prayed Psalm 23 from the depths of my soul and hoped that God would hear every word.

The Lord is my shepherd;

I shall not want.

He makes me to lie down in green pastures;

He leads me beside the still waters.

He restores my soul;

He leads me in the paths of righteousness

For His name’s sake.

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,

I will fear no evil;

For You are with me;

Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.

You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies;

You anoint my head with oil;

My cup runs over.

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me

All the days of my life;

And I will dwell in the house of the Lord

Forever.

The doctors gave their final explanations before putting me to sleep and I said in my heart “Lord, I don’t know if I will wake up from surgery, but I do know that I am in your hands”. I closed my eyes and all I can see were images of my three boys. Their little faces were smiling back at me. Then they became a blur as the images started to fade away. 

During surgery they found that I had a lot of internal bleeding. My left tube was removed because it was completely damaged. I lost a lot of blood so they had to give me two blood transfusions. For a moment I was in critical condition, so my family just prayed. I came out of the operating room, swollen, pale, and extremely exhausted. I was under 24 hour supervision by the head nurse and my family took turns to be by my side. When I was finally sent home, I still felt awful, but thankfully I was finally in stable condition. 

For the next couple weeks I was in complete bed rest. I couldn’t walk, and could hardly get out of bed to go to the bathroom. It was difficult. The pain was different now. My body was different. I actually looked as if I had gone through labor and had a baby. I was blessed to have people help me with the cleaning and cooking.  God was faithful. My family was thankful to the Lord that He had preserved my life.

After a month of recuperating, I visited my doctor who gave me the clearance to slowly begin doing the things I hadn’t done for two months. My body felt sluggish and weak. I still had pain around the incisions and inside. Yet my mind and heart felt stronger and healthier than ever before. God had used this moment in time to quiet me down in order to strengthen my spirit, to begin a spiritual formation in my life that would transform me and everything around me.  God was teaching me discipline. I’m not talking punishment; I am talking about training myself to do something in a habitual way, not for the sake of rituals but for the daily enjoyment of God’s presence. One of the definitions that the Merriam-Webster dictionary provides for Discipline is “training that corrects, molds, or perfects the mental faculties or moral character”.  This is what happened to me! I began to live a new lifestyle, one that pleases God. My life was taking on the shape God wanted it to be. The spiritual formation I was studying in those books was taking effect in my life. I was the clay in the Potter’s hands. 

You see, to be spiritually disciplined is not an option is a necessity in order to spiritually survive. Without these important disciplines we cannot grow and will not know God as intimately as we should. As a Christian, and especially as ministers of God’s Word, we need to be spiritually disciplined. “It is the Holy Spirit’s job to keep the inner process of revelation underway. But in order for the Spirit to do his job, we need to cooperate and put ourselves in a place to deeply and reflectively listen.” (Calhoun 109). Praying, fasting, Bible reading, studying, solitude, and silence are some of the disciplines that will help us to find that place where we will find God and hear his voice guiding our steps.

Please understand me. I already practiced prayer, fasting, and all these things. But I lacked discipline in these things and order in my life. This health trial brought death to my old self; death to some earthly things that were ruling my life without me noticing. And although it took longer than 3 days for me to come back to life, or to come out of the belly of the whale, I eventually did. God has molded me into someone new. Suddenly quality time with my family began to matter most, my spiritual disciplines became the priority of my day, church stop being all about me being fed and it became an opportunity to share the Gospel with the lost, and the Chaplaincy ministry stopped being all about paperwork and office tasks and it truly became a mission field for me.  I knew all these things, and how it was supposed to be, but life can easily take you on another route and give you enough work to keep you busy and forget the important things in life, the essentials.

This month I went back to work and to my daily tasks and I have to say that being spiritual disciplined is not easy. It is a decision and a promise you make to yourself and that you must keep. Having achieved that, makes prioritizing your values a piece of cake. In other words, when we put God first and seek His kingdom, everything else falls into place (Matthew 6:33). 

My sister, I encourage you to examine yourself and see how your values line up. Is God everything in your life?(Matthew 22:37).  Is ministry or work taking the place of your family? (Mark 8:36).  Are you seeking God the way He is asking you to? (Jeremiah 29:13). Don’t wait for the “big fish” to swallow you, begin to obey that still small voice, the quiet whisper that speaks to your heart and respond to it by saying “Speak, for your servant is listening.” (1 Samuel 3:10).