39 and a half...

I picked up a book tonite that i had read about 2 years ago that i had asked a friend of mine to bring back to me from a conference he was attending; it was entitiled "nice girls don't change the world"...i've been in this place really the last few months, or maybe even the last year where i don't feel i fit in as far as in a ministry standpoint. when i went graduated form Bible college now a mere 14 years ago (yikes!) i thought I was going to change the world...i guess we all did; i remember hearing the statistic that 70% of all Bible school graduates will go back home, warm a pew it not drop off the face of the planet completely and never accomplish anything for the the Lord. i remember assuredly saying that i would never be one of those.
well as i read through that book i realized i had become a "nice girl" and i'm not changing the world. i listed all the excuses, work, finances, my marriage, my town, my personality...anything i could think of to justify why i'm not...i pondered what is it that makes some people leap from the depths of spiritual shallowness to an impassioned, brazenly open relationship with the Father? is there something i'm just not getting? how is it that just a few years ago i was sure of the vision and purpose for my life and now i couldn't even tell you if i have a vision or purpose?
so i prayed and asked the Lord if there was one significant event that caused this "downward" spiral if you will...He reminded me of two things, one was a specific event, from a younger christian, although in leadership in the church i had been committed to for 6 years at the time. I remember the statement saying that "my giftings didn't have a place in HIS (not meaning the Lord's but meaning his!) ministry, although he appreciated my faithfulness that he didn't think i could be used" what a blow - especially when every day he would call wanting my help...i think it was at that point that what truly happened is i felt unworthy of my calling, unwelcome definitely and above that as if my gifts were inferior because i wasn't the dynamic evangelist he proclaimed himself to be. in retrospect he was 25 years old, and maybe well meaning although i'm not sure how, i was the "more mature" christian who at the time her depth of character was attacked by someone that needed desperately to understand that we are each uniquely gifted and without each valuable gift the entire body does not function to it's fullest ability.
the second event was more of a discipline over time than a single happening - it was allowing the unbelief to change my heart. silently, a little here,a little there over a period of years letting my own thinking to believe that what i am is not of value or worth. even my own thoughts of "my life should have been different" but not choosing to sow the seeds that it needs to change and bear good fruit."
as i got to the end of "nice girls" i read Lynne Hybels proclamation that she doesn't want to be a nice girl, but a good woman, actually she wants to be a dangerous woman - one that "shows up" wholeheartedly, and and joins the battle against whatever opposes the redeeming work of God in our lives and our world... one that doesn't settle for shallow christianity or relationships and one that is unwaivering in her destiny.

once, a much older, wiser woman of the faith asked me one day about my time i spent at my Bible college, a seemingly innocent question you would think, but the way she phrased it has stayed with me to this day...she said "so did you find out how shallow you really were?" my reply of course was a resounding "yes"
i think we need to ask each other that very thing - "so are you really growing deep roots or are you just shallow like the weeds?" but then again, there's always the fruit...