Doing ministry work has always been something I enjoy doing. Well, it depends what it is, but going out into neighbors to show complete strangers love has always got me high on the Holy Ghost. Where I am from, we have surrounding areas that some people would not be caught anywhere near. For me, those neighborhoods are my favorite places to go because everyone deserves to be shown the love of Jesus.

Let me pause for a minute to talk about the Holiday season. It’s not my favorite, I just want it come and go. For many reasons, the Holidays are just not happy times for me. I will save those reasons for another day. But yesterday, the Lord gave me a reason to love this time a year again. My eyes are watering up as I type these words just thinking about it. It was one of those moments that I didn’t know I needed until it happened and the Lord never ceases to amaze me.

Yesterday morning I woke up so tired. I even had to go get a big energy drink to wake up and that didn’t even work. Dragging tail is an understatement on how I started the day. Knowing the day ahead was going to be long and busy, I prayed for the Lord to give me energy. Our church was doing a Thanksgiving meal give away and there were many things that we still had to buy to be able to pack up the bags. The list that was given to me had close to 200 items on it. The chances of me finding all of that in one place was slim to none considering that we are now down to the wire and in the midst of all the other Thanksgiving shoppers. When I got into my car, I said, “Okay Lord.. tell me where to go.” He gave me exactly two stores to go to, and which one to go to first.

Okay here is another pause in the story. To some of you, it might sound a tad odd to ask God what stores to go to. Here’s the thing, God knows what we need and when we need it. When we take the time to ask him to help us, He will never fail you. It doesn’t matter what it is.. He’s always going to lead you in the right direction. One of the stores he gave me I did not want to go into because I knew it would be full of people and I would have to maneuver around with a cart slap full of bulk items. But I listened and I was obedient. The first store I got exactly half of the items I needed and the second store gave me the other half.

Now keep in mind, my day already started off a bit aggravating. I wasn’t aggravated at the shopping that I had to do. I was worried I wouldn’t get it all and that there would not be enough time to get it all done. All I knew is that we had 50 turkey dinner packages to put together and only a hand full of people to help make it happen. I started my day off doubting God.. Not only did I find everything I needed in less than two hours but I had enough time to organize it all before the rest of the turkeys came and go home to change my clothes. Look at God go!

Okay, here is where I really started to doubt the Lord. Before I go on, let’s pause again for a moment. Sometimes we see mountains in front of us with no way around. The road we see to get around it is full of dangerous curves and it’s all up hill. Then when we get to the other end of it, then see that it really wasn’t bad at all. Which then leads to repentance because we are dumb and didn’t trust the Lord.

Anyways.. This particular ministry was put together by a lady at our Church. She had the vision and was determined to make it happen. The what, when, how & where made no sense what so ever. As the day went on, the thought of me choking her out started to make me smile a little bit. She wasn’t able to be there yesterday because her mother suddenly passed away. We were more than happy to fill in the gap for her but if it had been planned the way we thought it should be, then it would have made our day a little easier.

Yep.. I’m confessing that if it would have been done different it would have made my life a little easier. Don’t worry, I got a big plate of humble pie a little later in the day because God showed me exactly what he was doing. Our Church is very much a fly by the seat of our pants kind of Church. So what was going on yesterday wasn’t anything we weren’t use to already. Now that I think about it, I don’t think any of us were even mad about what was going on, it was just the enemy trying to convince us that we should be doing it differently.

We had a team making hot plates for the homeless and then a team of putting the bags together to go downtown to give away. We had a list of people that had already registered for a Thanksgiving meal and that left us with only a few to give away to anyone that just walked up. We loaded it all up, headed to our destination and had a parking lot full of people waiting on us. They were all so grateful and it was a such blessing to be able to help those families.

We had a list of almost forty people that registered but we had just under half that actually came to pick up their meal. It was starting to get dark which caused me to get a little antsy and I told the Pastor & his wife that we should just go give away the rest of the food in the surrounding community. I don’t know how to put into words what happened next. This is where the blessing really came into play, and this is where God showed up & showed out. We got into our cars, we drove around and ended up in this neighborhood close by. We get out and start handing people these huge turkeys with a bag of fixins’.. They were all just amazed and filled with gratitude. The smiles, the thank yous, the praise Gods and the joy of seeing their faces light up was all worth it.

Just imagine you are standing outside feeling like the world is crumbling around you. You have no idea how to feed your family for Thanksgiving and a truck just pulls up out of no where to give you an entire meal. No motive behind it but only to tell you that God loves you. There was a little girl that chased us for a block because she wanted to take a turkey home to her mom. She was the tiniest little thing and she was determined to get a turkey. Thankfully someone was there to help her carry it all home but the smile she had on her face as she walked away with this huge turkey in her arms, there are no words to describe it. As I watched her walk away, I could hear the Lord saying.. are you seeing what I’m seeing?

It all happened so fast that in the moment it was hard to process what I just seen. It wasn’t until I got home that it all sank in. “Wow Lord…just Wow,” is all I could say. How could I ever doubt Him and His plan? Why did I ever think that if we did it our way, it would have been better. There is no love greater than God’s love. He will NEVER lead us in the wrong direction… ever.

Always be obedient even when you think it’s dumb because God has a plan for it all. If you try to take over then you will miss the blessing he has for you. Thank you Lord..

I love your face!

Stay tuned..