God Set Each of us Apart as His Holy People
We ought not to hide behind our inexperience or lack of professional training. God tells Jeremiah: "Do not say 'I am only a child.' You must go to everyone I send you to and say whatever I command you." Too often we feel that the pastor is trained to do ALL the work, or we sell ourselves short and figure someone else is more qualified or capable. We fail to see that everyone has to start somewhere and you learn by doing. Or we do not take an honest look at the talents God HAS given us and in that way short-change God's investment. God works through our inexperience just as he works with our experience. Don't limit God by feeling that he can't work with what he has given you. He gave you the experience or the capability that he wants to use through you for his kingdom.
Don't worry about what to say either. God told Jeremiah that he would command him what to say. Moses also claimed not to be an eloquent speaker. God told him: "Who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or dumb? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the LORD?" To Isaiah, who professed to having unclean lips, God's angel touched his tongue with a live coal and said: "See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for." God has cleansed us from all our sin and given us the ability to speak. That is why we can go out and witness to our neighbor, our spouse, our children, to anyone with whom we come into contact about what Christ means to us. He will guide what we say.
When God gives us our talents and gifts and guides what we say, then he will also take care of the results. I may not have seen anything happen when I canvassed in Montana for my two months there this summer, but God is working his word there yet. He promises that his word will not come back to him empty but that it will accomplish his purpose. Just as we plant seeds in the ground and then water, fertilize and cultivate but yet have no control over the yield, so also God sends us out to work in his garden. He controls what happens. He promises us that our labors in him will
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