The Faith Journey: A Devotional

A New Year to Serve Jesus

It's a New Year, a fresh start, a new beginning. I don't know about you, but I'm ready for that fresh start. 2016 was great, but at times very stressful. I like this idea of a fresh start. It's also a good reminder of our mission, which is to be faithful servants of Christ. This fresh start brings this needed reminder. We must be a servant to everyone we encounter just as Christ was a servant to all.

As Philippians 2:5-7 says, "In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in the very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness."

We are to also be that kind of servant and share the love and light of Jesus. It can take something very small to make a big difference. For instance, think of how you came to know God.
What defining moment or time brought you to Him?

Now I'm going to tell you the story of how my grandma came to know God. She wasn't churched her whole life. When she was ten years old, one day she happened to walk home from the library and spotted a piece of paper on the sidewalk. She bent to pick it up out of curiosity, and unfolded it to discover a Bible verse. The paper held the words of John 3:16, reading, "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life."
That was her defining moment. It stayed with her, and she kept that slip of paper for the longest time. Her family didn't go to church either, but that Bible verse triggered my grandma to start looking for something. She didn't know what she was searching for at the time, but she found later she was looking for God.

"That was a seed that was planted for me," Grandma told me. "I always compared that moment to the mustard seed parable in the Bible."

My grandma found out that just a little faith, a little action of goodness, can bring such a big change. I've always found hope in her story, but I know this mission can be hard. It's easy to get discouraged. You can be trying your best to spread the love and light of God, and it can seem as if you're falling short. Your best effort may seem to bring no results, but keep that hope in Christ. Keep being a servant and spreading love.

I, too, have been pretty discouraged lately, especially with FCA. It started out so strong. There were about 80 people that signed up. At the first meeting, there were 60 people there! But then, at the next meeting, there were 50 people. Then 40, then 30, then 20, and now there's right around 15 people that regularly come. I was discouraged. Such a strong start seemed to level off into barely anything. It was like no one was being reached by our efforts to love.

The four servant events through FCA only discouraged me more. At most, there were only 3 or 4 members who came to each event. At the last event, I was the most discouraged of all. It was Angel Tree shopping. We'd raised about $75 through FCA, and our youth group had $50. So, we picked out two Angel Trees and prepared to shop. One was a boy, and the other was a girl. I was so excited to buy them clothes, and it seemed it was going to work out perfectly. Around 8 people in FCA said they were able to come after practice on Friday. We actually scheduled around basketball practice just so everyone could come. At 6:30, I arrived at Walmart to shop. I was so excited to split the tasks so everyone would get to pick out an article of clothing. My friend Ryan arrived, and then we waited. After about five minutes, I sent out a text to the people who said they could come. Then we waited another 15 minutes. No one replied. No one else showed up. My two closest friends said they could come, and they didn't even reply to my text.

I was so disheartened. It seemed like everyone was losing focus on the importance of serving. I felt like I was breaking down, because I couldn't even depend on my closest friends. I felt lost and alone. I'm not trying to be dramatic here, it's just how it seemed. I was so upset and I was trying to hold in my disappointment, but Ryan put me in perspective. We raised the money through FCA. People gave in their own way. And, most of all, we were going to help two children in a great need. That was more than enough, and he was so right.

So...instead of the 30 minutes I thought it would take with all the help, it took an hour and thirty minutes to shop, but I loved every minute of it. We were serving, and I could just imagine those two sweet kids receiving all these needed items. I wasn't discouraged any longer.

As for the members in FCA, God stopped me from being discouraged. Fifteen people are coming to the meetings. We're reaching 15 people, and that's a wonderful number! Everyone is still on the text list as well, so they're getting the messages.
Maybe it'll reach someone and they'll come. You never know, and God has a plan.

God again reminded me to just keep loving and serving with another recent event. My grandma sends out tangible invitations to around 40 people for our church services. Only a few recipients come, but she continues to send the letters to everyone anyway. It's been months and still, around 35 of those people don't attend services. But then, out of the blue, one man who'd never attended a service came to one. My grandma kept trying, and she reached someone. It was a wonderful reminder to never stop trying, because you never know whom you may reach through God, even after a long period of time.

Think about a time when you were discouraged. What brought you hope?

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I always love to say Galatians 2:20 to myself when I'm discouraged. It reads, "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me."

That's always a wonderful way to have hope and faith. I belong to God. He lives in me. He gave himself for me, so I must give myself to others in love and service. We all must give ourselves to others! It's a wonderful thing, too. What seems like work really is a gift. Knowing you're serving for God fills your heart. My heart is always full after serving because I know I'm serving for the one who gave everything to save me, and to save you.

My grandma's story of faith showed me how something so small can create such a big change, and that wasn't the end of her story. Sixty years later, she was waiting in the hospital while my grandpa was having surgery. On a table beside her, the hospital had placed a tray of Bible verses there. She smiled and randomly chose a verse. As she gazed at it, her heart beat faster, and time seemed to stop. The verse was John 3:16. My grandma was stunned. She looked through the bowl of verses to
see if they all were the same, but each one was different.

"God was sending me a message," she told me.

My grandma kept the verse while she waited, but when she left the hospital, she dropped it on the sidewalk.

"Who knows whom that touched?" my grandma wondered. "Who knows whom that might of reached? "

Someone, sixty years ago, dropped that slip of paper that my grandma found, and through their love and service to God, they changed my grandma's life. My grandma did just as that person did, and who knows? Maybe she changed a life just as someone changed hers with that simple, loving gesture.

That's all it takes. It takes one little seed to grow a lifetime of faith and service. That one seed changed my grandma's life. That one simple time when my family and I attended a service at a new church, God changed our lives. It takes one action; it takes one seed the size of a mustard seed, to change lives through Christ alone.

In Matthew chapter 13, Jesus said that the kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed. He said that though it's the smallest of all your seeds, when it grows, it is the largest of any garden plant. In Matthew 17:20, Jesus said, "Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you."

So, it's a new year, and a fresh start. This new start is most of all a reminder that we are here to be servants of God. Nothing will be impossible for us with Jesus at our side, and make sure to keep hope with you in this New Year, knowing that one little mustard seed can change everything.