By Marni Montanez
Isaiah 6:8 New King James Version
8 Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying:
“Whom shall I send, And who will go for Us?”
Then I said, “Here am I! Send me.”
Have you ever uttered this prayer to God expressing your deep desire to do and say all He wants you to do and say? Did you mean it at the time and find later it wasn’t what you thought it would be like? Join the club. There seems to be a normal trail of disappointment and frustration as those called into the Kingdom of God, journey toward their passion to serve God.
This verse appears so exciting and demanding of our immediate attention. “Here I am” says the writer, “Send me”. Applause! Applause! It sounds like immediately God is sending you out on your venture to work quickly and efficiently to get the job done. Theirs is no apparent time lapse.
Let’s rewind. Look at the verse again. God asks, “Who will I send”? There is nothing in His question that makes the matter urgent or meaning for this moment. He asks a question and the prophet answers. That’s all that happens in this verse.
At the beginning of our Spiritual walk, parts of us are hindered by unhealed emotions, sin and apathy. They are in the way of our success in the ministry. But the more these areas are freed up, the more God can put Himself and His desires in those areas. What we don’t realize is that between our complying with His request and when we actually get to do “the stuff” in the fullness of our anointing there can be a considerable distance. The time between is filled with repentance, tears, healing, more tears, disillusionment, rejection and betrayal. The list is endless of what we will experience in this time God is preparing us for our “send me” time. We have our own ideas of what the path should look like and the timing, but in reality we have no idea what is coming and most of the time we don’t recognize it when it comes. We start asking God “is this you”? We struggle with what’s before us and spend our days wondering what God is doing. He is doing much.
God expands us to incorporate more of Him so that when we make our entrance into “such a time as this” like Esther, that we were specifically created for, we will act in a manner that brings Him complete glory.
Part of sending us out is how He sends us out. If we go out broken and full of ourselves we will only damage others along the way, but if we allow God to heal and strengthen us in Him and allow Him to do things His way we will be victorious in our individual mission.
My challenge is to have you take time to reflect on your ideas about what your call should look like. Spend some time before the Lord. Ask Him if your ideas are right. Allow Him to grow you in each moment. He will direct your path and keep you facing forward toward that which He will call you to do.
God bless
Marni
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The
purpose of this series is to encourage people to live as loving, compassionate,
and peacemaking children of God: Jesus tells us to pray, "Thy kingdom come, thy
will be done, on earth as it is in heaven." (Matthew 6:10) God tells us through
Micah (6:8), "He has told you, O man, what is good; And what does the Lord
require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your
God." And we know from Revelation 21:4 that there will be no more mourning, or
crying, or pain, or death. Thus, Christian living requires us to set the
standards of these conditions here on earth for our fellow human beings, and for
the other animals, as a witness to the rest of the world. To do otherwise is not
Christian.