From The Cheap Seats

My Personality Battle

Wow it has been a crazy time of year for me and finally it is starting to calm down. Now all I have left to do is go Christmas shopping. For the last two months I haven't been able to blog or let you know really what's been going on because of the business of my schedule. Averaging about 60-70 hrs a week has really put a lot of stress on my physical health as well as my spiritual health. So for the next few blogs I'm going to disect what has been my last two months. (If you're bored already I'm sorry I'll try to make it up)

About two months ago I sat in a meeting were most of my insecurities were layed down on the line. I'm not going to go into details but I really felt beat down after the meeting. Thus began the long month of Nov. A month where God allowed me to try ministry on my own. Thus began my personality battle.

As Youth Pastor you are asked to live a life that is no longer your own. Your time really isn't your time and for most of us we aren't sure when we'll be able to rest. I began to recognize this as we got into the Christmas season. My to-do list began to pile up and I never seemed to make a dent on it. I wasn't sure what was going on, I mean I was getting everything done yet it still seemed like I was never going to be able to stop working!

Nov. 30th through December 4th I was at Youth Specialties a Confrence designed for youth pastors. (You'll hear me refer to this multiple times in the posts to follow) There was a speaker there named Phil Vicher and what was different about Phil was that it was a go get 'em speach but it was let me tell you how I failed speach. It all came down to this single question..."how much do you rely on Christ in your ministry?" I began to reflect on the battle that was November. All the sudden it hit me...My personality battle wasn't how am I going to be the best youth pastor ever, it was why am I not depending on Christ in ministry. My eyes were opened to the inner struggle that had been going on. I realized this gigantic hole in my ministry. and it was (as chessy as this sounds) was my dependency on Christ.

Since that service every day I sit in my office and before I begin to plan a thing I stop and ask Jesus just to be in charge! I'm not sure if this makes sense but for me at this time in my ministry and life, to learn what it means to rely on Jesus has been a life changing revelation!

posted by Micah Dormann @ 10:39 AM