Adam Turtle, Freelance Web Design in Belfast, Northern Ireland
Since1986
City Church
- 15th July, 2007
- filed under: San Francisco
- 1 comment
So the last two weeks I’ve been going out to City Church here in San Francisco. Despite being in a minority demographic (student) in terms of church folk, it’s a decent church. I’ve really enjoyed the teaching and there’s no two ways about it – God has been speaking to me through the church. These last two weeks the pastor has been talking about spiritual guidance, asking God for direction when you don’t know what to do. Something I’ve found myself doing quite a bit since I got here.
I was fortunate enough today to get a ride to church with Chris, a nice guy I met at the summer conversations thing last week. In his main address today, the pastor Scott Sherman was talking about getting answers from God. He brought up the familiar tale of the Christian who sends a ’spirit-gram’ to God and expects a reply ASAP. Then when the reply never comes, we’re pretty quick to blame Him for not guiding us. I particularly like the quote he brought up:
Love God, and do as you please
Augustine
On first glance, the above quote seems a bit flippant. But what Augustine meant by it was: really trust God and know that in all things if you seek to do His will He will guide you. You can’t wait around to expect something miraculous to happen, God lets us make mistakes in order to grow. This reminded me of a conversation I had with a friend, Arf, at a CU party last year. We were talking about God’s will and how to know that you’re on the right track. Arf is amazing at explaining things. In his words, God doesn’t have a specific linear path for us to follow. If he did we wouldn’t face decisions every day of our lives. He won’t always provide one clear answer to every question or decision we might have. Instead, God’s will for our lives involves change of character. God is our Father, and much like any father caring for their child they don’t have all the answers and they won’t make all the decisions for the child. God really doesn’t mind if you grow up to be a doctor and married to a specific person, or a road sweeper and single all your life. He gives us the boundary in which we can act upon His will. In the end, the specifics of your life are irrelevant – it’s been said many times that God looks within. There could be 100 different jobs you could do and the same number of people you could share your life with, but any one of them could be God’s will. The lessons learned and the changing of your heart is what His plan for your life is.
Of course, mistakes are a part of life. I’ve spent a many hours wondering in my own mind if moving here was a mistake. Again, the address in church today helped me. God reminds us that His ways aren’t ours, and if we were to know all the plans He has for our lives, we would lose the need to depend on Him. Probably the most striking thing I took away from today was the story of David. We’re all familiar with David’s biggest mistake – Bathsheba. But while what he did was definitely not the wise thing to do, from that mistake came Solomon who went on to become both a wise king and descendant of Jesus. So sometimes the mistakes we make can lead to a bigger picture.
For now I’m trying to figure out what my next move is. I’m blessed to have great friends who can advise me and still keep in contact. In all things, despite having crappy days at work and so forth, it’s still a comfort to know that through everything God is unveiling His will for my life and when I look back in years to come I will be able to see exactly how He is shaping me.
Hi Adam, happy birthday. Another year older and not getting any better looking!!! Hope you have a fun birthday. Do you have an address that we can send a little birthday present over to? Alternativily I could send something via Mum if that would be better. Anyhow hope all is well, keep the blogs coming as we are all enjoying reading about your travels. Take care…Dave, Pamela and Chloe…….