Religion

//Your Position Is Replaceable, You Are Not\\

Posted on by lainamunoz

I’ve had the wonderful journey of working in the food and service industry for 9 years out of my life. In the time that I worked I can honestly remember calling into work twice when I was really sick, I probably showed up way too many times when I was too sick to be working and any other time I couldn’t work I would get my shift covered. There was a small part of me when I left my first job that wanted the place to fall to the ground (cue Taylor Swift “Bad Blood” in the background). I wanted to think I was the reason that establishment was standing or that maybe they would miss me when I’m gone. I’ve had a lot of moments in my life when I have the humbling realization that I’m not the stuff.

I’m actually just me.

But me can be pretty great.

You see, in food service a lot of us think we are the reason the shift runs smoothly, which is comical now that I’ve been on the scheduling side of things as well. Working in section “B” on a Friday night shift doesn’t mean you’re the best at what you do, it honestly means you are a body and there needs to be a body, somebody, anybody in that section. And if you never came along somebody would be in that spot.

I was recently chatting with someone about leadership here at Hillsong International LEADERSHIP College and what I found was this: Anyone can fill a role. This is awesome. I’m actually so thankful. One of the mornings I was scheduled for serving at Sisterhood I was really sick, like get up and walk around and feel like I was going to lose everything I even thought about eating the day before so I called who I needed to call to let them know their star host wouldn’t be there (if you haven’t figured out my snark yet please understand I don’t think I’m actually the best host there is.

Actually, I still haven’t figured out what I’m doing))

I then slept in my bed for the rest of the afternoon.

While it is a tad inconvenient to not have the people you planned to be there turn up – there is still a fix. You shift people and fill the roles and make it work. I don’t have to turn up to anything; my role is replaceable, however I am not. It isn’t a matter of me doing the task assigned, it’s a matter of my person, my heart, what I’ve walked through, what I have to give that is uniquely mine and if I don’t turn up and rock out my roll then I will never cross paths with the people G-d might be wanting me to speak to or receive something from. He might have someone that needs to be loved the way I understand how to give love, He may need me to give my smile to someone who is having a bad day or my heart to someone who needs whatever it is G-d has placed over me. I might need that message for this season or week. I may be blessed tremendously by serving the wonderful women of Sisterhood (that always happens without fail).

Positions and leadership come and go but my character and heart are the things I’m allowing to fill those rolls. I’ve been challenged over and over by G-d this semester to do well with what is in my hands now. Why is this so important? Because He placed  (Whatever I have the opportunity to do) IN MY HANDS. No one else owns the little hands that I do and they are attached to no one else’s body. Which means no one else’s mind can control the things I play, write, hold, break or build.

What I’ve walked through has formed who I am and G-d has refined that person, and is STILL refining that person. No one else can offer what I can and no one else can offer what YOU can. You have an impact and a light that you carry that is uniquely yours. I don’t know HOW G-d created all the different people that there are or the insane dynamic of characters there are but shoot, He did a great job. I always take a look at my house and the amazing women I live with… we are SO different but all have something to contribute to one another and to the people we surround ourselves with. No one else can add any more or less than what they have. If it wasn’t Krysia or Evelin or Reema living in the rooms that they do then another body would fill that position… but it wouldn’t be THEM.

Whatever role you do or don’t have,

whatever team you lead or serve on,

whoever you are trying to be.

Be you, be there. No one else can.

Scrabit : Art

Posted on by lainamunoz

October 2010- what a day today has been… please enjoy this #ThinkBackThursday

“Most artists can’t draw, but all artists can see.” – Roy Simmons

“Go and tell this people: “‘Listen hard, but you aren’t going to get it; look hard, but you won’t catch on.’ Make these people blockheads, with fingers in their ears and blindfolds on their eyes, So they won’t see a thing, won’t hear a word, So they won’t have a clue about what’s going on and, yes, so they won’t turn around and be made whole.”
                  -Isaiah 6.9-10

It seems like G-d might have wanted us to understand something here: Art isn’t just about ability; it’s about seeing what needs to change and creating something that can make a difference. G-d’s art is to make us whole through giving us the vision to see what needs to change.

I was reading a delightfully short book by Seth Godin called Graceful where he took a full section to talk about Art. He defines art as this: “Art is anything that’s creative, passionate and personal… Art is a personal gift that changes the recipient.”

G-d’s art is revealed in the everyday continuation of what He started long ago. Genesis 1.1 “First this: G-d created the Heavens and Earth – all you see, all you don’t see”

G-d was the original creator and the only one by which we may LEARN what He wants to do with our lives. The beauty of His art is that there is still life yet to be revealed. Some things in creation we are still waiting on, there are things and colors in heaven that we still haven’t experienced – and I cannot wait. He set the heavens in place, His majesty is seen in all there is and He holds my heart and molds in everyday into something reflecting Him.

G-d is a passionate G-d, He is a compassionate G-d, a G-d who thinks about us and has purpose for us.

He is a wonderful, powerful master who sees us in the state we are in and calls us His.

He is a personal G-d who cared so much about the people He created that He sent His one perfect thing He had left – His son so that He might be reunited with us.

I can’t help but think through a few things…

1.   Are you letting G-d’s art CHANGE you? When was the last time you admired the sunrise or sunset and couldn’t focus cause the presence of G-d was so thick through your thoughts that you broke out in praise with your entire being?

2.   Are you letting G-d direct your art that He has for you? Some of you have read these posts and thought, “oh that’s nice, but I don’t have art to give”… how selfish. You have a gift that only you can give, you have an art that only you can perfect FOR HIM and you don’t care enough to search it out? Maybe it doesn’t look like messy hands from painting, or like a keyboard to type stories into. Maybe it looks like buying a bag of food a day and driving until you see someone who might need it? Maybe it looks like having a conversation everyday in which you remind someone of how much they mean to you? Possibly you could take 30 days to spend time getting better at listening to G-d? Maybe G-d has given you a heart for missions but you’re in a different season where you can’t leave yet – What if you were to passionately pray for a different location or people group for 30 days? What if you were to check up on the area to see what G-d was doing with your prayers?

“The more people you change, the more you change them, the more effective your art is… If there is no change, there is no art. IF no one experiences it, there can be no change.” –Graceful

((What has changed around you lately?

((((Have you inspired the change?

Scrabit : Raw : A Psalm of Sorts

Posted on by lainamunoz

Today’s #ThinkBackThursday is brought to you by the year 2010 and the color red

He’s faithful to my heart.

Glory to the righteous one.

G-d, I’m not sure how to get everything or anything in words.

I hurt and you heal… That’s just how it’s always been. Lord, You’ve always been there for me even after all the selfish mistakes I’ve made. You are a forgiving G-d. I don’t know why life take turns and makes you go down paths that you have never even come across. I don’t know why I feel this need inside me to make sure someone is there with me holding my hand. It doesn’t make sense if I knew that I’d have to trust you through this one. Then why is it hard? Why do I constantly have to fight the pain of it all?

“Consider it a sheer gift, friends, when tests and challenges come at you from all sides. You know that under pressure, your faith-life is forced into the open and shows its true colors. So don’t try to get out of anything prematurely. Let it do its work so you become mature and well-developed, not deficient in any way. If you don’t know what you’re doing, pray to the Father. He loves to help. You’ll get his help, and won’t be condescended to when you ask for it. Ask boldly, believingly, without a second thought. People who “worry their prayers” are like wind-whipped waves.” – James 1.2-6

((Are you kidding me G-d?       ………a gift?

So what then? It’s time to live out our faith. G-d knows what He is doing even when we are in the middle of a storm. The only thing I can gather from this portion of my love letter is to stick it out. G-d, sometimes I don’t want to, so I guess I’ll have to choose again today to trust You with it.

Dear Father, I don’t know what I’m doing, help my heart to calm down and not worry about my life. I don’t want to be flaky but I want to be taught by the master how to be faithful.

“Steep your life in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. Don’t worry about missing out. You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met. 34“Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes.”

– Matthew 6.33-34

Command: Don’t worry about missing out.

Promise: You’ll find ALL your everyday human concerts will be met.

Lord, help me trust YOUR timing… and help my heart to understand when my brain is the only thing that knows what is right.

Tuition Flavored Bread

Posted on by lainamunoz

Well, I’ve always had a knack for sharing too much – then again, that’s why I started this. I felt like what was dropped in my spirit was to share my story; Share my ‘right now’ moments with Jesus. So please read this as just that, my story.

I got an email a few weeks back about a students’ favorite time of the semester: tuition is due. Cool.

I’ve been abundantly blessed with my season and my time here so far. G-d has been providing more than I need in many instances and I’ve seen blessings on blessings that I’m floored by. I moved here and my parents agreed to do what they could financially to help out with tuition and emergencies so in this case of the tuition email I wasn’t too worried as it came to the actual financial number on the page. I mean, no one wants to drop $2800 ever… unless you’re buying a jet ski, or a trip to Australia to come visit me, or like a really cool puppy with hunting and fishing and defending skills. So, I do what any college student running low on savings does and forward the email to my dad. His response shouldn’t have made me cry but in context of my season in my heart-feelers – I broke.

“How do you want to have this happen? You can pay it and I can raise the allotment so you get that money back quicker or we can put it on my debit card…”

Why any of this is important – I’ve been walking through a pretty dry and obnoxious desert season since Colour Conference. Maybe it didn’t start out this way but by this week I’ve grown pretty frustrated and unentertained with Jesus. Last week I wrote about ‘Daily Bread’ and having all we need… this week I’m frustrated that I’m only getting what I NEED which makes me sound terrible but this is real talk Wednesday (or really Friday by the time you read it). As far as revelations on Jesus, songwriting, being creative, writing, seeing G-d in all of creation it has been difficult for me to just sit and think “Wow, G-d, you’re doing so much” He is – He has, even if He never did one more thing for me He would have done enough. But feelings and being a human sucks and sometimes we have attitude issues. Previously in my week my journal looked a little something like this:

‘G-d, I’m not super happy with You – I’m just frustrated because I feel like I’m hearing a lot of words, and they’re all good words but I am personally struggling to find You. I feel like I’ve sat and I’ve waited and I feel like I keep being given JUST ENOUGH to get by’ ((and as I was writing loads of, “Laina, seriously? JUST ENOUGH?” thoughts came over me as I remembered what I had written about no more than a week prior)) –

‘No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.” Hebrews 12:11’

So, back to the part where I tie this in a pretty package and explain my heart-space-thoughts.

I’m sitting at the coffee shop with Krysia and Brian reading my dads email and trying to think through how to respond and what to say and what might be a good idea. I look at my bank account in the states and it has $2800 in savings… so I start to think, yeah I can pay tuition but it will wipe everything I have so I will either be relying on my dad or have to get a job or both. Which begins to start ripping away at my heart. You see, the last set of ‘instructions’ or ‘nudges’ I had about coming here was to sit, and learn how to receive from G-d. To rest (which included trusting Him with finances and not working) – and see how big G-d really is, I’ve worked the last 10 years of my life so it’s no issue for me to have a job and complete school. What the issue is for me is to sit, trust, rest and receive. As I typed an email back to my dad I let him know, ‘Yes, I can pay it but it’s all I have left so I will need you to help me’. I started realized what G-d has been up to (at least a very, VERY small part of what He has been up to). I’ve not been super pleased with my season and I’ve kept asking Him for something more than what I have; A word of confirmation, a day where I don’t feel like I’m wandering, water, something more than the minimum of what I need; and I could tell He was whispering, ‘How do you want to have this happen? You can give me the rest of what you have and I can keep giving you what you need or I can put it on my card…’

for lack of better words I felt like G-d was offering me a cop-out; maybe not a cop-out but an easy out for this season.

He can and will cover it. He can make it easy.

But, it took me realizing a smidge of what He is actually doing to say, ‘no, I can pay it, I’ll give the rest of what I have and trust that you’re going to set me up with just enough for this next season, discipline isn’t pleasant but you have peace for me through it and righteousness that you want to place in me.’

It killed me to say, “So dad, the last words I got from G-d was to sit… but I haven’t learned that lesson yet so I don’t feel like I need to get a job, which means I need you, to be faithful and help. I just need help.” because it makes my feel LAZY AS. Which kills me. I hate being lazy, I hate sitting, I hate waiting and I hate relying on someone else for my needs (I’m clearly in a learning process) I wanted to be able to say “Cool, I’ll just go get a job and this will all go smoother” but I have zero peace about that.

Chapels here in college have been cutting to the heart lately for me. Catrina (our principle) spoke yesterday which ended in Krysia (my housemate) giving me a glare as if they both had read my prayers to Jesus that day. Catrina spoke on the desert, how in the Bible this is an area of preparation, and that something great is coming when we are in these seasons. Sitting in the desert means we are on our way to the promise land even though at the time it feels like it takes everything we have to find an oasis. But, if the option is the easy out and remaining comfortable or spending what I have to see if G-d will show up… I guess I’ll take the latter.

I guess I’ll continue with my last set of instructions, I’ll continue to speak His Word over my life and take this desert as a reminder that something great is coming. I’ll choose to believe that His word is living and active and when I feel like I’m remaining the same, I choose to believe that His word changes me.

((He has GOOD for me.