Sliding Doors #3 – Ministry

Hi friends,

I have so many ‘sliding door’ moments that if I were to share them all with you, I would fill every blog I intend to write in 2023, and most probably right through to the end of 2024 as well. I won’t bore you with them all, however I do want to share just one more on this subject, and that is the ‘sliding door’ of ministry.

For over twenty years, my husband and I, along with our team, built and poured out our lives into a ministry that God had called us to grow from the ground up. It has been, and continues to be an incredibly fruitful ministry, nevertheless, a shift was taking place in our spirits. It wasn’t long before God spoke to my husband and I confirming what we were sensing – ‘It’s time to pass the batten on because I am calling you both to multiply what you have done in one nation into many nations.’ Sounds amazing right!

Of course there was an excitement in our spirits about this, but what did that mean? ‘God are you asking us to start from scratch in another nation and build again, and do that over and over in multiple nations?’ We weren’t sure we could physically do that. Thankfully God clarified what He was actually saying to us. ‘What I have taught you during this season, the life lessons, and from the experiences you have gained – whether they have been good, challenging or even failures, is too valuable to go to waste. I want you to pour all of that out into others serving me, in order for their flame to continue to burn strong in their ministry. Care for them, love on them, be who they need you to be for them, whether that be as a pastor, a mentor, a coach or a trainer.’

You maybe wondering what this has to do with a ‘sliding door’? Let me tell you, it has everything to do with it.

We had been known for, supported and respected over many years for what we had done in the ministry God was asking us to hand over, therefore it would have been easy to hang on to that ministry as our security. It was not a pride issue, we have always be humbled by people’s belief in us as we carried that call, but now God was asking us to trust Him in the letting go of the known, to take hold of the unknown? To release what had become comfortable and quantifiable, and exchange it for an uncomfortable stretch and what seemed unquantifiable?

Who are we now?

Identity is something we all wrestle with, and unless we remain grounded in ‘whose’ we are, God’s son or daughter, joint heirs with Christ, we will always be looking for our identity in the approval of others. If our identity is not found in Christ, we hang onto things that we are meant to release.

When God comes knocking at your door and calls you to release something of significance – to pass on the batten, what is your response? By hanging on, we do ourselves and others a disservice. 

Andy Stanley once said; ‘Replace yourself, and you will always have a place.’ 

When we replace ourselves, we open the door for others to rise up and take the reigns, the next step of their call, while at the same time we make room for God to open new doors of opportunity for ourselves. Don’t fear letting go because God has more for you. He is not done with you yet.

As ones to always say ‘YES’ to God, my husband Paul and I, in obedience to His direction, handed the ministry over and stepped out of the comfortable and known, and into uncharted waters. Although we don’t have it all figured out yet, we know that we are right where we are suppose to be, and those doors God spoke to us about, are already opening up to us, even in a greater way than we first imagined.

Which door is God asking you to walk through today?

Deb x