But may all who search for you be filled with joy and gladness in you. May those who love your salvation repeatedly shout, “The LORD is great! (Psalm 40:16)We have been in Boonville off and on for around four years. I spent an abortive year and a half in Lincoln but we came back to Boonville. We like it here. We like the church and I have carved out a ministry and a place here. I do a lot in the church, enough to almost be a full-time associate minister. We enjoy the church. There is a good spirit here and the people in general like us, some even love us. They respect us and listen to what we say. When it comes down to it, we are the church’s fellowship ministry. And I provide a good balance to the pastor here and in general, I believe, do a good work.
The problem is, of course, that we have no money. There are no jobs to be had and we are living on our retirement which is less than $1000 a month. I like our apartment but it is HUD housing and I do not like being beholden to the government. We have refused food stamps and outside food help and the Lord has blessed us food-wise. We have a lot of people over for meals and the Lord sees it and blesses us with a full freezer of meat.
But we live close to the edge in several ways. One of those ways is that I am not doing what really makes me happy: that is, preaching. I am an adjunct to another man’s ministry. While my work is well-received and necessary, anything I do is in cooperation with his ministry. It is not really my own.
He knows that too and I think it bothers him. But since the church is not a rich one, there is nothing he can do about it.
Now a church has called me and wants me to come. The problem is that it is a small church in a little bitty town in Kansas, a place I have never had any desire to live before. It is a part-time position but it comes with a parsonage and it would be mine.
I am not a small town guy, but at the same time, as I have said before, what else am I doing?
But, on the other hand, as my mind is cursed with saying, we like it here. But we are financially strapped. Really we are poor, I suppose, but I never liked to use that word. Anything that happened that required money would hurt us.
The denomination is one I would like to go back into. I am sorry that I left the Christian Church and went to the Pentecostals. That move has been nothing but pain. While the Christian Church was not necessarily wonderful to us, at the same time, we did alright.
What am I going to do? I search God’s will. Move to this little town in the middle of the Kansas nowhere, 100 miles to the nearest large city, 30 miles from the nearest WalMart? Or stay here in what is a comfortable but unsustainable lifestyle?
Hear me, O Lord.
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