THE OTHER SID⁸E OF PRAYER

I have prayed.

 

                    Prayed so hard my knees hurt.

I have prayed.

                    For you, and you

and you and you.

I have prayed.

                     For lives and loves . For heals and hearts.

For days and nights , for fears  and frights.

I feel the prayer.  It often makes my heart ache.

   Ache with tears of sadness.

It often makes my heart leap 

   Leap with joy and blessing.

But today I only see my reflection in the shadowed mirror of life.

Today I stand before you.

           you, and you and you!

I am standing in the world

    of needed prayers..

feeling hands of healing.

   Feeling carried.

            feeling cradled.

                  Filled with love.

Standing on the other side of prayer.

       Standing on the promise

              of peace and the healing of my soul.

If you know me you're my friend.

If you love me, I can face the 

trials .

     I'm blessed to be standing

   On the

               other side of prayer.

The Minister

 The Minister March 1, 2021 Stephen J Jeffries

I was probably sixteen when I came out to my pastor. I remember being alone in a car with Reverend Renard on a bright sun-filled day. I do not remember why I was with him, and never was alone with him again.
I remember stumbling with the words but feeling like God was sitting on my shoulder, coaching me and filling my mouth with the words.
"I feel called by God to be a minister!"
 Most pastors at that time in my life were like priests. I was raised in a Baptist church, but pastors and priests sat on a pedestal that stood just above Mom and Dad and the Doctor,Dr. Green, who delivered me.
After I said it, I felt relieved but vulnerable and a bit scared of the reaction. Would he laugh and say " oh, thats a good one. You aren't deserving."
But of course He would never say that. He smiled and I am sure said he was pleased and he knew God was pleased.
After that day, I don't remember much about that decision.  It seems, I just went on with my life ,maybe thinking about the future but not what that commitment to become a minister really meant.
It wasn't long after that I was forced to decide on what to do after High School. 
My mom was insistent on me going to school after graduation.  I had no problem with that, but the reality of the cost of most colleges and the fact that   I had worked in my dad's repair business since I was nine years old, I started looking for business trade schools.
So I was enrolled in International Business College in Fort Wayne Indiana. I could have gone to a college in Indianapolis but I was excited to move away from home and explore life a little.
Two years later I found myself in Rome New York at Griffiss Air Force Base.  
I don't remember thinking about "the ministery." Had I forgotten? Had I ignored that commitment, which as hard it was to say at the time  I knew I took seriously.  
It was years later that I realized that somewhere in the blurr of living and growing from that wide eyed teenager to a near adult, that I was reminded that I was still committed to that goal that God had given me.
It was years later, when I read the inside cover of my wife's high school  yearbook, that I realized I had discussed this goal with Joyce when we we dating.
As friends often do, someone had written in her yearbook, 
" Best of luck with becoming a ministers wife".  Wow!  I had felt strong enough about that calling to discuss it with the woman I loved. 
When I first remembered reading this years later, after we had settled into living  life in Greenfield, where I first worked at a loan company, than as a jeweler and finally as a business owner of The Acorn Tree,A gift/wedding business..  
But was I a failure? Did I ignore that call to God's ministry I had felt so strongly all those years ago.  
Somewhere between being a teenager, raised in a fairly fundamental Baptist church, and an adult who had built a strong mature and growing faith in God I had 
redefined what it meant to be a minister.
Just as mysteriously as it was when I heard God calling me into the ministery, it was even more baffling when I heard God say" you are a minister".
All those years later, I still had the feeling I was not worthy but I also had the feeling God knew what he was doing.
I realized the pedestal that I had put most ministers and the ministry on was more about respect and not so much about being better or different than I felt I was.
I learned that He calls us all to be ministers to each other and to our earth and all life around us. 
Way back when I worked for the loan company. I dealt mostly with people in financial trouble. I remember now how good it felt to help them not just with money, but with a presence in their life.
I think now even in the jewelry store I had a quiet ministry. Just the act of helping people choose gifts for those they loved, or choosing that all important ring to mark the beginning of a life together was some how a ministery. I know by the time I started The Acorn Tree, which became my life ministry, I knew what it meant to be a minister.  God blessed me for over thirty five years in the gift and wedding business. From the God given since of creatively to touching so many people on the happiest days of their life.  All these years later I still have customers and friends remind me of how I mattered years ago when I helped them with a wedding or event  or  by  just making something special for someone they loved.
We are all ministers.  Every day is a new chance to touch someone's life and make a difference in the world.
Every day we are called to be ministers. I still often feel unworthy, but God's love makes us all worthy.  I still know for sure that " I AM BECAUSE GOD IS."

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