What to do...what to do...

OK. So I've been hung up on Spiritual gifts for a while. I've taken SHAPE classes and done DiSC tests. I've read books (even the Bible!). I'm still unclear on what makes a gift Spiritual. And how you're supposed to know if it's Spiritual or just genetic or something. Be that as it may, I do believe that I have the gift of Administration. Exciting, huh?

Last week Mike and I met with a person at First Baptist to try to gain some insight into our life. We've been drifting for some time, waiting for something, but not sure what. And we know we have a tendency to have blind spots, so we were looking for some help. Turns out our very good listener friend thinks we should look at our gifts, talents, abilities, etc to help us grasp what God is doing in us and with us.

Of course, I've already taken the assessment (a couple of months ago, in fact), but Mike hadn't done this one before. So Mike did his yesterday. (It was supposed to take about 45 minutes, but it took Mike over three hours. Does this tell you anything about our indecisiveness?) Now we're trying to figure out what this means (on our own because our friend is out-of-pocket for a week or so). We haven't come up with much, but I always find it a fascinating exercise.

Basically it looks like Mike is schizophrenic and I'm OCD. I'm thinking we'll make a followup appointment with our new friend as soon as possible.

We're both big on "helps" - Mike more in a mentoring/discipling kind of way; I'm more of a behind-the-scenes organizer. I certainly can see all kinds of places the two of us could participate, but what we desire is to make it a full-time commitment, not just a weekend hobby. The hard part has been convincing anyone else. And it's not like we're independently wealthy - we'd need to make some money doing it, too. So are we headed for disappointment? Are we doomed to be ministry wannabees?

We'll see.

Oh, have I mentioned "The Sing Off" is on again? Love it!!!

Disappointed

I was going to title this entry "Retraction", but I just did that a couple of weeks ago. Today we decided to withdraw our offer on the townhouse I was talking about. It's really disappointing because I thought we were finally putting in some real roots here by purchasing a home. Things just weren't coming together right, and it was starting to feel like moving forward with the purchase would not be a wise decision.

We've been praying for direction for so long, I don't know that we would recognize an answer if we got one. But I do think God gives us wisdom when we need it, even when we don't want to listen. I mean, I really wanted this townhouse purchase to happen. I recognize my tendency to force things, so I tried to step back and let Mike decide. But that sweet man doesn't want me to be disappointed, so he was wanting me to decide. Both of us knowing that we should back off but not wanting to face the decision. But we did.

Anyway, this makes life hard (isn't it always?) as we've already given our notice on our apartment, and even without buying this townhouse, we need to still move somewhere closer to my office. So we're apartment hunting again. Yuck! I really should keep packing, but I just didn't feel like it today. Maybe I'll have some renewed energy tomorrow.

For now, I'm simply going to re-read Psalm 31.