Over the past few months, as my count-down began for the end of maternity leave, and beginning full time work, I reflected about what I had learned and experienced in the past year. I give thanks to the Lord for making the Everlasting Way and Finishing Way clearer to me. By diligently trying to practice on many of the elements that I had been weak on in the past, I have improved greatly on doing house chores, being more stable on exercising, and planning for my daily schedule.
Several factors helped me to make those improvements. The main reason was I had the opportunity to join the Monday and Friday morning team worship regularly during these months off, and the worship really helped me to enter into Abba and the Lord’s love more deeply. By placing different truths about God before our eyes, our hearts became drawn to God, and that made me feel more motivated to help myself to be in condition even when I am not with brothers and sisters. Many times after the worship, I felt I could lay aside everything to love God. This was my motivation to lay aside my feelings of laziness and unwillingness, and just to do what I should do – e.g. to draw near to God even when I felt tired or I had “no mood” to do it; to exercise even when my muscles felt heavy and I would rather sit and eat more snacks; to cook dinner and wash up dishes without complaining, even though I wished someone else would do them.
The second reason was I experienced the support and encouragement of the sisters in my group. During this year, I had more time to have deeper fellowship with different sisters going through the same life stage as I do. Their experiences, advice, prayers and care encouraged me to rise up further for the Lord and for this family. When I saw their improvements, I felt a greater desire to go forward together with them, so that we could be a stronger team to bless God’s family and God’s will.
Another improvement was that I became more active in preaching the gospel to people around me. In the past, I would preach the gospel and help in outreach – but only within my comfort zone. For certain people that seemed well educated, well experienced in life, I felt shy to approach them or to testify before them about God. However, the Lord’s love urged me to consider the people around me from God’s perspective. They are all greatly loved by God, and very precious – and each one also has great need in their heart; I also need to love them and express this love by sharing God’s love with them. I decided to have a birthday party for my daughter, and use that as a reason to invite many of my coworkers who also had young children to come and meet brothers and sisters. It went well, and we were able to invite some to other events for more follow up.
From seeing all the improvements of the sisters around me, and also from myself, I can feel the beginning of a revival. I look forward to pursuing and co-working with a strong team to love God, and to bring many families to know God and His love purpose!