It was the last week of October when the lead pastor of my small group back at home said to me, “Marcela, on Nov. 4, you’re bringing the word!” to which I replied with a nervous laugh. I’m pretty young compared to the rest of the people in my community group, so it came as a surprise when he made that statement. Besides, there were other people with more experience in giving the word, that I thought, “What could I bring to the table to share?” I’m only 20 years old; what do I know?
I began asking my mom questions: What should I do? What should I preach? What do you think would be the perfect message for me to give? All of these questions began to overflow my mind as I began to grapple with this task. I wanted to be able to give a message that wasn’t going to serve me but would serve others and speak His truth. I just didn’t know what it could be!
The only advice my mom gave me was, “Pray, Marcela. God will tell you.”
Before I continue, the purpose of writing this article is to share my own journey in preparing a message to my community group/home church and how I encountered this new challenge in my walk of faith. I’m not a perfect person, and neither are you, but there is a certain joy that comes with serving God and learning how He is molding me. And I found myself wanting to share that with you, reader.
I prayed. And prayed. And prayed.
The only words that remained on my mind were spiritual warfare, so I ran with it.
I immersed myself in my Bible and found as many scriptures as I could that correlated with the theme of “spiritual warfare.” As I kept reading and reading and reading, my eyes began to grow tired, but I didn’t want to give up yet. I pulled out my journal and began writing what was put in my heart. I began to remember my own personal struggles and how I sometimes struggled. In my spiritual warfare, I grow anxious and weary and cry all the time. And it is in those times when I have learned to lean on Him.
I poured into this journal with verses and other scriptures from the Bible. Pretty soon, I had written over four pages with a message that was put in my heart.
I let my mother read it before I gave the message, simply because I wanted to see if there was anything I should add or take away or correct, but to my surprise, she thought it was a solid message that was well-supported with scriptures. My goal was to give a message that was straight to the point and Bible-based.
When it came to the time for me to give the message, I was nervous at first. However, pretty soon, I began to let Him speak through me with this message. I became passionate about it because I understood it and came from a long walk of life which gave me the ability to be compassionate with others. I knew that the message I gave fulfilled its purpose when many people that night began to tell me how they have been struggling but realized that they just needed to lean on God more, despite what is going on around them.
That’s how I knew that God had truly put that message in my heart and why I had gone through what I had. It all served a purpose.
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