Today's Devotional
February 18, 2009
Subject: Used Before You Choose
Jeremiah 1:4-5 "Then the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations."
I didn't realize it then, but as a "black boy," it wasn't "okay" for your best friend to be a "white boy" in 1969. I didn't realize it then, but I was right when I argued against my older sister when she "accused" me of "liking white people." I didn't realize it then, but there was a purpose behind my reason for wanting to attend a college that had more racial diversity than, the historically black college in my hometown, which had been attended by everyone in my family to that point (mom, dad, older brother and two older sisters). Then yesterday, after I wrote the devotional blog about "Race Church," my long time friend and Christian brother wrote me and talked about how crazy he thought I was when I joined the 3,000 member Sherwood Baptist Church in Albany Georgia in 1991. There were less than 10 "people of color." So yesterday was an epiphany for me because when I had the conversation Monday evening with my brother about how churches are still way too segregated, I told him that I've always had this dream/vision of a campaign amongst churches where we take the initiative to worship with people of other colors and how we can't expect the "world" to come together if we can't do it in the Christian community with the power of Christ.
The epiphany was that although I've had in my mind great plans to work to unify the body of Christ, through all of the things that have happened in my life, some of them before I even knew Him, God had already been using me to work that plan. There are now lots of other ways that I see God using me to work that plan, which really wasn't my plan at all, but instead, His plan. I wrote a song many years ago called "Color Me Christ," which speaks to the fact that as believers, greater than the color of our skin is the color of our message and that color is Christ.
I'm really amazed today at how God uses us before we become usable and how He uses us before we even decide that we want to be used. So today if you're trying to think about whether or not you can fulfill the purpose and plan that He has for you, you're already quite a few steps behind Him. He has already chosen you and more than that, you've already been used.
Carlen
