Blessed Today

Sometimes this Operation Christmas Child life is a real stretch for me.  I've been fighting a cold this week and learned as the week began that my Operation Christmas Child area team's Prayer Coordinator was praying about stepping down from that role because of her heavy family responsibilities in caring for her elderly parents.  She's been my Barnabas and while I know God is in control, the prospect of losing her support in the role of coordinator was hard to imagine.

Wednesday night we had our area team meeting.  Interestingly enough, none of the team members who were at January's meeting were able to be at February's meeting and vice versa.  I planned and prayed for the meeting but wondered how it would go.  I'm praising God that it was very encouraging.

We laughed a lot together and felt like a real team.  Tracey stepped up to make a new table display for an upcoming event and Terri said she'd put together a gift basket for that event and also would plan an upcoming recruitment meeting.  Heather came with "save the date" notices for September's packing party already made and Cindy volunteered to take charge of coordinating refreshments for meetings.  What a relief to hand off those details.

But last night as I lay in bed with my thoughts churning I found it hard to sleep. One of my team members, Pat, says that I "fret too much."  As I lay there contemplating the new team member application I just received and had to process and wondering if we'd lose our prayer coordinator and praying about the thousands of items we're asking God to provide for our packing party, I began to fret that maybe I was fretting.  (after all, FRET is a four-letter-word for us as Christians.)

So I got out of bed and reviewed verses I'd memorized and determined to claim them.  I went back to bed and fell asleep surrounded by those promises.

And today was bright with blessing.  Linda, my Barnabas/Prayer Coordinator, sent an e-mail me to tell me that not only did she feel God's confirmation that she should remain as Prayer Coordinator BUT she is also going to the Operation Christmas Child Connect Conference with me.

What a blessing.  What an answer to prayer.  What a stretch.