The Matthew 28:19 Project

When I started reading the Bible, I realized that I needed to begin serving God. The only problem was, I didn’t know how to do that. I’m not a singer, even though I love music and attending concerts. I’m not very social, and most of the time, I would much rather be at home with my cat and the dog than be around a lot of people. In almost any social setting, when I’ve grown tired of being around people, I’ve perfected the art of what my friends at work like to call my Irish Exit. One minute I’m there, and then poof, the next minute I’m gone.

 I’m not very crafty, and I can’t draw or paint pretty pictures. My graphic design skills are good enough to get the message across, but that’s about it. I am a pretty good photographer, but I didn’t know how I could use my photos to serve God. 

I do enjoy writing fictional stories. Back in the day, I was addicted to a soap opera and used to write fictional stories centered around my favorite character. God cured me of this addiction by canceling my show! I had thought about taking an old soap opera story that I hadn’t finished and reworking it into Christian warfare fiction. It was about demons, angels, and spiritual battles. I wasn’t reading the Bible back then, but now, after eight months of doing the Bible Recap, I’m pretty amazed at how accurate I was about where I was going with this story.

So, when I was trying to figure out how to use my minimal talents to serve God, I had thought about writing Christian fictional stories. When I read through the book of Daniel and reached the part where God gave Daniel all those end-time visions, Daniel didn’t know how to interpret them, so he asked God. God responded to his prayer by sending an angel, but the angel was waylaid by one of Satan’s angels. Okay, now I don’t know about you, but I want to know what happened between the archangel, who I think was Gabriel and the angel from Satan. That would make a great story! 

I thought about writing that story out, but I forgot about it until just now while writing this blog.  I believe our Awana program started around that time, and I figured out how to serve God with my photography skills, which is probably why I forgot about my grand idea to be a fictional Christian writer in the fantasy genre. (I don’t even know if such a genre exists!)

Thinking about stories in the Bible, there are other things I’d like to know, such as I would like to know what happened to Jonah during the three days he was in the belly of that big fish. I would also like to know what happened when Moses was leading the Israelites through the desert for those forty years. I also want to know what happened when Paul was in the desert for those three years after his conversion.

The idea of using my creative writing skills recently came back to me because I was listening to a sermon on the Great White Throne Judgment, and this scenario popped into my head. That scenario stayed stuck in my head for two weeks so I decided to just write it down. I thought it would be straightforward to put down on paper what I was visualizing in my head. I’ve done that for years, so I assumed it would be easy. I was mistaken. I didn’t expect how unsettled I would feel while trying to put into words what I saw in my mind. I become so uneasy that I needed to take breaks. I still haven’t been able to finish this because every time I write on it, it starts to creep me out and I have to stop writing.  I don’t know how authors who write end-of-time fiction manage to do it without losing themselves in the visions their imaginations create.

This is probably why God hasn’t carved out a path for my creative writing ability yet, because my soul can’t handle the things my imagination conjures! That is okay because I can wait on God to open up that door when He is ready. He’s given me plenty to do right now with the blog, the Matthew 28:19 Project website, creating content for the Fellowship Baptist Church Facebook page and Awana starts next month.

If you are searching for a way to serve God, there are ways to do that while you wait for guidance from Him. Your local church offers volunteer opportunities that might help you discover how to serve God. Your community also has volunteer options that allow you to serve Him. My mom volunteers at our local thrift store run by one of our churches. My sister volunteers at her local soup kitchen. I found my role in serving God by volunteering at my church, so get out there and start volunteering!