10 Scriptures To Help You Stick It Out In MinistrySample

Living a life in ministry has not always been easy for me. I realized pretty quickly that I didn’t receive the gift of leadership but nevertheless, I live a life in leadership married to a very strong and capable leader. I like to say I’m in leadership by default. Living life in leadership by default can be overwhelming. For many years it meant I hid. I hid from responsibility, I hid from being recognized, and I hid from opportunities. I believed I didn’t fit in leadership and if God hadn’t gifted me in that way, He couldn’t use me. What a lie I allowed Satan to whisper for way too long. This scripture was key in breaking the chains that held me because it gave me permission to be uniquely me. You see for years when I wasn’t hiding, I was mimicking others. I saw how other pastors’ wives and women in ministry were living out their role, and I tried to follow their lead. And I failed miserably. Then I learned one of the greatest lessons for leadership and life in general: Comparison kills contentment. Often, as leaders, we see how someone else leads and we take our cues from them instead of searching for our own direction and finding what God desires for us. We see success in another’s ministry and change ours to match it. Before we know it we can be living someone else’s life and missing our own. I’m not saying we can’t take helpful pieces from one another. I’ve learned so much from other leaders. Many godly people around me have greatly influenced who I am as a person. They have helped me develop into who God created me to be. I love the way Galatians 6:4-5 reads in the Message, “Each of you must take responsibility for doing the creative best you can with your own life.” I am called to live out my own creative best, not the creative best of someone else. Be true to yourself. Trust who God created you to be. Rest in knowing He’s made you capable and unique. Don’t mimic your way through life. What area of life are you most tempted to mimic? Have you allowed comparison to kill contentment in your life? By Brandi Wilson