by Marilyn Ehle
“Jesus prayed… “As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world… Father, just as you are in me and I am in you…May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.” John 17:18, 21
I am not by nature a people person. I grew up in the country as an only child who loved walking alone in the fields surrounding our home, or reading under low over-hanging branches of the cedar tree that grew on the one windowless side of our house. (Where my mother couldn’t see me!)
Even today my favorite times are like the ones experienced as I write these words—sitting at a small scarred wooden table in my favorite café, looking out the paned window at sporadic traffic soundlessly passing by. The café owners are generous toward moles like myself—they keep my cup filled and their kitchen conversation is thoughtfully muted.
So what am I doing in a life normally filled with teaching, organizing, counseling? A life far removed from meandering through fields or sequestered under pine boughs?
A night over 50 years ago is burned into my memory. It was the night I felt God whispering “…so send I you.” The years since that night have been saturated with challenge, disappointment, joy, sorrow, adventure and fulfillment. Along the path I have sometimes complained, insisting that I am inadequate for the task, or I would prefer different traveling companions, but the one who called me has gone with me to refresh, encourage, teach, prod and love.
How tragic it would have been in insist only on walking in fields and sitting under trees.
You can comment on this devotional online at:
https://thoughts-about-god.com/blog/2010/11/21/me_send-i-you/
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