Sometimes...

Sometimes being a youth minister is awesome, but sometimes it's really lonely. Sometimes, I really get tired of being the strong one. Sometimes, I really just want to depend on someone else to get things done. And it's at those "sometimes" that I try to remember that God is the one that I need to depend on.
Sometimes, it's so hard to depend on God when I cannot see him or touch him. I really wish that he would come down and talk to me like he did to people in the Old Testament. It would be so much easier. But when I have these "sometimes", I have to remember how He has touched my life and blessed me far beyond what I deserve.
When I get these "sometimes" I can feel God's comforting hand on me, whether it's through my personal study time with him or whether it's through somebody at His church. God, I thank you for you peace and love and hope that you give me. May I never lose it.
The other thing that's hard about ministry is the lack of real friends. You have all these people that put on their church faces around you because you are a "minister". I want so badly for people to know that I am just a regular person like them who messes up just as much and sometimes worse. I want them to know that I am made holy and righteous not by my own life but by Christ and his life and death, the same way they are made holy and righteous. And I want them to know that I do not judge them for their shortcomings. I love and care for them, not because it's my job but because they are God's creation and he sent His Son to die for them.

Father God, I ask for real friends in my ministry.

Josh