Summer Begins

Today begins my summer.

All the activities of spring--Lent, Easter, Baccalaureate, graduation, Mother's Day, and VBS--are completed. While farmers are gearing up for wheat harvest--their busiest time of the year--this is my opportunity to gear down.

I always look forward to this 3-month window--June, July, and August. It's my chance to take vacation time, evaluate the past 9 months of ministry, and make plans for the next months--from September '06 to May '07.

Usually I enter this time of year tired and worn out. That's why I took particular note of something that the Fitz Family's "Father Fitz" said during their juggling show on Friday for our VBS kids.

He read from Colossians 1:28-29, where the Apostle Paul says:

We proclaim him, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone perfect in Christ. To this end I labor, struggling with all his energy, which so powerfully works in me.

Mark, the real name of "Father Fitz", commented, "It's interesting that Paul doesn't say he struggles with all of his energy, but rather the energy of Christ."

Indeed, that is interesting, for it reveals the way in which we should do our work--and it shows Christ's desire to give us his strength for our physical and mental tasks, particularly in the work of discipleship.

It makes me wonder, how much of my labor has been according to my strength and how much the Lord's?