A letter from our Pastor.....

Quiet a while ago I filled out the 99 Things About me, and it got me thinking about things I would personally like to do in my life and I started making that list, surprisingly most of the items are pretty achievable. One of the top items is volunteering and/or working in children's ministry at our church. I've wanted this for awhile but for too many reasons to list have not done it. The most recent reason is that I used to tell people I would start volunteering with the children when V. and I got close to building our own family. Now that we actually trying I really don't [more] want people to know and/or ask more than they already do.

Needless to say I've pushing it out of my mind until a few weeks ago, we received a letter from our head pastor asking us to volunteer with the children, here is the kicker though it was written directly to us! Our pastors and elder board hand selected several people/couples that they specifically would like to see helping with our children's ministry and youth program. No big deal except there are easily 1,500+ people at our church! I felt pretty special, V and I spoke about it and agreed to attend the informational meeting and then pray on it. V is a pretty shy guy and the thought of speaking (or reading) in front of people, even tiny people in diapers, makes him very nervous so the mere fact that he was willing to go to the meeting was enough for me.

Flash forward to now. I can tell I am supposed to do this, for a lot of reasons but mostly I just know I am, I feel called. I was sad that V did not feel the call, part of me thinks he does feel it but his fear of public speech has stopped him, but that is ok I love him just the same. I put aside my dream of working along side my hubby in the ministry and turned in my background check (as required for all volunteers) and waited to receive my schedule. I have that now, I'm the lead teacher for the infants! I have a little homework to do and will have my first meeting this coming weekend. V is proud of me for obeying the calling I feel, he's even asked if he could come with me and just watch and see what it's like (I think hanging out with babies for 2 hrs has appealed to him!). I told him I'd check and see if that was ok. Sure enough the woman in change of the children's ministry is not only ok with it but very excited! I can't wait to tell V!

I won't lie, I'm terrified people will continue to nag us (or worse nag us even more) about having children etc...I know they mean no harm with their words but they cut deep just the same. I am not sure I'll always react as kindly as I would like but I have decided to allow myself to be as honest as I feel necessary in the moment.

I volunteer during the evening service for the entire month of Sept then have Oct, Nov and Dec off and volunteer all of January. I pray I get to return in January a very happily pregnant volunteer.