God Can Still Use You
When God told Jonah to go to Nineveh, he ran. Moses murdered someone. David committed adultery. Rahab was a prostitute. Mary Magdalene had seven demons in her. But God still used every one of these people in ministry! So, why couldn’t He use you? Who said that He couldn’t?
It took me nearly 30 years to figure that out. Through many years of oppression. Through many years of hurts, depression, being told “women can’t preach,” and that if you’ve committed “bad sins” then God can’t use you. What exactly were the “bad sins?” Because when I’d read the Bible, it listed some things, but it never said anything about committing “bad sins” that would cause God not to be able to use you. In fact, in the book Romans it says that nothing can separate us from the love of God!
“For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” ~Romans 3:38-39 (NKJV)
If nothing can separate us from the love of God, then that must mean that God loves us ALWAYS! And if He could use Jonah, Moses, David, Rahab, and Mary Magdalene, even after the things they had done, (Rahab is even in the lineage of David and Jesus!) then why couldn’t he use you, too? He CAN! And He wants to! However some of us, myself included, have to figure it out the hard way. Of course, Moses took the hard road, too. As did Jonah, and most of the other people in the Bible. Jesus drove seven demons out of Mary Magdalene before she began following Him! But follow Him she did! You see, we are all pieces of the puzzle God is working on. Every puzzle piece is needed. Every puzzle piece is unique. And every puzzle piece fits into the unique spots that the Lord wants them to fit into. Including you.
Although I got saved in 1982, I didn’t learn much about being a Christian, much less following Christ nor serving Him until around 1999. When I became part of a Christ centered health program and began doing Bible study and learning Scripture by memory, I began learning things about God that I didn’t know. But it took even more time than that before I REALLY began serving Him and making Him Lord of my life. Including the Holy Spirit coming over me in such a way that put me in the floor! I’m a slow learner sometimes.
May I encourage you today to not ask for anyone’s approval for what you do for the Lord. After I had some very Godly people pray for me, helping me find the freedom in Christ that I’d been searching for and didn’t know it, I found a freedom, peace, excitement, and a ministry, that had been waiting for me for 30 years, maybe longer, I don’t know! Oh, I’m SO glad that God is patient.
I knew I was saved. But I didn’t realize that He could use even me. This is what the devil did to me…. But God can still use me, and since I’ve sent the enemy packing, I can now focus on what God wants me to do. You can, too!
