By: Sarah Nutter
I had to do one of the most ridiculous things of my life the week before Thanksgiving. I work with the junior high at my church, and we just finished this semester’s series, which involved trying to go through the entire Bible in 10 weeks (not an easy thing, let me tell you). As a grand finale of sorts, the head youth pastor decided to do something different. His plan: there would be five “stations” the teenagers would go through – the Garden of Eden (a party with tons of food), the desert the Israelites went through, an operating room to represent healing, the belly of the whale Jonah hung out in for three days, and finally the Tabernacle found in Leviticus where we would gather to worship at the end. Jesse, the pastor, assigned a point person to be in charge of each of the rooms.
Let’s think about this – none of those rooms sounds easy to create. But I think the Tabernacle is the hardest. I’m just saying that out of bitterness because guess who he asked to be in charge of that room? Oh yes. Yours truly – freshman in high school who hasn’t studied the Tabernacle since her 3rd grade Sunday School teacher used felt cutouts to explain the dimensions of the Holy of Holies.
The floor was my head and the ceiling the surface of the sludge I was in.
I asked Jesse what he had in mind for it, and he said to be creative and try to make the designated room look as close to the Tabernacle as possible. Oh, piece of cake. Just find some golden altars and an ark of the covenant at my local Wal-Mart. What’s more, we were told about this the week before the actual thing. (But don’t let me make this sound worse than it is – another worker volunteered to construct an ark for me).
That night I hung out with my suitemate and another girl on our dorm floor, and I couldn’t help but convey the sheer desperation I was feeling. I had three huge papers due that week and no vision of how I could create this room in a cost-efficient and simple manner. Just when I thought I honestly might cry, my suitemate looked at me like a little kid at Christmas and said, “Sarah, this might sound weird, but this is actually the kind of thing I would be really excited to help out with.” My other friend said the same thing. I couldn’t believe it.
I couldn’t believe God had provided two people to help me right when I needed them most. But now that I think about it, I don’t know why I was so surprised – God does that all the time. He provides. Like when I went to college and wanted so badly to get involved in ministry of some form and He provided a youth pastor to visit one of my classes and ask for help with his junior high ministry. Or something simple, like when I was having a bad day and wanted to get off-campus at midnight and He provided a good friend to go with me so I wouldn’t have to be alone. God is a provider. I hope you notice His provision in your life. He provides for more than just the essentials like food and clothes. He provides for the deepest longings of your heart.
This holiday season, I would encourage you to think about what God has given you. And then take it a step further – think about how you can be like the God who provides. If God is a provider, and we want to be like Him, then we should also be providers. Blessed as we are, sometimes we are ignorant of other people’s needs. I hope we will all look for ways God might be able to use us to provide for others. And in the meantime, let’s be thankful for how He provides for us.
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