June 16, 2010

When it's All Been Said and Done

Greetings from the deep end!
This is gonna be a short one. I just have a few feelings I want to try to work out. So, I was done with youth tonight, they prayed for me, Pam and the kids. We all shared a bunch of our favorite memories of our times together, and I shared my last words of encouragement and challenge for their future in the youth group. Did fine, didn't get sad, didn't cry, my voice didn't even crack. Gave and received hugs and well wishes, not a tear. Then at 9:03pm I went back to the youth room to shut down for the last time. I shut off the A/C, told the kids I was closing up, and flipped all 6 light switches. As I turned around and looked at the darkened room, lit with only the dim light that came through the windows, I looked at Matt walking out the door with his long board for the last time and stopped moving. I just stopped. Matt seemed to look at me as if he were waiting for me, but I couldn't move, and didn't speak. As Matt turned to leave and the door shut behind him, I found myself all alone in the youth room and suddenly a myriad of thoughts and memories, both good and bad, flooded into my mind. Remembering battles won and lost, kids that came for a long time and kids that were only there for a season.

I walked to the stage and sat down on the second step and began to choke up. I asked God as I looked at the empty room if I had done what I was supposed to do with the kids He gave me in the time He gave them to me. I asked if I were leaving the youth group, the church, in a better position than it was when I arrived. As I asked the question, I wasn't sure of the answer to those questions. As I thought and prayed a song came to mind. I couldn't remember all of the words but I remembered the gist of it...


When It's All Been Said And Done

Verse 1
When it's all been said and done
There is just one thing that matters
Did I do my best to live for truth
Did I live my life for You
Verse 2
When it's all been said and done
All my treasures will mean nothing
Only what I've done for love's reward
Will stand the test of time
Verse 3
Lord Your mercy is so great
That You look beyond our weakness
And find purest gold in miry clay
Making sinners into saints
Verse 4
I will always sing Your praise
Here on earth and ever after
For You've shown me Heaven's my true home
When it's all been said and done
You're my life when life is gone

The song didn't give me any answers, as the song is questions only. I guess that means that God, rather than giving me a solid, easy, yes or no answer, brought to mind a song that only multiplied the questions. Great. Thanks! But that is where I am, did I do what I did here for the right reasons? If I did, then it was worth while, if I didn't, I hope and pray that God will use it anyway. I won't probably know about the impact that my life and actions in Sheridan may have had until heaven. That is the great drawback to ministry, and youth ministry specifically. We do lots and lots of work on hearts, we can't see hearts, and only in heaven will we be able to really see what work God was able to do through our feeble hands and hearts. In the end, "Only what I've done for love's reward, will stand the test of time."



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