9 “Do not get any gold or silver or copper to take with you in your belts— 10 no bag for the journey or extra shirt or sandals or a staff, for the worker is worth his keep. 11 Whatever town or village you enter, search there for some worthy person and stay at their house until you leave. 12 As you enter the home, give it your greeting. 13 If the home is deserving, let your peace rest on it; if it is not, let your peace return to you. 14 If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, leave that home or town and shake the dust off your feet. 15 Truly I tell you, it will be more bearable for Sodom and Gomorrah on the day of judgment than for that town.

Dear God, I don’t think I would have liked this assignment. In fact, I would really have had to have been filled with the Holy Spirit to do it. I don’t like the idea of going out with no money, extra clothes, etc. Heck, I am leaving for a retreat today at a nice place, and I am still going to pack a fair amount of clothes to take with me. Then I would have to find someone to put me up. Yeah. Good luck with that.

I think there are times when you call us to do extraordinary things like this, but I also think that the Holy Spirit empowers us when those times come. I can think of brave things I have done in the past, and I can tell you that each time I found that I had the peace of the Holy Spirit and the power of the Holy Spirit with me. I am thinking of the time my wife and I helped a homeless woman and her daughter in an extraordinary way. Or when I left a secure job to embark on the unknown. Or when I took a job that I wasn’t sure could support us. You prepared me for each of these little assignments, and, while they were difficult, I found them to be doable.

Then there are the times my fear and/or apathy left me sitting inactive instead of following your call. These examples are too numerous to count.

Father, I pray that you will prepare my heart, mind, soul, and body for whatever call you have for me. I pray that same thing for my children and my wife. Help us to all represent you well and to give you the glory for the things you are doing in our lives. Love others richly through us and be glorified in everything that we do.