What Did God Do During My Sabbatical?

September 5, 2024 | by: Dale Thiele | 0 Comments

Posted in: Pastoral Encouragement

I want to share a bit about my sabbatical, a first for me and a first for Oak Hills with one of her pastors. Instead of talking about what I did on the sabbatical, I would like to consider what God did during the sabbatical. “In him we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28). And apart from him we can do nothing (Jn. 15:5). So, let’s look at the last two months through the lens of what God has been doing. 

  1. God has Been Building His Kingdom Around the World. God continues to raise up leaders for his church at Oak Hills, in Ethiopia, and in Romania. And through the ministries of his churches, people continue to come to faith in Jesus Christ. Consider two examples from Ethiopia. Two young men, whom I had the privilege to teach for five days, have spent the month of August in the Somali region of Ethiopia sharing the gospel with Muslims. God has moved in the lives of Abraham and Tsegaw long before I ever arrived in Ethiopia and is using them for the sake of the Gospel. Then there is Pastor Rata, one of our translators. Rata has been so enthusiastic about the training, he brought ten new students to the class. This means more leaders of the church in Ethiopia are received solid biblical training. In Romania, Andras Visky has been an active evangelist for decades. Now his children and nephew are carrying on the ministry outreaches to university students and the Roma people. Even through the formal process of officer nominations, God builds his church and provides leaders for ministry growth. Jesus promised, “I will build my church” (Matt. 16:18), and he has been active in fulfilling his promise. 
  1. God has Been Growing Oak Hills through the Ministry of the Saints. Every member of the body of Christ is a minister and has ministry responsibility (Eph. 4:12). God uses the ministry of each member to make the body grow so that it builds itself up in love (Eph. 4:16). The ministry of Oak Hills is not dependent on one person. 
  1. God Continues to Empower His People for Faith, Holiness, and Ministry. One of the themes that has stood out in my reading and study is God’s empowerment of his people. Paul prays that the church in Ephesus would be “strengthened with power through his Spirit” (Eph. 3:16), and then commands “be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might” (Eph. 6:10). God promises in Isaiah 40:29, “He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength.” As Paul’s prayer in Ephesians 3 indicates, God’s power works in his saints through the Holy Spirit. John Currie explains in his book, The Pastor as Leader, “For those who are in Christ, the imperative with respect to the Spirit is not to receive the Spirit but to be filled with the Spirit—to allow the divine person who has already taken up residence in their lives to pervade and empower their lives for conformity to Christ and service for Christ. The question, as it has been put by others, is not Do we who are in Christ have the Spirit? but Does the Spirit really have us?” (p. 73-74). Any growth in holiness, any fruitfulness in ministry, any deeper delight in Christ… all of it is empowered by the Holy Spirit working in our lives. 
  1. God Refreshed My Soul. I have regular habits of spending time with the Lord in Scripture and prayer, but this sabbatical allowed me to linger longer and do some in-depth study my schedule normally does not allow. I worked verse by verse through Isaiah. What a rich encounter with the “Holy One of Israel”! God labors through this prophet to draw a people to trust in him alone. And he promises that his word will produce fruit (Is. 55:11). God looks to the one “who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word” (Is. 66:2). Such relaxed study was life-giving to my soul. And I will continue to look to the Lord’s provision through these means of grace. God is faithful and trustworthy. 

I pray that God captivates your attention day by day, for he is always at work. And a mind stayed upon God alone is kept at in perfect peace (Is. 26:3).  

-Pastor Dale

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