I have no idea what I'm doing

Last December I made the world's greatest fundraising plan.  I put together a list of all the places I was going to take fundraising trips, I picked dates for each trip, I wrote down who I was going to talk to in each area, and I prayed over the whole thing.  Sweet.  This year was gonna be cake.

Then real life happened.  I took on several new responsibilities, started several new projects, welcomed our second-born into our house, and basically tried to do my best in all those areas.  Except, of course, fundraising.

At one point I noted that there was a trip scheduled for about four weeks away.  I blinked and it was three weeks away.  I made a note to myself to make some calls, then it was suddenly two weeks away.  I frantically tried calling lots of people at that point and was welcomed by many voicemail greetings.  At T-minus one week I did get a few things together, but it was quite minimal.

A day or two out, I decided to cancel the trip.  As I picked up the phone to call the two or three people I'd made appointments with, one of them called to cancel with me anyway.  One could choose to see that as convenient.  I chose to see it as further proof of my failure.  Even my pathetic mini-trip appointments wouldn't have worked out.

After I put down the phone, I actually said out loud, "I have no idea what I'm doing."  And it was true.

But that's not the whole truth.

For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are. (1 Corinthians 1:26-28 ESV, emphasis mine)

Paul here is unabashedly proclaiming that God actually chooses the foolish, the weak, the low, the despised and the "nots" in order to accomplish His purposes.  God is unimpressed with the wise.  The strong have nothing to offer Him.  Whatever it is someone claims to have or be - God brings them to nothing - and uses His weak chosen to do so.

Of all the talents and abilities God could choose to use in the world, His favorites are the ones who are clueless, powerless and pathetic.

God chooses those who say, "I have no idea what I'm doing."

It's those people that recognize that they could never overcome their sin and brokenness through their own virtue.  It's those people who will admit that they need a Savior.  It's those people that will make fantastic missionaries for Jesus Christ.  It's those people that God is using to declare to a power-hungry world that real power isn't in their noble birth or Ph.D, but in a Man who became nothing for us so that we might become something in Him.

So make a plan.  Put together lists of names.  Schedule time to make calls.  But don't worry when you're confronted with your own inability to actually raise the funds.

It's just proof that God is using you.