UNDERSTANDING WHAT GOD HAS GIVEN

 

"We have not received the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us." 1 Corinthians 2:12 God desires for us to know what He has freely given to us. One of the responsibilities of the Holy Spirit is to reveal His plans and purposes to us. They may be hidden for a time, but if we seek Him with our whole heart, we can know what He has given to us. John the Baptist understood this principle. When asked if he was the Messiah, he replied, "A man can receive only what is given him from heaven" (Jn. 3:27). John understood his role in the Kingdom of God. He came to pave the way for the Messiah; he was not the Messiah himself. His ministry on earth was very brief, yet Jesus described his life in this way: " 'I tell you the truth: Among those born of women there has not risen anyone greater than John the Baptist; yet he who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he' " (Mt. 11:11). Once we understand what God has given to us, we can walk freely in our calling. However, if we strive to walk in a role that He never gave us, it will result in frustration and failure. God wants to reveal His plan to us by His Spirit. This requires a willingness to seek and accept what He gives us. It may be different from what we thought. It may require adjustments to follow His path for our lives. As we learn from the life of John the Baptist, obedience requires death to our own will. Ask God to reveal what He has freely given to you. Pray that you receive and embrace only those things He has reserved for you to receive and to accomplish in your life. Then you can be assured of a life full of meaning and purpose, and you can look forward to hearing those all-important words someday, "Well done, My good and faithful servant."

THE GOAL OF LIFE

 

"'For I know the plans I have for you,' declares the Lord, 'plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.'" Jeremiah 29:11 For many people in the world, real meaning in life is the next vacation, career success, or stepping up the income ladder. It is a life based on pleasurable experiences. Many a human being has toiled their whole life to gain a pleasurable lifestyle only to find a life that is empty and meaningless. You only have to watch television for one evening to discover that advertisers want us to believe this is the goal of life. The work-to-play theme is consistent with most advertising messages. Solomon was a man who had nothing withheld from his appetite. He was a great builder, a great businessman, and a great lover of women. Every imaginable pleasure was his. Nevertheless, he was to discover that these things alone could not satisfy the human soul. A recent trip to a beautiful island left me grateful that God had allowed me to understand the futile trap of the work-to-play lifestyle. It is great to experience times of refreshing and visit beautiful places as long as we don't fall into the trap of thinking that these experiences equal a meaningful life. God's beautiful creation can so easily become a prison of emptiness if Jesus is not in the center of it. The apostle Paul said there is only one way to find meaning and purpose in life: "I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know Him better. I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which He has called you, the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints, and His incomparably great power for us who believe..."(Ephesians 1:17-19). Knowing Christ brings the only real meaning and purpose to the human soul. Spend time today getting to know the Lord in a more intimate way. Then you will discover real meaning and purpose in life.

THE BOOSTER ROCKET

 

"After the death of Moses the servant of the Lord, the Lord said to Joshua son of Nun, Moses' aide: "Moses My servant is dead. Now then, you and all these people, get ready to cross the Jordan River into the land I am about to give to them-to the Israelites." Joshua 1:1-2 A rocket launch is truly an amazing phenomenon to me. Tons of weight is stacked vertically to the sky with thousands of gallons of fuel exploding in a matter of moments. Soon the rocket drops its take-off boosters and uses additional boosters to move the rocket to the next stage of the mission. The first engines have a unique purpose...to get the rocket to the next stage. Joshua was known for almost 40 years as "Joshua, servant of Moses." God's preparation for him required years of selfless service, training in the desert, and tests of faith. Those preparation years were booster rockets designed to move Joshua into each new stage of his development and his ultimate calling. God allows each of us preparation times to lay a foundation that He plans to build on. Some of those foundation times appear to be laborious and meaningless, yet these varied experiences are what God is using to frame your life for the message He plans to speak through you. Without these foundational experiences, the Jordan River can never be crossed and we cannot enter the Promised Land. Embrace these times of seeming inactivity from God. They, too, are a rocket booster to your next stage of your walk with God. Being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus (Philippians 1:6).

CATALYST TO A CALL

 

Saul got up from the ground, but when he opened his eyes he could see nothing. So they led him by the hand into Damascus.  For three days he was blind, and did not eat or drink anything (Acts 9:8-9). It’s hard to find anyone in Christian history who became a great leader without earning an advanced degree in adversity. To look at John Wesley (1703- 1791), you wouldn’t have thought of him as a great Christian leader. He was just over five feet tall and skeletally thin. In his early years, he suffered greatly from feelings of guilt, inadequacy, and a morbid fear of death. Though he didn’t understand the Christian gospel, he devoted himself to doing good works for the poor in an effort to earn his way to heaven. While in his early thirties, he sailed to America to do missionary work among the American Indians. While crossing the Atlantic, Wesley’s ship passed through a violent storm that broke the main mast off its base and nearly sank the ship. As the waves crashed over the ship, Wesley huddled in terror, knowing he didn’t have peace with God. He survived the storm, and continued to struggle in his relationship with God for several more years. Finally, back in London, he attended a meeting on Aldersgate Street, where he heard a preacher say that salvation comes by faith in Christ alone. At that point, he said, "I felt my heart strangely warmed." Soon after that, Wesley began preaching the gospel. His fifty-two-year preaching ministry became the foundation of the modern evangelical movement. But it never would have happened if John Wesley had not been tossed on the stormy seas of adversity. Adversity is often God’s manure for spiritual callings.

STAYING THE COURSE

 

Then the angel of the LORD ordered Gad to tell David to go up and build an altar to the LORD on the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite. So David went up in obedience to the word that Gad had spoken in the name of the LORD (1 Chron 21:18-19). In 1857, an American businessman named Jeremiah Lanphier was sent out by his local church to begin a noon-day prayer meeting on Fulton Street, right around the corner from Wall Street in New York City. A simple prayer, a willing heart, and an act of obedience resulted in city transformation throughout the United States. However, at that very first meeting, no one showed up in the first 35 minutes.  But Jeremiah waited. Gradually, six people wandered into the room at 35 minutes past the hour. Six months later, 10,000 people were meeting for prayer throughout New York City. This led to one of the greatest spiritual renewals in the United State’s history. What would have happened if Lanphier had decided to abandon the idea after 30 minutes? In a small, darkened room, in the back of one of New York City’s lesser churches, a man prayed alone. His request of God was simple, but earth-shattering: "Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?" He was a man approaching midlife, without a wife or family, but he had financial means. He had made a decision to reject the "success syndrome" that drove the city’s businessmen and bankers. God used this businessman to turn New York City’s commercial empire on its head. He began a businessmen’s prayer meeting on September 23, 1857. The meetings began slowly, but within a few months 20 noonday meetings were convening daily throughout the city. Thousands met to pray because one man stepped out. This was an extraordinary move of God through one man.[1] It only takes one man or woman who is willing to be obedient to be used by God to impact a workplace, city, or even an entire nation. Simple obedience can lead to things you cannot imagine. Are you willing to be used by God?   [1] John Woodbridge,., More than Conquerors: Portraits of Believers from All Walks of Life (Chicago, IL: Moody Press, 1992), p. 337.

YOUR IRREVOCABLE CALLING

 

"For God's gifts and His call are irrevocable." Romans 11:29 It is dangerous to align your calling and your vocation as dependent on each other. God calls us into relationship with Him. That is our foremost calling. It is from this relationship that our "physical" calling results. Whether that is to be a teacher, a stockbroker, a nurse, a pastor, or any number of vocations, we must realize that when He calls us, the change in vocation never changes His call on our lives. It is a mere change in the landscape of our calling. This is why it is dangerous to associate our purpose and calling too closely with our work. When we define our work life exclusively as our calling, we fall into the trap of locking up our identity into our vocation. This promotes aspiration because of a need to gain greater self-worth through what we do. Os Guinness, author of The Call, describes the great artist Picasso, who fell into this trap. "'When a man knows how to do something,' Pablo Picasso told a friend, 'he ceases being a man when he stops doing it.' The result was a driven man. Picasso's gift, once idolized, held him in thrall. Every empty canvass was an affront to his creativity. Like an addict, he made work his source of satisfaction only to find himself dissatisfied. 'I have only one thought: work,' Picasso said toward the end of his life, when neither his family nor his friends could help him relax." [Os Guinness, The Call (Nashville, Tennessee: Word Publishing, 1998), 242.] What happens when you lose your job? Do you lose your calling? Do you lose your identity? Do you lose your sense of well-being? No. Calling involves different stages and experiences in life. Disruptions in your work are an important training ground for God to fulfill all aspects of His calling on your life. Trust in your God who says your calling is irrevocable and that all things come from Him.

OPPOSING GOD'S LEADERSHIP

 

The anger of the LORD burned against them, and he left them (Num 12:9). Beware of trying to depose a leader that God has raised in your midst. Leaders are placed by God in business, government, churches – almost every place where leaders are required. When God places a person in position of authority, it is a grievous sin to go against that leadership. God Himself opposes those who come against His leadership. God’s leaders are not perfect. They make mistakes. That is why following a leader can require a faith that goes beyond faith in the leader. Our faith lies in the God who elevated the leader to his or her position. Miriam and Aaron, the older brother and sister of Moses, had a family dispute about Moses’ wife, who was an Ethiopian and Cushite. She most likely was a black woman. We do not know the nature of the dispute, but it was a typical family conflict. However, the family conflict began to impact God’s agenda for a nation. They were now meddling in God’s business. And He did not like that in the least. God literally brought Aaron and Miriam into the switching house. He judged both Miriam and Aaron for their rebellion against His ordained leader. "Why then were you not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?" (Num 12:8). Miriam was stricken with leprosy and had it not been for Moses’ appeal on her behalf, she would have been cast out for good. God gave her a second chance but it required being cast away from the camp for seven days. Miriam and Aaron repented for their rebellion. If you struggle with a leader that God has over you, pray for that leader. If God wants to remove that leader, He can do it. Think twice about conspiring to remove a leader whom God has not chosen to remove yet.