to be ourselves...

“Somehow,” notes Os Guinness, “we human beings are never happier than when we are expressing the deepest gifts that are truly us.” Now, some children are gifted toward science, and others are born athletes. But whatever their specialty, all children are inherently creative. Give them a barrel of Legos and a free afternoon and my boys will produce an endless variety of spaceships and fortresses and who knows what. It comes naturally to children; it’s in their nature, their design as little image bearers. A pack of boys let loose in a wood soon becomes a major Civil War reenactment. A chorus of girls, upon discovering a trunk of skirts and dresses, will burst into the Nutcracker Suite. The right opportunity reveals the creative nature.

This is precisely what happens when God shares with mankind his own artistic capacity and then sets us down in a paradise of unlimited potential. It is an act of creative invitation, like providing Monet with a studio for the summer, stocked full of brushes and oils and empty canvases. Or like setting Martha Stewart loose in a gourmet kitchen on a snowy winter weekend, just before the holidays. You needn’t provide instructions or motivation; all you have to do is release them to be who they are, and remarkable things will result. As the poet Hopkins wrote, “What I do is me: for that I came.”

Oh, how we long for this—for a great endeavor that draws upon our every faculty, a great “life’s work” that we could throw ourselves into. “God has created us and our gifts for a place of his choosing,” says Guinness, “and we will only be ourselves when we are finally there.” Our creative nature is essential to who we are as human beings—as image bearers—and it brings us great joy to live it out with freedom and skill. Even if it’s a simple act like working on your photo albums or puttering in the garden—these, too, are how we have a taste of what was meant to rule over a small part of God’s great kingdom.

(The Journey of Desire , 152–54, From The Ransomed Heart, by John Eldredge, reading 145, Ransomed Heart Ministries www.ransomedheart.com)

 

power of leadership

In 1^st Corinthians chapter one, there is an interesting passage where Paul confronts the church and rebukes them because their fighting among themselves.  He says, “One of you says, ‘I’m with Paul.’  Another says, ‘Peter’s who I follow.’  Yet another said ‘I only serve the Messiah.’”  (My paraphrase.)  He is basically chastising them for their attitude of division.  He was appalled at the thought that people would say that they were aligned only with him, and against another.  In fact, he goes on to say that he was glad he only baptized a couple of people in the church, though he had ministered to all of them and was the apostolic oversight for the church in Corinth.  Why?  Because he didn’t want them to have any more reason to use him as a dividing factor. 

 

He goes on to say that Christ is not divided.  He reminds them that they are a body, and that they need one another, that one member is not greater than another, even in the leadership of the church.  He reminds them that they were nothing when they came to Christ.  In a wry sense of humor, he tells them that there was not many “wise” or “noble” in their ranks when they came to Christ.  Simply put, he is “putting them in their place.” 

 

There is no place for elitism in the Body of Christ.  As the old phrase says, “the ground is level at the cross.”  None of us, regardless of the calling or function we hold, are permitted by the Gospel to elevate ourselves over another.  In fact the model that Jesus gave us is that we are to come up under others with our support.  Our leadership comes in strengthening others, not in strengthening ourselves.  We lead others by releasing them and teaching them to come into their own.  The King of Kings said, “I’ve not come to be served, but to serve.”  Later he told his disciples after washing their feet, “now you do the same…be like me.”

 

Our leadership quotient is not determined on how many people call us their leader, pastor, etc., but in how many people we’ve served, helped them to find and fulfill their destiny and released them to do the very same thing with others without our need to hold on to them.  The trap of leadership is in the need to be a leader.  It destroys the basic result/fruit of leadership, which is to train and release others to do what we do, not to clone and control our followers.  Leaders will produce leaders and leaders who don’t lead only become frustrated and lose heart.  We can destroy what we desired to produce when we “need to be needed.”  Our place is to impart, train, release and become proud parents as our children move on to do greater things than us. 

 

Think of the joy that Jesus had when he said, “greater things will you do than me, because I go on to be with my father.”  He had more things to do, greater things, but from heaven, and now he was releasing his followers to do even more on earth than he did.  His earthly ministry alone did not touch the known world, but his followers did.  In that act, he changed the world, because he was not afraid to release.  In fact, he released his disciples even before they looked ready, before they thought they could handle it…even before he thought they could.  “How many times do I have to tell you…” was a repeated theme in Jesus’ talks with the disciples.

 

To return to the beginning of this post, Paul understood the power of leadership.  He knew how to claim his right to speak into their lives through his relationship with them, but never did he want them to divide the Body of Christ because of their connection with him.  He only wanted them to live out what they had learned from him, which was love and obedience and unity.

thoughts to the called

Got to reconnect with a friend from Bible College this week and it made me begin to think back to our college days and the fervor we had for serving the Lord in ministry.  Our college was an independent (then) charismatic/Pentecostal college, with a strong focus on living the life of faith and giving all we have for ministry.  I am so glad that I went there.  I’ve never regretted going to Zion Bible Institute (now Zion Bible College, with the Assemblies of God).  It gave me foundation of love for ministry and a willingness to serve in whatever capacity God has for me. 

 

At the same time, there is a naiveté that comes to Bible College students I think, especially in settings like ours.  You have a dream, you’re preparing for your call, you know that it’s going to be hard “out in the real world.”  But it isn’t as we have always dreamed and ministry life can be hard.  Harder than we thought. 

 

I guess if I was to address a group of Bible College students today, I’d say something like this:

 

Never stop dreaming, but realize that life and ministry will not be easy.  This is not to say it’s not fulfilling.  To fulfill the call of God on one’s life is the greatest fulfillment of all, but there will be obstacles to those dreams. 

 

Yes, some of them will be the devil.  He is real and he will try to take you out.  Therefore you have to have the armor of God on everyday, and stay in constant connection with God.  The faith you have in God will defeat every fiery arrow that comes your way. 

 

But the other obstacles may be more detrimental.  The devil can use them, but most of the time, he’ll just let them happen to you.  These are the plain circumstances of life.  Everyday will present new challenges with family issues, children, bills, mortgages, church squabbles, secular work issues, money, etc., etc., etc.  Grace is the only answer to these problems.  You must rely on the grace of God to give you wisdom as you navigate these waters.

 

Then another obstacle is one that we don’t expect, but it is there:  it is God himself.  There are times when the angel of the Lord will stand in your way and you’ll beat the donkey you’re riding to try to get where you think you’re supposed to be, but it won’t move, and so saves your life, your ministry, your call.  Even Paul had an experience where he was not permitted to take the Gospel where he thought he should, because God had another assignment.  What would have happened if he would have went anyway??  Listen to that still small voice.  That means you have to be quiet, shut up.  Stop talking so much, we don’t know as much as we like to think we do.  We must listen.  God will speak.  He is not mute. 

 

Lastly, we ourselves are the greatest obstacle of all.  Our desire to do and be can sometimes stand in our own way, because our motives are really about what “we” can do and who “we” will be, and not who God is and what He desires.  James said, “you don’t receive because you ask ‘amiss.’”  Nice way of saying, “hey, idiots, you’re asking for the right things, but you’ve got the wrong motives!!  Wake up and smell the coffee.”  We must have a heart like David to say to God:  “Search me and try me and see if there is any wicked (wrong, misdirected) way in me, and lead me in the way eternal.”  It’s that attitude that will bring us through all the obstacles of ministry and life. 

 

Don’t be discouraged when ministry doesn’t look like you thought it would.  Realize that God is doing something greater with every change of the wind.  You are called, you are chosen, just stay close to God.  The Jews had a phrase:  “May the dust of your rabbi fall upon you.”  This meant, may you walk so close to your teacher that the dust he kicks up on the road will fall on your clothes.  May the dust of Jesus fall upon you.

worth

Worth.

The other day a friend of mine and I were discussing about how she used to not feel “worthy” enough to go to church or to serve God. It’s the age-old story of how the enemy and religion makes us feel worthless and not good enough to participate in the Kingdom of God, or to even get to know God.

The thing about worth is that nothing is worth anything until someone wants it.

Oil can sit in the ground or under the Gulf for centuries and unless someone wants it, has a purpose for it; it remains “worthless.” But it’s the desire for that oil that causes it to become worth something. (Have you filled up your car lately?)

Same can be applied to anything in your house. We’ve all heard the proverbial “if something were to happen to your house, what would you take with you?” scenario. It’s those things that mean so much to you that you would be willing to risk being harmed to get them back that are “priceless” to us. There is nothing we’d take in response for it.

An object, whether it be oil, diamonds, pictures, etc. cannot determine it’s own worth; only the one desiring it can determine it’s worth. The same goes for our worth. In ourselves, we have nothing to offer God in return for his love and his grace, but that is not why he desires us. He desires us because he has already set his love upon us. He has chosen us from before we were born to receive his favor. This is what determines our worth to him. We see the great extent that he went to in giving up his Son, enduring his own pain and risking his name and reputation to rescue the object of his affection: us. He desires us; he has a purpose for us. It is his attention and his intention for us that causes us to have worth.

Today, in spite of anything we may feel, see, hear about us, think about ourselves, our worth is not affected by these things, but only by the one who loves us and has chosen us to be by his side and live in his grace. His name is Father. And you are worthy by his choosing.

looking where i want to go...

Sorry for the lull in writing, it’s not that I’ve not had anything to say, just no time to write it!!

I went to a class this week at work and it was interesting, but one thing that was said, but had nothing to do with the presentation, stood out to me.

The speaker is a motivational speaker/coach and also he teaches high performance driving. He made the comment that when you are driving and you begin to skid, keep looking where you want to go. He said too many times people look at where the skid is taking them, as in “Oh, no, here comes those trees, I’m going to crash!!” He said we will drive toward where we look, so look at where you want to go.

I quit thinking about driving about then, and thought about how life causes us to skid sometimes. There are things that we can’t control that hit our lives and we feel like we’re in a “skid.” (And sometimes we leave some skid marks…on the road and in our pants!) Anyway, the point is when those skids happen, many times we look at the worst case scenario, we begin to believe we’re going to crash, and we may still get banged up, but the truth I caught yesterday from God was this: keep your eyes on him and where it is he’s calling you and you will survive the skid. Look where we want to go, and we’ll keep moving in that direction.

Sure, skids happen. (I think I’ve heard something like that before.) But we can and will survive, just keep driving and looking where you want to go.

“Let your eyes look straight ahead, fix your gaze directly before you.” (Proverbs 4:25 NIV)

time

Coming back to the thoughts about healing as a process, there is one more issue that is involved, but I wouldn’t necessarily classify it as a gate or an obstacle to the process. It is more of a factor of the environment of healing.

Time.

You know the old saying: “Time heals all wounds.” And yes, there is truth in that statement, but what of those many people who have allowed the many years come and go and they are still as wounded as the day they were hurt? Mostly, I believe, it is because they’ve sat down by the gate of unforgiveness and they’ve never release the person who wounded them. So, let us return to time.

Recently I had a minor medical procedure done, and it got me thinking about “recovery times.” (If you must know, let’s just say there are not going to be anymore “little pj’s” in my future. ‘Nuff said. J ) Anyway. Recovery times are different according to the degree of the wound, and the source or place of the injury. My procedure required rest for a weekend, but friends of mine are recuperating from procedures that require six weeks or more of simply “recovery time,” before they can even begin to return to their normal schedule.

Like we read in the article by Os Hillman that I posted earlier, we need to take the time to heal. But during that time there are different things that happen. Whenever you’re dealing with a wound, whether expected or unexpected, your attention comes to the hurt, the pain. In the physical, your body refuses to allow you to forget that something has changed in it. In the spiritual/emotional, the pain we feel may come out in different avenues, through anger or fear, depression, etc. We must be alert to these signs our soul is trying to communicate to us its pain. We must give attention to it. Stuffing our pain won’t make it go away. In fact, just like in the natural, if we ignore pain, it will cause us more trouble later. In pain, we also protect ourselves. We cover the wounds and keep others from touching or bumping into us. We pamper ourselves to make us feel a bit better about the situation. But health does come and we cannot stay in that position forever!

The good news is that as we recover, as we walk through the gates and the process of our healings, we find that our attention is no longer needed to those areas of pain. It slowly returns to the things that matter outside of us. There is a place for paying attention to our own needs when we’re going through pain and healing. It’s important. It’s okay to focus on what we need at that time. But we can’t live there. Our focus cannot be forever on ourselves and time helps us to do that. The question will be w when time finally passes us a good report of health, whether or not we will allow ourselves to let go of the habits of self-protection that we developed during the healing process. Will we acknowledge that it’s time to look away from our painful past and lift our focus to others and the future, no matter what the risk of future pain may be? If you are in the process, take the time, allow the healing to come, but know that there will come a “time” when it will be your turn to move forward into the future health of spirit and life!