Being useful for God (and not just talking about it)


I was reminded today in church (yet again) that we are called to make a difference in the world. It's sometimes said that Christians are so spiritually minded as to be of no earthly use!

This shouldn't be. Gen 1:28-30 explains that God gave Adam the earth and everything in it, for Adam to rule over. Matt 5:13-14 explains that we are the salt of the earth and the light of the world. Habakkuk 2: 14 says that "the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea". The Lord's prayer's first request is that "[God's] will be done, on earth as it is in heaven".

One of my favourite verses Ephesians 2:10 says "For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus, to do good works which God prepared in advance for us to do". Obviously, God has expectations of what we are to do in the time we have on earth.

1. Don't get caught up in the mundane

Pastor encouraged us to be bold and zealous in doing the work of advancing the kingdom of God. I think the enemies of zeal are the thorns of life which choke the word of God and prevent it from flourishing - see Matt 13:22.

It's easy to get caught up in the minutiae of life. Life is full of small issues and worries that, if unchecked, will occupy every nook and cranny of our time. We will NEVER have enough time to do everything. But since we have decided to believe Jesus, then we should make sure to stake out His territory in our lives i.e. everywhere! If we have decided to do something for Jesus, make that a priority. Do it now. Make a space in your diary. Let. Nothing. Push. That. Commitment. Away.

2. Look outward

I thought of using the example of establishing quiet time as one of the commitments that we should set as a priority. But as I wrote this, I realised that being salt of the earth and light of the world means more than that. Quiet time is important, but it is also essential to look outward. Beyond ourselves, beyond our immediate family even. So stop a second and think:
  • How useful am I being, as God's instrument, to the people around me?
  • Am I being so caught up in work or domestic matters that I have no time for anything else?
  • Can it be that God has put me in an office where I have no purpose for Him except to provide for the family?
  • Or in a church where He has no agenda for me other than turning up on Sunday?
  • Or in the big wide world, where my only role is to be a good Dad?
  • Since believers and non-believers alike try their best to be good workers and good parents, think about "how am I doing this work in a way that glorifies God?"
3. Do something about it now

And don't stop with just thinking. Don't just think or talk about doing something, or why it's so difficult, or why we can only start next week. Decide and do something. Start small if we have to, but don't get stuck in first gear interminably. If we fail, so what? Start again. Better than endlessly thinking and talking about it and never actually doing it.

Let's rise above the mediocre Christian life and "throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked our for us." Heb 12:1

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Life as a pie chart

Image
Someone told me recently about a "life exercise" in which one compiles all the stuff that makes up your life, and puts it in a pie chart.  So let's say for me, something like this. The idea is to visually demonstrate to myself that, in the event I lose one of these things, then I can see that, hey life is not so bad, that wasn't such a big deal.  Say for example, if I suffered a blown ACL, and couldn't run or play basketball any more, like this: At first blush - I'd say, hey, I still have my wife, children, parents, career, church life - so, chin up, things are not so bad.  Pretty good life visualisation tool to bring some optimism back into play! ... But what if, a month later, something happens at work, and boom, career gets sidetracked, I lose my job, or get put in cold storage somewhere, like this: Oops, now only half my life is left!  With only half of life's meaning left to me, what do I do? And what if something happens to
Read more

Bullying? Stand up!

Image
When I was a kid, I remember being bullied a fair bit.  I was small for my age, bespectacled, shy.    The teachers didn't help by putting a target on my back by making me Vice Head Prefect.  I would get my stuff just taken away from me by bigger kids, dragged out into the field to be tickled until I collapsed (much less fun than it sounds), and pushed into the storm drains.  Not all the kids were full-blown bullies of course.  But I remember some of them standing by, and politely holding my spectacles (so they wouldn't be broken) while the bullies did their work on me. Most of this stopped when I got to secondary school, where a much larger proportion of my fellow students were now just as nerdy!  And of course I grew up too.  I don't really look back on those days with any kind of animosity, because I think it never occurred to me that it was unusual.  But I do think my experience made me a bit more sympathetic about people around me who are being bullied. When you
Read more

Family AND Team

Image
I heard an interesting viewpoint this weekend. A family is not inherently a team. Hmm.  Sometimes at work, often in church, and most of the time at home, you hear people say to each other that we are family. And often, we really are. We care for each other above and beyond transactional matters.  It matters to me when my colleagues and cell group members (and of course my actual family members) go through illnesses or family issues or work challenges. I root for their success at presentations and projects and relationships. I care about what they care about, even if it has little direct impact on my own life. In a way, a family is sort of an amalgam of people who support each other in pursuit of each member's personal goals. For example, as a father, I support my children in their academic, career and ministry goals. But where they go to school, the grades they get, and the careers and ministries they build - they're really their goals, not mine.  Ditto for my role as a church
Read more