As we move towards the end of this year, I am keenly aware of the fact that this year was a year where there were many choices that was made for us. Instead of being able to make choices and bearing the consequences or rewards thereof we were forced into things like lock-downs and still it seems to be a ongoing treat hanging over our heads. We may be heading for another lock-down of some sort. In the midst of this, and while some choices are made for us, we still have the responsibility and the privilege of making good choices. I think the danger is that we will start to feel powerless and start thinking that we cannot make choices to respond in a godly manner to the situations we are in. In the light of the last 2 weeks discussions regarding what is in our hand - let us also look at where and how is God giving us opportunities to focus on making good and righteous choices. Even if it is just choosing our attitudes.
This week I share with you yet another one of Ellel Ministries blog posts about this very topic. Let us focus on the areas where we are empowered to make choices and let us make good ones, ones that will have lasting benefits for us, those around us and for His Kingdom!
When I posted last week's devotion on "What is in your hand?" a friend send me this video clip, and I decided to share it with you this week. The core of the message that lingered with me was the fact that we often struggle to move forward because we focus on what we do not have instead of looking at what we already have and then ask God how He wants us to use it to build His Kingdom. May we journey with the Holy Spirit asking Him what we already have that He intends us to put to good use for the Glory of the one who gave it to us!
God met Moses in the wilderness, at a burning bush, to call Him to the task of going back to Egypt to bring his people out of slavery and into the promised land. To Moses this task looked just too big. Surely God had the wrong person, for Moses could not talk, had committed murder and therefore was a fugitive in a foreign land. But, God does not make mistakes. He knew exactly what He was doing when He met Moses and called him for this task, and God had resources that Moses did not know about. God's resources are mostly right in our hand and it is mostly unconventional. Very often it is everyday things that we do not regard as a godly resource because it is so ordinary, so everyday, so conventional and after all we expect the spectacular. While God is also the God of the spectacular, He surely also is the God who does spectacular with the ordinary. Moses had many excuses for not embracing God's calling for him, and thought the people would not believe him anyway. In this discussion with God, he asks God for a sign that it was really Him. God asks him:
2“What is that in your hand?” And he said, “A staff.”
A Staff... a pretty ordinary item for a shepherd in the wilderness. With this staff he protected the sheep and gathered them together when they went astray. With this staff he walked over the rugged terrain and most probably killed many a snake. Yet in this instance God sees much more than a shepherd's staff. He sees a staff of miracles. With this ordinary item, God would do the spectacular. God would turn it into a snake that ate the faro's magician's snakes. With it God would turn the waters of the Nile into blood, part the seas, bring water out of the rock, win a war against the Amelekites and it would become one of the 3 items that would be stored in the Holy of Holies of the tabernacle, always blooming, even without being connected to a tree. God himself would give this staff life and life in abundance.
So the question to each of us this week is: "What is in your hand?" What did God place in your hand to perform His Kingdom purposes with? Perhaps it is time to walk through our lives to contemplate and write down what do we have in our hand? It is highly likely that God placed a handful of treasures in our hand to be used in a time such as this, for His Kingdom purposes. Are we willing to make ourselves available to Him? Will we recognize the moment when He wants to use what He already put into our hands?
He is the God that does the spectacular with the ordinary
I think all of us at some point in life struggle with questions like "when, how where and what is my calling?" or maybe even "do I have a calling and how do I live it out if I have one?" Every person's calling is unique and we need to hear from God what it is - but that we are all called to something and that we all thus have a purpose is a fact. In Jeremiah 1 the word of God says the following:
Jeremiah 1:5 "Before I formed you in the womb I knew [and] approved of you [as My chosen instrument], and before you were born I separated and set you apart, consecrating you..."
We are called before we are formed in the womb! God is a King and He has a Kingdom that is perfect and without sin. Before the foundation of the earth He had a calling, a purpose, in His Kingdom, He looked at that purpose and then He created me and you for that specific purpose. He does not wake up in the morning with His to-do list for the day and then wonder who on earth is going to be ready and available to fulfill that purpose for that day. When the day arrives He already know exactly who He designed and equipped to fulfill that purpose at that given time in history. The only question left to be answered is will you and I say "Yes Lord we are willing to go!" or do we believe the lie of the enemy that we do not have a calling or purpose in God's Kingdom? Or that we are not good enough or ill-equipped?
The truth is - God is a King. He has a Kingdom. His Kingdom has purpose and you and I were created for a purpose in a time such as this!
Monday devotions @work 2 November 2020 People of Hope: Part 25: David
Read 1 Samuel 17
When we think about David I think the first story that comes to mind is probably the story of His victory over Goliath. What I think we do not always realize is that David did not start off as a warrior, He started as a shepherd. God had to grow David into a warrior that would have the exact skills needed to overcome Goliath. For years David was protecting his sheep, fighting off jackal and lions and bears. He practiced with his sling-stone over and over and over to hit a target with precise accuracy while guarding his sheep. He developed that skill without anyone watching and without much notice from the outside world. In this season of David’s life, he was fighting his battles alone where nobody could see. Then came that one day where everything changed. The Philistine was mocking his God. Nobody was prepared to take him on because nobody had the right skills. The unconventional warrior skills necessary to overcome a giant in an unconventional way, came in an unconventional package. David’s whole known world was looking, holding their breath and two armies with highly skilled warriors and armour where at stand-off with each other. A shepherd boy who could not even wear the armour even though the king offered it to him, stepped up to the task. He was armed with a sling-stone, faith, years of guarding sheep and empowered by God for this precise moment. He gathered 5 stones – because Goliath had 4 more brothers. He was ready for them too.
Goliath did not see this one coming. He did not see that fateful stone come that would end his life and his mockery of God, but he also did not see a shepherd boy without armour as a threat big enough to be cautious, and definitely He did not see David’s God backing Him with authority and growing him into an unconventional warrior for a moment such as this.
There are many battles in our lives that may seemingly look mundane and we may not pay attention to it as something that has purpose or will one day have purpose. Most of these battles we must fight on our own, much like David had to fight the lion and the bear on his own, and without anyone seeing the victories. Nothing is without purpose though. It is during these times that our faith grow and our hope is established enough so that we will be ready when the moment comes that we have to face our Goliath. May we not lose hope, get discouraged or disheartened during the times we need to go to battle alone. May we endure through these times well knowing that God is most certainly growing our faith, our experience and our battle skills so that we will be ready on that day when God need it for the ultimate purpose He created us for.
Let us sing with David Ps 27:11-14 (NKJV)
Teach me Your way, O Lord, And lead me in a smooth path, because of my enemies. 12 Do not deliver me to the will of my adversaries; For false witnesses have risen against me, And such as breathe out violence. 13 I would have lost heart, unless I had believed That I would see the goodness of the Lord In the land of the living.
14 Wait on the Lord; Be of good courage, And He shall strengthen your heart; Wait, I say, on the Lord!
