After four years of trying to sell our old house, we finally moving into our new house last August. To prepare it for retreats, I’ve been immersed in chores: creating a new kitchen, installing new cabinets, making a desk, and rewiring about twenty light switches to link them to Alexa. All things I’ve done before: plumbing, carpentry, and wiring.
Now that the house-updates are done, I sense God calling me to write a book on Cultural Creep (how we adopt the world’s solutions while rejecting God’s answers), to talk with a friend about a difficult subject, and to coach a spiritual organization about how to communicate God’s word.
And I feel wholly and completely inadequate. How can I communicate the world’s influence without sounding like a crabby old man? How can I speak to my friend without sounding like a harsh jerk? How do I move from behavior-ism to gospel-ism when tips and techniques seems their default message?
I’m sleeping poorly because I think God is assigning me tasks that I’m ill-equipped to execute.
God Always Demands the Unreasonable
Everybody’s inner default is to fasten onto the familiar, to perform tasks we already know how to do. But the greatest triumphs of past spiritual leaders were always when they tackled the impossible:
- God asked Abraham and Sarah to have a child when they were in their nineties;
- God told Moses to find water for Israel in a rock in the desert with no oasis in sight;
- God wouldn’t let Gideon battle Midian till he reduced his army from 32,000 to 300;
- When God called St. Francis to rebuild the church, God meant an entire culture not a tiny chapel.
Why does God always draw us beyond the end of our resources? Not just to the edge of our strength, not merely a toe over the line of our aptitudes; he persistently pushes us past our natural abilities until we cry “Uncle!” (Or, “God help me!”)
Perhaps a better question is: Why don’t we cry “Uncle” or “God help me” in the everyday jobs we know so well? Why do we flock to assignments that don’t need God?
It’s Always About His Life in Us
Scripture repeatedly teaches a simple message with multiple metaphors, the most common is: “Unless the Lord builds the house, its laborers work in vain.”
When I was preparing our new house for retreats, I didn’t pray much about my activities. I’ve performed them so many times before I could do them in my sleep. Well, as I sleep-walked my way through carpentry, I was training myself to build my house without the Lord. Literally.
So why should I be surprised when difficult assignments make me feel totally helpless? I’ve orientated myself through regular practice to work as an independent contractor.
When God told Moses to confront Pharaoh (the greatest leader of the greatest empire), he said, “Tell Pharaoh to give away his single greatest resource for constructing cities; and tell him make it snappy!” Moses asks God “How can I do this?” because it seemed impossible. God answered, “But I will be with you” (Ex. 3:12).
I think God orchestrates unreasonable and impossible tasks to re-orient us to accomplish even the tiniest tasks through him; not on our own, and not completely on his own. He likes to work his greatest miracles through us, his life in ours.
Whether we’re tackling a toilet or walking on water.
Sam
Indispensable or Invited?
“I’ve orientated myself through regular practice to work as an independent contractor.” You can just imagine the bells that rang in me. As I learn to live with diminishing physical resources and indeed to die well from this cancer, I am more and more astonished, embarrassed, even appalled by how much of my life I have lived like an independent contractor. Excellent metaphor, Sam. One of my oldest friends said as her first recognizable phrase age 2, “no! Do myself!” I prefer “independent contractor.” It sounds a little more mature…
Hi Jenny,
My prayer for you is that you experience more and more of His life in yours. I cannot imagine what you are going through, and your “impossible” situation is so much more difficult. I’m impressed with your spiritual care and your honest self-appraisal.
I’m probably still at the “No! Do myself!” stage.
Thanks,
Sam
I thank God and I thank you! Very pertinent reminder for me today and I think that book topic is well overdue, I will wait excitedly for it! We Christians need to be reminded to seek God first. Thanks for all you do Sam. God bless you and your family.
Blessings back at you!
It’s so easy to fill our days with work we do well, not the work that needs to be done. Then at bedtime we can say “Boy, I got a lot done!!.” Maybe, maybe not. A friend told me to start each day with the hardest, scariest task you had ahead of you. So maybe I need to check in with the Boss each morning to see what is His “job one.”
Thanks for the reminder.
Thanks! Great point. We can build a house on our own, but if it isn’t of God, it will not last.
Jesus said, “I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit–fruit that will last.”
I think we all want fruit that will last.
When I read this article,I didn’t read it from the perspective of mission work or anything like that but rather it plays out well to my current situation- to do what is acceptable to God, I must suffer 3 years for something I had nothing to do with and at the same time work to forgive the one that put me in the position. Something that seems not possible without God. And then, I see myself pulling away from Him-cause I am not exactly keen on taking on that cross- it seems that I am on a crossroads- I take that cross and continue as a christian, or don’t and be a pagan again…although this seems like a nobrainer- At the moment these 3 years seems more that the eternity in heaven:(
Hi Chris,
My heart goes out to you. I know what it is to suffer for something I was innocent of. (On the other hand, there have probably been as many times I didn’t suffer for something I was guilty of 🙂 Alas.)
I sometime think God lets us suffer innocently so we get the tiniest taste of what Jesus innocently suffered for us. It makes me love him more.
Which is good, because I need him in all my suffering, innocent or not.
I always love your comments and your honesty. Thanks.
Sam, first of all, you hit the nail on the head. If God called us only to things within our capability, we could accept the assignment and complete the project without Him. Second, “Cultural Creep” will be as timely as “Hearing God in Conversation.” Growing up in the 1950s, we were led to believe that worldliness consisted of things like smoking, drinking, going to the movies, kissing girls who wore lipstick, or playing cards–with the possible exception of Old Maid–on Sundays. We are being squeezed into the mold of the world by things much more insidious and pervasive.
Take that hill country in the name of the LORD.
Hi Doctor,
Thanks for sharing. It’s been too long!!!
Your closing comment is what is motivating me to write that book: “We are being squeezed into the mold of the world by things much more insidious and pervasive.”
Thanks, Sam!
Sam…
When you gonna do the 4th Quarter Retreat in Colorado? Just sayin’.
Richard
I’ll let you know. We did one in November outside the Springs, but I didn’t invite this list. My bad.