A Totally Useless Waste of Space?

Feeling Useless & Hopeless

Compassionate Help for “Hopeless Losers”

By Grantley Morris

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“I’m hopeless!”

Not with God!
To think, “I’m a useless waste of space; I’d be better off dead,” is a soul-destroying place to be. Being certain you are a hopeless loser, or that accident or disease or advancing years has rendered you incapable of achieving anything of value will obviously make you feel useless. Nevertheless, feeling hopeless or useless, no matter how devastating and convincing the feeling, does not make it true; it just means you will need a lot of convincing before you change your mind.

I understand you fighting me in my efforts to empower you to see that you are not nearly as hopeless or useless as everything suggests. For sure, some of the following will not apply specifically to you, but some of it will, even though you will probably feel certain you are an exception to all of it. You deserve to be understood and to be patiently given all the proof you need. I get down on my knees and beg you, however, not to be like a drowning person stubbornly fighting off his rescuer. No matter how enticing such resistance is, it is clearly not in your best interest, and your well-being is all I care about.

Talking about getting on one’s knees: why not earnestly pray right now that as you read God opens your eyes to those parts that particularly apply to you?

Not for financial reasons, of course, (my idiosyncrasy is to refuse to make money from any form of ministry) but because there is so much of value in my book, Waiting for Your Ministry (also available in audio form), it is my personal preference that you read the book, instead of reading this webpage. Nevertheless, I live to serve (Explanation) and I am acutely aware that anyone hounded by oppressive feelings of being a useless non-achiever is likely to be hurting too deeply and feel too drained to muster the strength to read anything not highly relevant. So in this webpage I have distilled from that book excerpts particularly helpful and inspiring to everyone devastated by what seems undeniable proof of being useless or hopeless. In Not The Failure You Thought: Help When You Feel You’ve Failed I have used the same method. Since there is a degree of overlap in the two topics, but the excerpts are quite different, you might also find that page helpful.

Since I often quote from my book in other webpages (Reason) you might have possibly already discovered a snippet of the following but unless you have read the entire book, most of it will be new to you.

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“I’m hopeless!”

Not with God!
 

 

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Can’t Do Nothing Right!

Spiritual Reality Check

Most of us, ably supported by Satan, are unnecessarily harsh on ourselves. This self-inflicted, satanically-enhanced torture can wound deeply. We may presently be so hurt and agitated that we can’t be sufficiently still to hear God’s call, or are too despondent to amass the faith to embrace his challenge. In this webpage we will look to the Lord for healing and inspiration.

Scripture’s silence implies Jesus spent most of his time on earth doing almost nothing worth mentioning. This impression is amplified by the shock registered in his old acquaintances at the thirty-year-old’s miracles. More astounding still is that even his teaching and wisdom surprised people who had heard him all his life. (Mark 6:1-3; Luke 4:22) Thirty years! That’s over ninety percent of his earthly life.

Dare we say that during this time the Sovereign Lord of Glory was useless, or a failure? The very thought is blasphemous! You know God’s Son is of infinite worth because of who he is, not for what he does.

Well, remember that you, too, are God’s child. You have already attained the highest status.

Real significance and fulfillment can only be found in your union with Christ. To seek them through what you do is to chase a vapor. To look to anything other than Christ for our sense of worth is like a commoner made royalty by her marriage to the king, hoping her trinkets will make her important.

Performers often gauge their success by how much people pay to hear them. The King of glory paid the highest conceivable price – the staggering cost of his Son’s life – just to be close to you. That’s how precious you are. Furthermore, he has made you heir to heaven’s riches, destined to reign with eternal honor. As God’s heir, you are of such mind-boggling importance that nothing – not even the greatest achievement – could increase your significance.

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Can’t Do Nothing Right!

 

 

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With God,
No One is
Useless

Heaven’s Bunglers Convention

Heaven’s honor roll reads like a Who’s Who of bungling. And I love it!

I must have slammed into so many closed doors in my spiritual job search that my whole head is a dead end. Of my legendary brain malfunctions, you’ll squeeze just one example from me. Divulge more, and I’d be sentenced to wearing a paper bag over my head for the rest of my natural life – and that’s a prospect I don’t relish, no matter how much you think it improves my looks.

I was about to go home when a manager said he couldn’t start his car. Some idiot had left the headlights on. Suddenly my nerves thought I’d caught malaria. That morning I had tested the lights of our entire vehicle fleet. ‘That’s funny,’ added another manager, ‘I can’t start my car either – battery’s dead.’ (It was definitely malaria, maybe yellow fever as well.) Up walked another manager – and was that another one behind him?

I’ve got a mechanical mind; it’s just that the gears have jammed.

When I have mistake and onions it’s neither rare nor well done. And just when I’ve had my fill I’m forced to eat my words. And that’s only the entrée. Somehow I always end up in the soup and have to pay for it. Humble pie follows with a generous serve of raspberries and I scream.

I make more slips than a lingerie company. As my mind lurches from one goof-up to the next, I fill with despair. Then I limp to the Bible and find comfort. I bump into Isaac, who blessed the wrong twin; (Genesis 27:21-35) and Jacob, the scheming mummy’s boy, who had to marry his sister-in-law to patch up his first mistake. (Genesis 29:20-28) I hear Job clawing for words to recount the tragedy that marred his childhood – he was born alive. (Job 3:1-19) I see Saul hiding amongst the baggage; (1 Samuel 10:22) David squabbling with his brothers; (1 Samuel 17:28-29) Jonah bewailing the death of a weed; (Jonah 4:7-9) Thomas poking holes in Jesus’ side. (John 20:24-25) I don’t know that they had pogo sticks back then, but if they did, they played under the table for too long. Hard-boiled? These egg-heads were always in hot water. Whenever they had a brainwave heaven ducked for cover. Of course, Solomon had a good head on his shoulders – a cute brunette one night, a redhead the next. I think he ended up counting his wives and kissing his money.

Jesus hand-picked the quiet, intelligent type. When they were quiet, they were intelligent. They spent the rest of their time turning howlers into an art form. Their business cards must have read Bloopers for Every Occasion. There were the sons of blunder, James and John, armed with tongues programmed to shoot first and ask questions at the inquest. Those thunder-heads even thought the Prince of Peace was into star wars. (Luke 9:54) Then there was Peter, whose mouth went into spasms whenever his brain died. He always spoke with his mouth full, and still found room for the other foot. (Any normal sized mouth would have had corns.) You were sure to find this crying shame somewhere between boo-boo and boo-hoo. And while our silver tongued, lead brained hero was doing what came naturally, everyone else was scrambling to prove they had the IQ of a doughnut hole. Who could forget that ridiculous prayer-meeting when the maid left Peter locked out in the cold, the pray-ers thought the maid had gone around the twist for being so stupid as to think their prayers had been answered, and they finally made the brilliant deduction that the guy, who looks and sounds like Peter bashing on the door, must be Peter’s angel? (Acts 12:12-16) They believed in keeping their brains in ‘as new’ condition. Remember the dozer with the window seat who fell three floors to sleep during Paul’s sermon? (Acts 20:9) They make that drop-out look like a genius. Paul wasn’t kidding when he said that by normal standards few of the Corinthian Christians were wise. (1 Corinthians 2:26-27) If they were anything like the rest, you could pool their intellects and not have enough to power a headache.

I could put my feet up with folks like that. And what fires me is that these scatter-brains are God’s sort of people – the type through whom he changes the world.

Christians squabble over whether tongues have ceased, but no one doubts that signs and blunders are with us still. The centuries have made Christians no brighter, nor any less treasured by heaven. My favorite is Dwight Moody. He hated his first name, pronounced Jerusalem in two syllables, and wrote without a speck of punctuation. Can you guess the words he was attempting to spell in the following: sucksead, beleave, shure, clurks, bead, hav, don, bimb bi, peter? (Succeed, believe, sure, clerks, bed, have, done, ‘by ‘n by’, better.) ‘I am getting over the difficulty,’ said middle-aged Moody about his spelling, ‘I am always sure of the first letter and the last . . . ’ Such shortcomings are endearing. To scorn them is to act like a thirteen year old despising childish behavior in his little sister – behavior that more mature people find adorable. Had we a massive intellect and love approaching that of our great King, we would not only discern the frailty of even the greatest earthly minds, we would probably feel as warmly about their foibles as we do about those of the cutest child.

 

 

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A hopeless waste of space?

Not in God’s eyes!
Limitless Potential

Our mighty Lord can use anything for any purpose. Look at the tiny book of Jonah. God used a storm, heathen sailors, a sea-creature, a plant and a grub, as well as moody, heartless, rebellious Jonah. (Jonah 1:4,12,15,17; 2:10; 4:6 ff) Centuries later, the Lord even made a Messianic prophet out of the man who sentenced Jesus to death. (John 11:49-51)

One of the things that transformed the great evangelist D. L. Moody was the sudden realization that ‘It was not [the famous preacher, Charles Haddon] Spurgeon who was doing that work: it was God. And if God could use Spurgeon, why should he not use me?’

Was that same God who mightily worked in Spurgeon and then in Moody suddenly incapacitated when he took up residence in you? Dare you claim that your weakness could weaken God?

If the Lord could work only through people of a certain caliber, the Most High would be impotent and dependent upon human abilities. That’s unthinkable. Either God can move the world through you or he isn’t God. (E.g., 2 Chronicles 14:11; Isaiah 40:29) Incompetence melts in the presence of omnipotence.

So if the Lord appears not to be using you, it cannot be because you lack ability. In fact, God delights in displaying his majesty by employing those who seem hopelessly inadequate. (E.g., 1 Corinthians 1:26-29; 2 Corinthians 12:9-10)

And I hope you know enough about God to realize that it cannot be because he does not love you! What more could the One who died for you do to prove his love? Let’s not slander the Holy One by imagining infinite love is so fickle that it fluctuates according to a person’s physical attractiveness, popularity or talent.

By making you feel as if God loves you less than certain other Christians, it seems as if Satan is attacking your self-esteem, but he isn’t. He is attacking the integrity of God. He is hissing that God’s love is so inadequate that it is only people who have certain qualities whom God can love or be gracious to. That’s a lie! God’s love toward you is perfect. GOD IS FOR YOU. He’s cheering you on. He’s on your side!

In this world, success is often relative – the closer the relative, the higher you go. Don’t decry the system: remember who you call Father.

Christian, you are the focus of divine love; filled with the majesty of Almighty God; spiritually enthroned with Christ in his heavenly palace; granted the highest level of access to the greatest Person and the holiest place. (Ephesians 2:6; Hebrews 10:19-22) You are the work of divine hands, made perfect in Christ Jesus. And enshrined within your being resides the infinite power of the sovereign Lord. (1 Corinthians 6:19; Ephesians 3:20) How dare you think you’re useless!

Top fashion model Claudia Schiffer has been nominated the most beautiful woman in the world. Yet as a teenager, she concluded from her lack of popularity at school that she was not beautiful. We make a similar mistake in assuming that if we are not popular with people, we lack what it takes to make it in a big way with God.

In 1943 five missionaries tried to establish links with an unreached tribe in Bolivia. Not only did they fail, it cost them their lives. It took the wisdom and perseverance of Joe Moreno, using an entirely different tack, to achieve what the five could not do. Joe was a sixth-grade drop-out; a middle-aged farm laborer with three children who had been abandoned by his wife. He considered himself unworthy of the title ‘missionary’ yet he achieved more than those he revered. The lower you are, the stronger God’s urge to lift you high. (Job 5:11; Psalm 113:7-9; Isaiah 40:4; Ezekiel 17:24; 21:26; Luke 1:52-3; 1 Corinthians 1:26-29)

If you have so far achieved little, it says nothing of God’s plans for you, nor of his evaluation of your worth. Prized silverware is reserved for special occasions. The fact that it is rarely used hardly means it is of little value. A craftsman will use some tools more than others, simply because they have different functions. Frequency of use in no way indicates quality, nor the craftsman’s pride in the tool. No one in a right relationship with God has a sane reason for feeling inferior to people who are used often.

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A hopeless waste of space?

Not in God’s eyes!
 

 

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With God, no one is hopeless

Basking In Infinite Love

Anyone who feels slightly worthy of divine love has had no more than a superficial brush with the majestic and holy Lord of heaven and earth. If you are not overawed by the thought that a perfect God could love you, then you are either so jaded to the truth or so infatuated with your self-importance, so blinded to reality, that your need for spiritual revelation is desperate.

Heaven sometimes lets our efforts fail so we may learn it is not our labors or our diligence or our usefulness that makes us precious to God. If your child fell ill and could no longer do her chores, would your love for her diminish? Well, don’t imagine this speck of human love exceeds the love of the Almighty.

Would you attempt pushing a jumbo jet to help it fly across the Atlantic? That would be wiser than trying to do your bit to help Christ secure your salvation or breach the infinite gulf between who you are and what a person would have to be to merit God’s smile. Anyone foolish enough to keep trying will be left on the runway when departure time arrives. In love, the Lord will not take us far in ministry until this issue is sorted out. (Romans 3:19-24; 9:30-33; Galatians 3:1-14; Philippians 3:3-10)

We often get the salvation part fairly right, yet still imagine we must earn God’s smile by serving him. It’s hard to believe the King of glory would treasure our friendship. Though we keep pushing it down, bobbing close to the surface of our consciousness is the thought, ‘The Lord saved me because of the things I can do for him.’

The false notion that service could buy God’s approval might heighten motivation, but heaven will not exploit it. Nothing is more important to God than our spiritual well-being.

They had just brought in the washing when there was a knock on the door. ‘Oh no! The house is in a mess! And just look at me . . . !’ exclaimed Martha.

‘I’ll get it,’ called Mary. She opened the door and her heart skipped a beat. There was Jesus and all his disciples.

‘Come in!’ she gushed excitedly. ‘Martha! It’s Jesus!’

Martha was in a panic. How was she going to feed them all? If only she’d had more warning. She had wanted everything to be so nice for Jesus. ‘Where’s Mary? She’s taking her time!’

She ran next door to borrow some food. Still no Mary. She stoked the oven and got out the plates. Still no Mary. She peered out and there was Mary sitting at Jesus’ feet with not a care in the world! Martha exploded. Yet it was Mary that the Savior defended.

I don’t question Martha’s love, but her sister was more perceptive. Mary had discerned that Jesus’ yearning was not primarily to be served. He craved intimacy. Cakes could never taste so good that Jesus considered it worth being robbed of Martha’s presence.

Basking in the love of Jesus seems self-indulgent. We feel compelled to slip out of his embrace and whip ourselves into running errands for him. To sit with the King in the drawing room might be acceptable for royalty, but not for the class of people we see ourselves as. Slaving in the kitchen seems more appropriate.

God, however, is a giver not a taker. If the Lord of hosts wanted slaves he could compel the entire human race to serve him. He yearns for love, not labor. An hour spent luxuriating in the King’s presence means more to him than a life-time of fear-motivated service. If it’s a genuine expression of love, sweat is beautiful. But service as an expression of a slave-mentality grieves him. God longs to lift us from viewing ourselves as heaven’s second-class citizens. He has made us royalty and he wants us to know it.

Whether it is this particular revelation, or some other message he wants to share, sometimes the only way our Lord can get our attention is to block all ministry opportunities. Otherwise, we’d be in too much of a frenzy to hear him. We can only give to others what we have first received from above. Resting in God’s presence enables us to receive.

Locked doors are infuriating. I rant. I rave. I kick the door. But when at last I see more clearly, I realize enforced rests are a precious manifestation of God’s love. How I thank God for not letting me smash down the door. What tragedies he saves us from! Father calls ‘time out’ and I’m given the opportunity to commune with the Lord of creation and receive whatever it is I need.

We look to the day, however, when our Savior need no longer resort to compulsion before we ‘come aside . . .  and rest awhile.’ (Mark 6:31) We are nearing graduation when we have learned to sit daily at Jesus’ feet.

Service is being granted the honor of an assignment worthy of God himself. It is God doing us a favor, not the other way around.

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With God, no one is hopeless

 

 

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A useless non-achiever?

Not to God!
Reprogramming our Minds

Unfortunately, intellectual assent is easier than feeling inwardly convinced.

One has simply to consider the plight of skinny girls who see themselves as fat to realize that a wrong mental image of ourselves can be so powerful as to resist all logic. Anorexia can so grip its victims as to defy what their eyes tell them, what the scales tell them, what other people tell them. Such a mindset can kill. Spiritually, the forces of deception arrayed against us are no less intense and the stakes can be eternal.

Throughout our lives we are subjected to the brain-washing of a godless world that values even its own not for who they are but for what they do. It is vital that we counter-attack, constantly expanding our minds with God’s estimation of our worth; persistently rejecting the human vantage point. (2 Corinthians 5:16-17) Diligent attention to reprogramming our minds will slowly loosen the strangle-grip of those deceptive feelings of worthlessness. (Romans 12:2)

We need more than this, however.

While some mental patients have delusions of grandeur, we suffer the opposite psychosis. Relative to who we are, God’s children – even those with dangerously inflated egos – have delusions of insignificance.

The instant we were born-again, our status and potential rocketed out of this world, leaving our self-image floundering somewhere between earth and reality. The gulf between who we really are and who we think we are is so serious and so beyond our normal comprehension (Ephesians 3:19-20; 1 John 3:1-2) that we literally need divine psychiatric help. (Ephesians 1:16-19; Colossians 1:9; Philemon 6. The psychiatric definition of a delusion is a false notion that cannot be altered by reasoning or by demonstration of the facts.) A major task of the Holy Spirit is to help us grasp the enormity of what has happened to us. (John 16:14; 1 Corinthians 2:9-15; 1 John 4:13; Ephesians 3:3-5; John 14:26; 16:13) It is vital that we keep probing the Scriptures (2 Corinthians 4:6-7) and pleading for spiritual revelation. We are like paupers ecstatic because we think we have inherited $10,000, when we’ve actually received $1 billion. We live chronically impoverished lives and the less we know of our spiritual inheritance, the greater the tragedy.

So to mental discipline add the spiritual therapies of faith, prayer, study, revelation, and submission to the Holy Counselor. By drawing on these vast resources, banish every thought that anything you accomplish could boost your personal worth. Drown the doubts, insecurities and guilt feelings. Cling to the emphatic Word of God which affirms that God’s estimation of you is far too immense for human fame or shame to budge it. (E.g., Galatians 2:6; Ephesians 6:9; Job 34:19) Whether the high point of your Sundays is counting the souls you have won or counting the specks on the your pew, on the ceiling on your hospital bed, the King delights in you.

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A hopeless waste of space?

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Help when you think:

“I’m Useless!”

The Exception

In theory, God can use anyone but you think you are special. You’re an exception, right? Okay, let’s find an exception. Create in your mind someone incapable of achieving anything of significance. Make him unable to read, write or speak.

‘What about sign language?’ you ask. Okay, rule that out too. Just to be sure, we’ll imagine he is blind and suffers severe mental retardation. If you insist, we’ll say he’s had these limitations since birth.

You want to pile on even more disabilities? This is ridiculous. How about making him spastic – so handicapped he can’t even wriggle out of bed by himself? Maybe he could use his hands. We had better make him incapable of even holding a spoon.

By now we have surely blocked every possibility. He can’t read, write, talk, sign or see; unable even to think straight or move properly. We have created in our imagination a hideously handicapped person utterly incapable of achieving anything of note, right? Hogwash. I’ve been describing Leslie Lemke, a man so powerfully used of God that you have probably heard of him. Steve Bergelin – who has worked with Bob Hope, Robert Schuller, Paul Harvey and many others – claims to have seen no one touch an audience the way Leslie does.

After sixteen years with not a glint of the most rudimentary potential for anything, Leslie was suddenly empowered to play the piano. Using fingers incapable of the simplest task, he played intricate pieces like a professional. Later, years before he could speak, he began to sing. He need only hear a piece once before he can reproduce it flawlessly, with skillful embellishments. He’s now world-famous and has been instrumental in leading many to the Lord.

Robert Reed’s speech is slurred. He has twisted hands and useless feet. By himself he cannot bathe, eat, brush teeth, comb his hair or put on his underwear.

He is a missionary in Portugal.

Bob Byers, besides being tormented by total blindness and poor hearing, was so paralyzed that not only was he completely immobilized below the neck, his front teeth had to be extracted to force liquefied food past his locked jaw. He could not read, write, see or move. You could fill a chapter detailing fundamental things this man could not do, but you could fill a book with things this founder of Mission to the Blind Overseas achieved for the glory of God.

Achieving this of eternal worth is for everyone. Don’t ever let Satan call you an exception.

A mental asylum inmate grabbed a canvas and painted. In his saner days he had attempted theological studies and missionary work. He apparently failed at both. Added to this was the torment of repeated failures at romantic love. Now he was attempting to paint. He seemed to like the result. But who could appreciate the product of a twisted mind? Can a tortured soul produce beauty?

In 1987 a canvas changed hands. It fetched $US 53.9 million – a world record for any painting. The previous record belonged to another painting by that same impoverished man. A third work of his changed hands for $US 20.2 million.

Obviously, the artist is now famous. But do not let van Gogh’s present-day fame blind you to the fact that those treasured works of art are by a mental patient who died in obscurity; a luckless madman who suicided after living only half his life.

From humanity’s sludge comes the finest gold.

Charlotte Elliott became an invalid in her youth and deeply resented the cruel restrictions. Decade after decade found her wrestling those same agonizing restrictions. Her brother’s evangelistic success, contrasting so markedly with her own fruitless life, intensified her anguish. She longed to serve her Lord but instead she was incapacitated, isolated, useless. At age 47, still single, still sick, still cut off from ministry opportunities, she pressed into a poem her frustration, confusion and helplessness, with words like ‘fightings and fears within, without’. The year was 1836. The poem became the hymn Just as I am. Years later, still a century before Billy Graham took up the hymn, her brother looked back on his productive life and confessed that he had probably achieved less in all his years than his sister had accomplished with one hymn. Her hymn is now believed to have ‘touched more hearts and influenced more people for Christ than any other song ever written.’

It would take quite a library to detail the achievements of spiritual giants like Catherine Booth, Frances Havergal, Charlotte Elliott, David Livingstone and Amy Carmichael weighed down by chronic health problems; of Christians like Alexander Cruden and William Cowper afflicted by bouts of insanity; and of the legions like Gladys Aylward (it is speculated that Miss Aylward had ‘a profound learning disability’) who with God soared above their intellectual limitations.

Or are you too ordinary? That’s another myth we’ll sink.

Every physical and mental barrier to be powerfully used of God crumbles at the name of Jesus.

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Help when you think:

“I’m Useless!”

 

 

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Can’t do anything right?

A Lowly Ministry?

The gifts of the Spirit arm us for active duty. The Spirit fits us out with that particular mix that suits our individual call. Yet we usually eye such gifts as evangelism, prophecy, teaching, miracles, and ignore the other half – helping others, administration, showing mercy, giving, serving. You may even feel compelled to check the Bible before believing they belong alongside the attention-grabbing charismata. (Romans 12:7-8; 1 Corinthians 12:28)

The way we revere a few gifts and denigrate the rest, you’d think the ideal body of Christ consisted of a giant set of flapping gums, a fingernail emitting divine bolts of power, and a few emaciated odds and sods.

Is there really such a thing as a lowly ministry? Might it not be that the only thing that can make a ministry mediocre is a mediocre effort? In the context of ministry, Paul speaks of ‘striving to excel’. (1 Corinthians 14:12 – Amplified Bible – many versions are similar) The pursuit of excellence is a challenge from the throne of God to every Bible-believing Christian.

‘Do small things as if they were great, because of the majesty of Christ,’ counseled Hudson Taylor. He said we should even ‘hang up clothes, wash, dress and comb our hair in a way to use to the full measure of ability which God has given us to the glory of his holy name.’ I was so impressed I chose a likely spot on the floor, rummaged through two dirty shirts, assorted books, three socks and a shoe, finally found a pen, blew off the fluff and recorded the quote. (My special gift is the ability to encourage – people come to me thinking they are the world’s worst and leave greatly encouraged.)

It is not organ music, stained glass or living off other people’s money that makes a task sacred. The sacred is no less and no more than that labor instigated by the Lord of lords, produced in union with his Spirit, and offered to him in joyful submission, faith, love and purity. That’s why Scripture fails to denigrate even the sweat of a slave, when offered to God by a heart redeemed by Christ.

If you are called to be a cleaner then rise to that challenge with the grace of Strauss, the flair of Michelangelo, the persistence of Edison and the dedication of Jessie Owens. Polish with the love of a mother, the care of surgeon, and the joy of a lover. Pour your soul into your work till it gleams with heavenly glory; till God can look at your floors and see his face in them; till all of heaven exalts you as an example of what a cleaner should be.

The standard and status of nursing rocketed because Florence Nightingale brought a sense of God’s call to a job that had been regarded as little better than prostitution. Edith Schaeffer, wife of Francis and hostess of the Christian chalet L’Abri, believed table settings could be elevated to an art form. The world has yet to see how you can transform the task before you.

The world marvels at the work of a genius. It is even moved by someone who overcomes severe handicap to do something a normal person could do. But though the world misses it, ordinary people are just as capable of heroics.

Paul White – later to became renowned through his Jungle Doctor books – wanted to become a medical missionary. His financial predicament made it essential that he obtain a scholarship to pay for his medical studies. This necessitated being ranked in the top two hundred students in the final year high school exams in his home state of New South Wales, Australia. He came one hundred and ninety-eighth. To add to the drama, to attain the mark that barely enabled him to scrape in, he had not only studied feverishly, he had repeated his entire final year at high school. His grades the first year were too poor. Now to turn this into a thriller, read the conditions of the scholarship: it would terminate the moment he failed just one examination, or part thereof, in any of the six years ahead of him. In his third year, over half of the students failed. With a pass mark set at fifty, he scored fifty, fifty, and fifty-one. He had pushed himself to the limit and he still had three more years to go.

Paul White might have had unremarkable ability but, to me, his graduation is a wonder equal to an armless woman using her mouth and feet to change her baby’s clothes; as sensational as a man walking on Mars.

Rarely in life do we have the precise measures of achievement that students have, but like White, we can grasp the hand of Jesus and teeter on the edge of our ability with the daring of a tight-rope walker, to the hushed delight of angelic throngs.

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With God no one is useless

God’s Favorite People

‘God must love ordinary people because he made so many of them.’ We laugh. But the truth is profound.

From tongue-tied Moses (to er is human) to cave-mouth Peter; from down-in-the-mouth Jonah to high-as-a-kite Noah; (Noah embarrassed himself by getting drunk (Genesis 9:21)) from Job in his trouble-bath to Mordecai having the last laugh, the Bible bristles with ordinary folk who achieved extraordinary things for God. And you were born to continue this tradition.

If to the world you seem insignificant, it merely intensifies God’s longing to raise you high. (This common theme in Scripture is worthy of close examination: Job 5:11; Psalm 113:7-9; Isaiah 40:4; Ezekiel 17:24; 21:26; Luke 1:52-3; 1 Corinthians 1:26-29)

Recall the Messiah’s birth. The leaders, the teachers, the theologians, and the priests, were oblivious to it. Heaven shared the news with shepherds at work; with old, temple-bound Anna; (Luke 2:8-18; 36-38) and with ‘wise men from the east’. The latter presumably weren’t even Jews.

It was the common people who heard this Man gladly. (Mark 12:37 b) And it was from their ranks that he handpicked the ones to fire the world with his glory. He chose hotheads with provincial accents, a tax man – a small-time turncoat any self-respecting citizen would spit on – and logheads with the stench of fish on their callused hands.

Christ was continually aware of the invisible people, whether it was a despised tax collector peering through the leaves, or an unclean woman pressing through the throng; a wild-eyed madman in the Decapolis back-blocks, or a luckless loner at the pool; a sightless misfit, or a stinking leper; a cripple, or a mute. (Luke 19:2-9; 8:43-48; 7:11-15; 21:1-4, 8:27 ff; John 5:2 ff) To a tired and hungry Jesus, befriending a spurned woman – giving hope to a Samaritan living in shame – was more important than food. Society’s rejects warmed his heart.

It seemed wherever there was a paltry act of kindness you’d find religious people simmering with contempt, and Jesus glowing with admiration. A pauper slipping a pittance into the offering, (Mark 12:41-44) a street woman’s pathetic washing of his feet, (Luke 7:36-50) a boy’s fish sandwiches, (John 6:9-11) thrilled him. Mary just sat on the floor in rapt attention. That was enough to fill him with praise. (Luke 10:39-42)

Jesus was forever shocking his observers by selecting non-entities for special attention. Society saw a dirty beggar, a nauseating blotch on the neighborhood, a curiosity for theological debate (is it right to heal on the Sabbath? who sinned, he or his parents?). Jesus saw a worthy recipient of his powerful love; a precious work of God brimming with beauty, dignity and heart-wrenching need; someone to die for. While crowds turned up their noses, he poured out his heart. The masses tried to silence blind Bartimeus, the loud-mouthed groveler. (Mark 10:46-52) They sneered at Zacchaeus, the money-grubbing runt who soon towered over them by displaying exceptional generosity. (Luke 19:2-8) His followers wanted to push aside snotty children. (Mark 10:13-16) They opposed the Canaanite woman whose incessant nagging was driving them to distraction. (Matthew 15:23) No one could guess who Jesus would next honor. It was sure to be some faceless loser they had not even noticed, or an embarrassing nuisance they wished would skulk away.

Jesus came to show us the Father. (John 14:9) Today, the religious world still looks at the big names, while God treasures the ‘unknowns’. He delights to endow with eternal grandeur their simple acts of service.

From the time Mary, ‘just a housewife’, mothered the Son of God, and the world’s greatest Teacher spent five or six times longer as a carpenter than as a teacher, humanity has had living proof that the mundane can be holy.

The world is filled with God’s undercover agents – ministers of the gospel who have successfully infiltrated enemy territory using all sorts of ingenious covers – housewife, plumber, bus driver . . . 

One of the most powerful influences in evangelist D. L. Moody’s life was the now-famous statement, ‘Moody, the world has yet to see what God can do with and for and through and in a man who is fully and wholly consecrated to him.’ The words that moved the man who moved the multitudes was uttered by a butcher.

In Argentina, around-the-clock pray-ers do battle in what is possibly one of the most powerful centers of prayer earth has seen. Some independent observers have concluded that it is bolts from this continual prayer storm that fuel the massive Argentine revival and spill over to the rest of the world. The participants are 2,000 prisoners.

Brother Andrew, ‘God’s Smuggler’, tells of a girl who became a Christian because he obeyed the Spirit’s prompting not to share the Gospel with her. He was in the ideal position to witness, but his Spirit-led refusal to exploit it, seized the girl with fear that she was becoming past hope. This moved her, like nothing else could, to give her life to the Lord.

The journalist who found Livingstone and was converted by him, initially grabbed headlines and published a book about his adventure. It is not this that interests me, however, but a letter Stanley wrote some years later. According to a modern appraisal of missionary history, this solitary letter, published in a newspaper, did more for the cause of missions than many missionaries have achieved in a lifetime.

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“I’m hopeless!”

Not with God!
The Stick-Holding Ministry

Come with me to Rephidim. Join a rabble of run-away slaves trudging through the scorched terrain. The Israelites have just escaped Pharaoh’s sword. Sinai still lies ahead. They are barely organized and not yet hardened to desert conditions. Some are nearing exhaustion. Dazed by arid bleakness, they plod in eerie silence.

Suddenly, from the rear a blood-curdling shriek splits the desert stillness. Still reeling, your ears are hit by an escalating babble of anguished cries, bleating sheep, shouted orders and pounding hooves. Swords glisten through the swirling dust. Arrows darken the skies. Blood stains the ground.

The fierce Amalekites have attacked.

With agonizing slowness, Israel’s fighting men try to regroup. The fate of the nation rests with them. Or so it seems.

An elderly man clambers up a near-by hill, a staff in his hands. Reaching the summit, he holds his staff aloft. You know the story. The key to Israel’s survival was that little old man on the hill, right? Wrong.

The octogenarian quickly tired. The staff began to lower. Immediately, the Amalekites gained the advantage. Israel was staring defeat in the face. Someone hastily found a rock for Moses to sit on and ushered him to it. Instantly, the battle turned. An usher had saved the day.

If that’s the first time God used an usher, he was merely setting a precedent. It’s been repeated times without number. (James 2:2-13 hints at the importance of this under-rated ministry.)

Before long, however, Moses’ arms began to tire. The battle had barely started. Israel was doomed. Then someone had a brainwave – hardly einsteinian, but on it hung the new nation’s very existence. Why not support the old man’s arms? This they did. It was they, as much as big-shot Moses and muscle-bound Joshua who saved Israel. An entire nation was indebted to two men helping an old man hold a stick. (Exodus 17:8-13; Deuteronomy 25:17-18)

‘Anyone could do that!’ you object. ‘Who’d applaud such a lightweight act?’ How distorted our thinking is. We, not heaven, are the ones who exalt trivia. Do seraphim turn cartwheels when the latest sports sensation kicks or hits a piece of leather? Do angels drool when a shapely distribution of body fat saunters by, or sigh in envy at a billionaire’s greed?

Neither is God awed by the nature of the gift he has given us – it’s his anyway. Whether our ability is rare or common is of no consequence to God’s evaluation of our worth.

With the Almighty pulsing within you, a stunning victory, an earth-shaking sermon, the sweetest music, are no more beyond your grasp than polishing the church floor. All that matters is what particular privilege the Lord gives you. (And all service is a privilege.)

Without God, nothing is significant; with him, nothing is insignificant. (Job 36:5; John 15:5)

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“I’m hopeless!”

Not with God!
 

 

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Help When You Feel You’ve Failed

Satan’s Slander

At church, it’s usually the car-park attendants who most inspire me. Most of us would make faithful preachers. We’d be prayerful, punctual and well-prepared if called to flaunt our talent in a flashy ministry. But how many of us would have the humility and strength of character to be faithful church parking attendants? Their task makes flossing your teeth high adventure. I’d feel like a second-hand tissue. With a face so long it gets caught in my belt, I’d be the constant brunt of Satan’s malicious whisperings that this service is just too degrading and embarrassing; that I must be the scum of the church. Could I successfully resist such slander? How I admire those saints, those Christ-like overcomers, every Sunday.

We are all subject to the Deceiver’s relentless barrage. If he fails to intoxicate us with pride, he’ll do all he can to induce a downer – maligning our ministry, telling us we are contributing nothing to the kingdom. Either way, surrendering to his persuasive lies will impair God’s work.

Imagine the consequences if in the midst of the battle Moses’ helpers had said, ‘I can’t fight like Joshua. I can’t lead like Moses. I can’t sing like Miriam, or engrave like Bezaleel. I’m just a run-away slave. Whoever heard of a stick-holding ministry! Life’s passed me by. Forget that stupid stick, I’m going back to my tent!’

Don’t conclude that God doesn’t have more spectacular things in store for you. What you are doing right now, however, is probably far more valuable and potentially more satisfying than you realize. You may be the only Christian presence in your work place, the only mother that precious child will ever have, the only one praying for that forgotten man, or the only one willing to encourage that person of unknown potential.

Lost in prayer, David Brainerd did not see the reared rattlesnake poised to strike his face. Watching wide-eyed with glee, were hate-crazed savages who had snuck up to the tent for the express purpose of murdering him. Unexpectedly, the snake suddenly veered and slid away. The Red Indians also silently retreated, awed by the snake’s reaction and intent upon spreading the word about this pale-face who so clearly had the Great Spirit’s protection. Oblivious to the entire episode, David broke camp and continued his journey. Yes, that was unusually dramatic, but are you any less ignorant of what takes place in the unseen spirit-world and within the sealed vault of people’s minds as you go about your normal affairs with the touch of God upon your life?

What was the greatest event in human history? Jesus’ death. Yet in a sense, it was nothing. People wanted him killed; he let them. It was no epic of human endurance. He even failed to drag his cross the required distance. There was no display of artistic skill. Other religions find it offensive. Intellectuals ridicule it. (1 Corinthians 1:23) Yet, in God, it is of incalculable worth.

Since we are sufficiently enlightened to view Jesus’ ministry as God sees it, let’s endeavor to be equally enlightened about our own service.

The church has a million unsung heroes. Their exploits, unknown on earth, are the talk of heaven. These resolute, Christ-like conquerors cannot be bought. They refuse to trade eternal acclaim for temporal applause. Heaven’s megastars may be so inconspicuous, you’d think they’re in training for the Pew Warmer of the Year Award. No one would guess the shock-waves they send through Satan’s camp when these spiritual gladiators plunder his kingdom. Everyone scrambles to be in the limelight, except these saints: they are light – the light of the world.

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A useless non-achiever?

Not to God!
Dr. Big-un

‘Fame, said Emerson, ‘is proof that people are gullible.’ Not the full harvest, perhaps, but those words are heavy with truth.

For instance, few Christians actually write the books they are credited with. Miss Hardwork could write a biography about Dr. Big-un and be the acknowledged author. Instead, Big-un might ask Hardwork to change the pronouns from he/him to I/me and call the book The Big-un Story by Dr. Big-un. It would not be unusual for Hardwork’s name to appear no-where in the book, not even in the section where Prof. Swellhead is thanked for scratching his nose and Sister Jane for feeding the cat. And somehow most of the royalties end up in Big-un’s bank account. That’s fair. He has so many more expenses. Simple things like clothing cost a fortune when ten thousand eyes are on you. No one sees Miss Hardwork, so her five-year-old dress and shabby shoes are quite adequate.

I’ll repent of my cynicism by pointing out that many conservative scholars believe the Bible has its share of ghost-writers – almost nameless people who, under an apostle’s direction and the Spirit’s anointing, used their own words to express the apostle’s heart. It’s not for us to judge Big-un. But there is a Judge, and in the end everything will pan out. Meanwhile, let’s try not to let some people shrink to nothing in our estimation while a few Big-uns fill the entire screen of our mind.

Nicky Cruz kindly insisted that Jamie Buckingham’s name appear on the book Jamie wrote for him. By the time the publisher was finished, the author’s name was not only smaller than Nicky’s, but smaller than that of Billy Graham who merely ‘wrote’ the foreword. (Actually, the foreword was written by Lee Fisher, Billy’s ghost-writer.) Jamie was peeved about that cover until humbled by the realization that God’s name appeared no-where on the cover. After that, he decided to become a holy ghost-writer. His next book was called God Can Do It Again by Kathryn Kuhlman (I had always thought she wrote that). Jamie had his wish: God’s name was on the cover.

As Jamie discovered, relative to our Savior, we don’t get such a raw deal. If torrential rain on foolishly deforested land causes a flood, it is ‘an act of God’. If the weather is perfect, who needs God? If someone smashes his thumb with a hammer, whose name gets cursed? If the hammer is on target – don’t talk to me about God, I’ve got work to do.

Following our Savior may take us into the shadows, but the time will come when we’ll shine like the sun. (Matthew 10:25-26; 13:43)

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A useless non-achiever?

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A hopeless waste of space?

Not in God’s eyes!
God’s Radical Views

It is common in our society to refer to one’s leaders as ‘superiors’. No wonder we fall for the lie that some vocations are superior. This delusion has so fogged our thinking that it would seem to require thousands of words to clear our minds. Yet just one sentence from Andrew Carnegie’s epitaph almost does it. This man started working for two cents an hour and ended up giving away $365 million. His leadership ability was the key. Before he died he ensured his tombstone read:

‘Here lies one who knew how to gather around him men who were cleverer than himself.’

When referring to the leaders and big names of the Jerusalem church, Paul wrote:

‘ . . .  those who seem to be something – whatever they were, it makes no difference to me; God shows personal favoritism to no man –’ (Galatians 2:6, New King James Version)

Let the truth overwhelm you: Paul was writing about the so-called pillars of the church, including Peter, James and John. (Galatians 2:9) He had in mind the most intimate friends of Jesus when divinely moved to declare that God has no favorites.

Try the Amplified Bible:

‘ . . .  those who were reputed to be something, though what was their individual position and whether they really were of importance or not makes no difference to me; God is not impressed with the positions that men hold and he is not partial and recognizes no external distinctions.’

One more time, remembering that Paul was referring to apostles ranked with the greatest and most spiritually gifted leaders the church has ever known:

‘ . . .  as far as their reputed leaders were concerned (I neither know nor care what their exact position was: God is not impressed with a man’s office) . . . ’

And what of the great apostle himself? Paul reminded the Corinthians that he preached Jesus as Lord and himself, not merely as Christ’s servant but as their slave/servant. (2 Corinthians 4:5 – note also 1 Corinthians 3:4-7) Burn that into your brain.

Prominence in the church – even God-ordained prominence – does not imply prominence in the heart of God. Not even apostleship breaks this immutable rule.

Except perhaps for a malfunctioning part of our body, our hair usually receives more attention than any other physical part of us, even though it is the least important. This paradox, insisted Paul, is typical of the way God deliberately arranges honor, prominence and attention among the members of his church. (1 Corinthians 12:23-25)

Leadership is valuable, but there are a multitude of ministries of equal significance.

It is our carnal side that covets leadership. Few of us display the spirit of Francis of Assisi. When his followers had swollen to thousands they began to abandon his principles. He returned from Egypt to find that the men he had left in charge were forbidding the eating of meat and allowing the ownership of goods. His response to those wanting to usurp his authority was to humbly relinquish leadership of the order he had founded. The Friars selected another leader, to whom Francis submitted as a common brother. Even on his death-bed, some eight years later, Francis bowed to his ‘superior’s’ directive that he stop singing and face death in a more ‘dignified’ manner.

Centuries later, George Whitefield, declared, ‘I know my place  . . .  even to be servant of all.’ Whitefield was the powerful founder of the Methodist movement. Today he is rarely credited with this honor. To foster love and unity between his followers and Wesley’s he abandoned his leadership rights and turned the entire ministry over to Wesley. To his horrified supporters he said, ‘Let my name be forgotten, let me be trodden under the feet of all men, if Jesus may thereby be glorified . . . ’

Not everything that passes as leadership in the Christian church corresponds to Christ-likeness.

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Help when you think:

“I’m Useless!”

Infinity

Another fallacy I’d like to pulverize is the notion that for divine service to be important it must touch many lives.

Bible translators Des and Jenny Oatridge were so sure that God cares not just for the thousands but for the ones and twos that they resolved to bypass large language groups that needed the Bible and find a language known only by a tiny minority. They got their wish when they heard of a language on the verge of extinction in Papua New Guinea. It was spoken by just 111 people. To sacrificially spend one’s life for so few would be remarkable if that tiny population were stable, but their numbers were plummeting at a phenomenal rate. Moreover, relative to hundreds of language groups, their need was minor; the tribe already had a strong Christian witness in languages they half knew. Nonetheless, the Oatridges devoted more than a quarter of a century to the herculean task of putting God’s Word into the mother tongue of this dying tribe. The heart of God and the hope that a few primitives might more fully comprehend the Gospel spurred them year after year.

Many of us would feel failures if our sole spiritual input were to a few homeless people. Yet we would think we had ‘arrived’ if our ministry were to three millionaires. What twisted minds we’ve got.

Let’s push aside petty human concepts and rise to the challenge of thinking like God.

The Savior shed as much blood for a derelict as he did for the entire world. In the combined angelic and human hosts there might be a trillion objects of God’s love, yet our amazing Lord loves an individual, not with a trillionth of his love, but with all his love. Moreover, his love for that person is infinite. You can’t exceed ‘all’, nor can you beat infinity. That makes it impossible for God’s collective love for a million, or a trillion, to exceed his love for one solitary person. That’s perfect love.

So, as staggering as it seems, if you alone can reach a particular individual, your contribution is as vital to God as that of someone who can reach a million.

Moreover, people who on earth enjoy popularity are already receiving a portion of their reward. Other things being equal, if your labors are unrecognized, you are more blessed than the person made famous by the obvious success of reaching a million. Instead of receiving your reward now, you’re accumulating eternal wealth. That’s great news because heaven’s interest rates are out of this world. (Luke 14:12-14; 12:33; 1 Corinthians 9:18)

Forget the multitudes; you are blessed if, by being true to your call, you touch just one person.

In fact you can do seemingly even less and still accomplish much. Consider Scott and his team, who struggled to the South Pole only to discover their honor of being the first to reach the Pole was lost forever. Amundsen had beaten them by about a month. To add to the futility, they endured further blizzards, illness, frostbite and starvation only to perish; the last three dying just a few kilometers from safety. Yet today their miserable defeat ending with death in frozen isolation, witnessed by not a living soul, is hailed as one on the greatest ever epics of human exploration and endurance.

Every fiber of my being is convinced that their glory is just a shadow of what you can achieve. Though you suffer in isolation and apparent futility, the depths of your trial known to no one on earth, your name could be blazed in heaven’s lights, honored forever by heaven’s throngs for your epic struggle with illness, bereavement, or whatever. The day is coming when what is endured in secret will be shouted from the housetops. Look at Job: bewildered, maligned, misunderstood; battling not some epic foe but essentially common things – a financial reversal, bereavement, illness; – not cheered on by screaming fans, just booed by some one-time friends. If even on this crazy planet Job is honored today, I can’t imagine the acclaim awaiting you when all is revealed. Your battle with life’s miseries can be as daring as David’s encounter with Goliath. Don’t worry that others don’t understand this at present. One day they will.

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Can’t do anything right?

No Call?

Another reason why some of us undervalue our service to the Lord is because we have not received a call of the thunder and lightning variety. God’s call is his selecting and empowering an individual for a specific task. The response he expects is not necessarily to do anything new. You’ve asked for God’s guidance haven’t you? Don’t you think God just might be smart enough to have maneuvered events so that your divine assignment is right in front of you? If so, he simply expects you to plunge into what you are already doing. Don’t conclude heaven rates your service as second-rate ministry just because you have no need for angels in luminescent nighties to boom something stirring like, ‘You should be doing something else, O great and mighty blockhead.’ There are Christians like Thomas who believe only because of a divine visitation. Yet, contrary to the way we often feel, Jesus affirmed that the people to be envied are those who believe without such displays. (John 20:29)

So long have I been tinkering with this book that it was years after penning the above that I sank into perhaps the blackest time of my spiritual life. It lasted for over a year and it was largely because I forgot the truth of the above paragraph.

I craved greater intimacy with God and more spiritual power. My one passion – my one reason for living – was to know Jesus and bring him glory. To allow more time for seeking the Lord I stopped my habitual revising of the book. I knew that my brain needed continual refilling with the words of this book or its truths would slowly seep from my mind, but I hoped the resulting frustration and lowered faith levels would merely intensify my drive to seek God. Heaven’s steely silence was devastating. Nearly every day I seemed to slump deeper until I was forced to re-read the book for my own survival. It worked. Meditating on the book revealed that my search for a spiritual breakthrough had degenerated into an excuse for unbelief. I had been edging closer and closer to refusing to believe God has great plans for me or even that he loves me unless he gave me an undeniably supernatural experience on which to hang my faith. How could I be so stupid? (Don’t answer that.) I was on dangerous ground. The omnipotent Lord, whose word is impossible to break, has gone to the extreme of putting his promises in writing. How dare I imply that even that is not enough!

Do I need a flock of angels on my roof, or an all-expense paid trip to heaven and back before I will accept that God thinks I am important to him? Christ’s shed blood proves God’s pledge of total commitment to me. Am I to pronounce that sacrifice inadequate and demand additional proof? Must God send a bolt of spiritual electricity through me before I’ll believe he wants to powerfully use me?

In his grace God might do something extra for me, as he has done for thousands, but to so focus on this possibility as to not believe unless he does it, is the height of impertinence.

If every non-Christian on this planet had amazing (though phony) spiritual encounters and every Christian received divine visitations every day, and I alone in all humanity experienced nothing, it could never diminish the infinitude of God’s devotion to me. If in his wisdom God decides to cut me off from such experiences in order to toughen my faith – that essential ingredient of spiritual life, more valuable than earth’s treasures – it is yet another demonstration of his love.

Faith in the unchangeable character of God is the only bedrock upon which a person’s ministry call can be founded. We have no need for God to write in the sky because he has written in a book. And Jesus taught that people who fail to believe the Bible would not believe even if they experienced the ultimate miracle of someone they knew returning from the dead and warning them. (Luke 16:27-31)

I dare not slacken my quest for a deeper spiritual experience. I will welcome any manifestation of the Spirit of God in my life and not proudly assume I don’t need it, but if God decides not to use such means to prop up my spiritual life, it merely proves the depth of his confidence in me. He obviously believes I have the grit to tough it out by raw faith.

Our call needs not spectacular confirmation but spectacular commitment.

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With God no one is useless

Lopped Off

The divine vinedresser prunes every fruitful branch. (John 15:2) Twigs with great potential are lopped off. That way, God’s life and our attention are channeled into those parts that will ultimately achieve the most. For months the vine seems cruelly maimed. But what seems a senseless waste produces better fruit.

On the steps of an opera house, gifted vocalist Peter Cameron Scott yielded to his Lord. In 1890, he set sail for the wilds of Africa. Cricketer, C. T. Studd was rich and famous in his home country. His reputation alone could draw a large crowd. Yet Christ inspired him to dispense of his wealth and trek to China, where he was neither rich nor famous. An irresponsible waste? Perhaps – if the Supreme Being were a celestial talent scout.

The Almighty is not frantically scouring the planet for someone with the natural ability to fill a particular role. Nor is he obligated to use our every skill. He is as capable of by-passing native talent as he is of supernaturally giving us new abilities.

Yet you are tenderly pruned with boundless wisdom. If a part of your life is thrown in the fire, another branch will bud, bearing bigger fruit.

Though groomed for it from his infancy, Ezekiel was barred by divine law from entering the priesthood until his thirtieth year. Finally, the day arrived. Can you see him, as excited as a flea at a cat show? Then you don’t know Ezekiel. In exile, Ezekiel was a priest without a temple. That’s like being a sailor without a ship, a painter without a brush, a carpenter without wood. Poor man. Instead of ministering rituals to his tiny nation he had to be content with shaking the entire world for millennia as a powerful prophet.

Brooks’ failure as a school teacher was so complete that he had to quit the profession forever. And the headmaster was as comforting as sandpaper. He informed the shattered man that he had ‘never known anyone who had failed as a schoolmaster to succeed in any other calling.’ The pain intensified. Utterly devastated, he intended spending the rest of his life as a recluse. Little did he know that one day someone would write, ‘What a blessing it was that Phillips Brooks was not permitted to be successful’ as a school teacher. Otherwise, ‘the brilliant, soul-winning, character-building minister might have been lost to the world.’

The Vinedresser is always right. And he still saves the best vintage until last. (Compare John 2:9-10) Disappointments are divine appointments to a later, richer harvest.

Perhaps you incorrectly discerned heaven’s call. (You thought it was heaven but it turned out to be a local call, not long-distance.) If so, quitting is no failure. You have given it your best and grown in the process. There is no shame in changing direction when that change aligns you closer to the perfect will of God.

One of the greatest preachers ever, Alexander Maclaren, has retained his influence for generations because he shunned what we consider the usual duties of a pastor to concentrate on sermon preparation. He would spend up to sixty hours preparing a single message. ‘He did more by doing less,’ concluded one biographer. I am reminded of the early apostles who off-loaded responsibilities they had originally assumed, to limit themselves to prayer and preaching. (Acts 6:2-4) Should this principle be applied to your calling?

Some of us either get involved in too many things at once or flit from one activity to another before getting established in any. We’re shooting out in all directions and wonder why we produce so little fruit. Welcome the pruning hook.

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Truth Distilled

If we seem to be achieving nothing, it is usual to feel like second-hand chewing gum. No matter how real the feeling, however, to give credence to the illusion is a tragic mistake. It is human to suffer irrational feelings but only the hopelessly insane are compelled to believe those feelings. Only people living in a land of fairies and goblins have the right to surrender to feelings of inferiority. Though you feel as cherished as a lump of soap at a boys’ camp, to God you are priceless. You may seem as useful as an inflatable anchor, but with God, no one is useless.

See Jesus naked on the cross, scorned by demons, soldiers and Jews. To even his supporters his failure was undeniable. Thousands were ashamed of him. We, too, may be pounded within and without by accusations that we are weak, ineffectual, useless. It is Satan, however, not our Lord, who is the accuser. Our Lord, is the redeemer who takes the shattered pieces of our lives and sculpts them into divine masterpieces that win both him and us eternal acclaim.

Try not to underestimate God’s ability to use for his glory, even the most trivial things you do. (I’d like to say never underestimate it, but that’s a tall order when living within you is the One whose power surpasses our wildest hopes. (Ephesians 3:20)


For more like the above webpage, see Not The Failure You Thought: Help When You Feel You’ve Failed

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I casually mentioned in the introduction that I live to serve and then felt compelled to add a brief explanation in a link. I also immediately added that link to my webpage Is Suicide or Euthanasia Ever a Moral Option for Christians? because it is quite a motivator to keep living. If you have not yet read that little explanation, I suggest you do, since it is most relevant feeling useless: I live to serve.

Related Pages

Spirit-Let Ministry: If You Think You’re Called to a ‘Normal’ Ministry, Think Again

Help When Feeling Suicidal

Slandered by Fellow Believers! Coping with Rejection & Cruel Criticism

Fear: Help & Cure

Mysteries Explained: Encouragement When Sin Keeps Defeating You

Encouragement When Demons Keep Winning

From Misery to Ministry: The Role of Sickness in Your Life

Too Old? You’re Joking!

Waiting for Your Ministry

[Help When Feeling Suicidal] [Much More!] [Bless & Be Blessed by Facebook]
[Daily Quotes] [E-Mail Me] [My Shame]

Not to be sold. © Copyright, Grantley Morris, 1985-1996, 2015. For much more by the same author, see www.net-burst.net   No part of these writings may be copied without citing this entire paragraph.

 

 

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