extreme makeover - spiritual edition

Someone once told me that there are times when God hides us from the world and the world from us.  It is not necessarily a season of winter, or even a season of cave dwelling it is just a season of well…being alone, being hidden, you are living in the world but it seems distant and removed.  Shortly after I came to Christ He tried to put me in a season of being hidden, and I was having none of it, While I couldn’t control everything that was happening around me, what I was able to control, I did, and with a fervent passion. 

Our time of being hidden is a time to embrace, you see there is a work He wants to do and He needs you to Himself to complete that work.

Walls are torn down

Shaky foundations are ripped up

And in extreme cases the bulldozer is sent in to just rip it all down and start from scratch.

Sometimes we are called to move and sometimes we are called to be still.  When we are moving we feel good, we feel like we are accomplishing something, but to be still, yikes that is a whole different ball game, it can be torturous, we feel unproductive because we want to be moving forward. We put ourselves out there and hear the crickets chirping in return. Perhaps there is work He wants to do in you, a work you will need to have done to enable you to step out and walk into the next season He has waiting for you.

 Have you ever noticed that for each new mountaintop we are reaching for the mountain seems to get steeper and the top higher? But every good climber knows that to reach that higher place a certain amount of conditioning and training is required.

Say for example you want to be a singer, you sing on the worship team but you want to reach people beyond Sunday morning service, say like Chris Tomlin, you have the technical skills but for some reason you can’t seem to break away from the Sunday service routine. You are discouraged, you wonder what is taking Him so long, the doors just don’t seem to be opening for you, but you know God wants to do something bigger with your singing, perhaps it is because He wants to do something bigger in you first.  I have said this before and it is worth repeating, I heard it in an Andy Stanley sermon, rather than seeking out God’s plan for your life, seek out God’s plan for the world and how your life fits into it.

You see, it not about us, but about Him and about serving Him.  So you have a gift to sing, but do you want to sing to glorify God or do you want to sing because you want to make a name for yourself, stand on a stage and have people applaud and cheer for you and buy your CD’s?  Not to say that you don’t love Jesus or don’t love singing praise and worship, but the question is, what are your motives?  Do you want to shine the light of Jesus before men, or do you want to shine the light of yourself?

Maybe He is putting you through an extreme makeover of the spiritual kind. Perhaps He has do something in you before He can do something through you, getting your heart right so you don’t run the risk of getting too big for your britches, because those britches will eventually shrink.  Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall, Proverbs 16:18.

In his book, When God Doesn't Make Sense, Dr. James Dobson writes this, if you want to know what a person is made of, grant him a high degree of social status and admiration.  His hidden character will soon be apparent for all to see. 

Give a man what he is not yet equipped to handle and he will  get too big for his britches. Give a newly minted college graduate the position of CEO before they have been humbled in the mailroom and chances are they will abuse their position of power because they were given too much too soon.

This is is a comment that someone left on my Friday thought post that I think sums it up: Some people get so hung up on money or even whether they are doing as much as you, or better than you. It can be overwhelming sometimes.
When in reality it's who we are that counts.
Take everything away and strip me of my clothes and all my possessions and that it the real me.
If we are not happy looking at ourselves that way, we just aren't going to be happy no matter what. (thank you Trez).

This was something that was brought up in my quiet time this morning. I have been asking God to use me in a big way, but I have to admit there was a certain level of narcissism to what I was asking Him for, not that I don’t want to do great works for the kingdom of God and for the glory of God because I do, but there was also an underlying element of selfish ambition that I wanted to fulfill.

1 Peter 1:15

But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do.

1 Peter 4:10-11

Each one of us should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s grace in various forms.  If anyone speaks he should do it with the strength God provides, so that in all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ.  To him be the glory and the power for ever and ever.  Amen.

1 Corinthians 10:31

So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.

1 Corinthians 10:33

For I am not seeking my own good but the good of many so that they may be saved. 

Colossians 3:17

And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

My prayer today is this:

Father please change my heart to put my own agenda aside and do this all for Your glory and to glorify You, in Jesus name, amen.