Archippus was commanded to complete what he had begun. The Greek verb means to “discharge fully.” A job half-discharged is of no more use than a gun half-discharged.
It’s important to finish if only because that’s what God does. We are to carry his character. It’s also important to finish because it shows we are people of our word. We will do what we have promised, no matter what the cost. And it’s important to finish because God gave us a full destiny, not a half one.
We long for miracles. But there is a price to be paid. Let me try to explain.
We sold our house last week, but only after a battle.
This has been a consistent theme for us. On our first home, the private financing was deliberately pulled by a disgruntled church member after we had signed the papers to buy it. We were saved by a miracle. We had to place an unconditional offer in order to secure our second house, and had only weeks to sell our first home (or face bankruptcy - again). We had another miracle.
Things were tough for God’s people. And worse was coming.
In the midst of it all, Isaiah called the people to look to the rock from which they were hewn, to look to Abraham their father and Sarah who bore them. And then he makes this statement: “For he was but one when I called him, that I might bless him and multiply him” (Isaiah 51:2).
For he was but one.
How many times have you felt alone, abandoned, misunderstood or powerless in the face of circumstances? How many time have you looked enviously or wistfully at others who do not appear to be in such a hard place?
For he was but one.
How many times does the church regard success in terms of numbers? Speakers are invited to conferences simply because of the size of their church. I once heard a very godly and wise pastor say he knew God had given him one of the largest churches in America simply so that people would listen to his message. He said it with regret that this should be the case. Yet so often it is.
For he was but one.
At Gethsemane, Scripture records Jesus was deserted by all of his disciples.
He also was but one.
Sometimes God strips away our outward success. He removes our popularity. He puts us in a place where it seems we have only him. But here’s why. It’s when we have nothing, when we know we are nothing, when we are but one, that he can begin to bring a harvest out of our lives.
If Abraham had not been one, God could not have been glorified in the miracle of multiplication that followed. Abraham was significant precisely because he was insignificant.
Many years ago and though very difficult circumstances, God brought me to the devastating realization that I wasn’t his greatest gift to the body of Christ. Something in me died, but because of the death, God slowly but surely began a process of resurrection which, I hope and pray, has brought blessing to the lives of others, blessing that would never have come had I found myself in a place of self-defined success.
We so foolishly think God is most glorified in our great ministry gifts and successes. What a lie! Advertising our ministry accomplishments brings glory only to us.
In truth, God’s glorification is found in our desperation. And that usually comes at the moment we feel we are but one.
I am so glad Abraham did not give up. His greatest qualification for leadership was his refusal to walk out. And because of that, the covenant line was preserved for the Messiah to come and save you and me.
We so often read the stories of the Bible with the end in mind. We forget what it was like for the disciples in the boat before Jesus showed up walking on the water to rescue them. We forget what it was like for Jairus at that awful moment when the messengers told him there was no point bothering Jesus because his daughter had died. We forget what it was like for Peter in Herod’s prison the night before his scheduled execution. We forget what it was like for Abraham during all those long years when he was but one.
If that is where you are today, hang on. Know that God is not deserting you, he is preparing you.
Knowing you are insignificant qualifies you to be significant.
Another day will come. Just hang in there and stay faithful.
You are not but one. He is with you.
Why is it that God delays? I have thought about this a lot the last several years, as we have gone down a long and often very hard path seeking God’s plan for the next phase of our lives. Does God not care about the situation we are in? Does he not see our desperation? Does he not hear our prayers?
The other night, I was reading that extraordinary story in the Gospels where the disciples were straining at the oars for hours, making little progress. All of a sudden, Jesus showed up, walking across the waters. They took him into the boat, and by supernatural intervention, they instantly reached the other side of the lake.
Like so many Bible stories, we read this one with the end in mind. We already know what’s going to happen. But we forget that those guys in the boat had no idea whether Jesus was going to show up for them or not. They were almost certainly desperate. They were probably near the end of their strength. They were likely terrified of drowning. And you can be sure they had been praying.
But their prayers had not been answered.
What do you think they were thinking? Probably most of the same things we are thinking when God fails to resolve our crisis when we think he should.
But the question we should be asking ourselves is not “Why is God delaying?” but “What is God doing?”
Sometimes God is taking the extra time to bring elements of his plan for us together which are at present unseen to us. The whole world does not revolve around you or me. Other people and circumstances are involved too, and have to be brought into the picture.
Sometimes he is saving us from things we at first asked for. How many times have you thanked God he did not give you that job, that relationship, that accommodation, that place of ministry you asked him for?
Often, he is simply changing and refining us as we pray, because in the process we are drawn closer to him through our seeking of him. Hopefully we discover it is more important to seek God than the thing we are asking for.
For all these reasons, we then look back and thank the Lord that it worked out the way it did.
The fact is that God does not delay at all. The word “delay” implies that something that should have taken place now does not take place until later. But God’s timing is as perfect as all of his ways. What seems to us to be delay is actually God working out his perfect plan for us.
So if you are caught up right now in what to you is a very much in-your-face delay, may I suggest you follow the advice James gave to those who were experiencing the same kind of thing: ask God for wisdom (James 1:5). Ask God what he is doing in your heart and circumstances. Ask him for patience. Cast yourself on him. Cry out to him. But don’t give up.
Because the very point at which you feel like giving up is often the moment God breaks through. When we are at our most desperate is when he receives the most glory for what he does, because everyone knows it is him, not us who has done it.
And when God moves, he often does so with great speed. Isaiah put it this way: “I am the Lord; in its time I will do it quickly” (Isaiah 60:22).
I read that verse the other night. And I read it just at the point where God had intervened in our lives in an extraordinary way, which in a matter of weeks resolved issues we had been facing for years.
More of that next week…
I’ve just come back from a weekend with 30 young men eager to grow in God and extend his kingdom.
What do young men need to hear about? Well, at or near the top of the list is how to persevere. And that’s what I talked about.
One of Paul’s most powerful statements is this: “Forgetting what lies behind, I strain forward.” The last phrase in Greek is a double compound participle. Yikes! What is that? It means an ordinary word intensified, and then intensified again.
In the same passage, where he writes to the Philippians using the terminology of about the Olympic races, he has already talked about pressing on. That’s a running word: “keep running.”
Now he adds to it the picture of the runner at the very end of the race, with his body stretched out at a 45 degree angle, straining forward to get the greatest possible advantage in order to cross the finish line first.
Our culture is built around convenience, not perseverance. We want it, and we want it now. We want to make the minimum investment to gain the maximum benefit. That’s why you see people lining up at the lottery counter and the casino.
That’s why we produce charismatic preachers who explode at 30 but are finished at 40, often by some moral or character failure.
God has a different way of operating. He will take 40, 50 or 60 years of a person’s life just to prepare them for what he wants to do with the rest of it. When he’s refined the gold, he can make something beautiful and lasting out of it.
But how do we get there?
Yup, you got it. Perseverance.
We watch professional athletes, skilled musicians or gifted surgeons, and none of us has any doubt about the incredible amount of hard work it took to get them to where they are.
So why is it we think that we can accelerate the process when it comes to Christian character or leadership?
Don’t trust anyone who hasn’t submitted to training. It is good for a man (or woman) to bear the yoke when they are young. That is the Bible speaking, not me.
When I started running again 9 or 10 years ago, it took me a long time before I really began to make progress. Then one day I went out with a running club in the UK, and to my surprise I found myself near the beginning of the large pack.
When I started to learn Hebrew, for a long time it looked like nothing more than hen scratching. Then one day I began to find myself translating Biblical passages and even reading parts of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
I’m sure there were many victims of my early years of preaching and counselling. I even counselled people (confidently!) on marriage issues when I was still single. But eventually God was able to use my skills and gifts to help people, though I am still amazed how he does it.
There may be shortcuts to the gym, but there are no shortcuts at the gym.
Likewise, there are no shortcuts to maturity.
It requires perseverance.
If there is such a thing as a guarantee of success in life, it’s perseverance. It will get you further than anything else I know.
And it’s just like a financial investment -- the earlier you start, the better.
Today would be a good time.
