GraceCreates

By Jon Walker

God has given gifts to each of you from his great variety of spiritual gifts. Manage them well so that God’s generosity can flow through you. … Do it with all the strength and energy that God supplies. Then God will be given glory. (1 Peter 4:10-11 NLT)

Generosity flows from the heart of God: “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.” (James 1:17 NIV)

When God gives, he holds nothing back. He gives every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms. (Ephesians 1:3 NLT) There’s no obligation for him to give us so much.

He gives because he loves.

He gives not only to bless you, but also so he can bless others through you. God designed you with a unique set of talents, gifts, skills, and abilities.

He gives to you so you can give to others. Receive from God, then give to others. “… Be generous with the different things God gave you, passing them around so all get in on it.” (1 Peter 4:10 MSG)

What does this mean?

• Be generous with different things – Here’s what I think Peter means: The other day I was at the YMCA, thinking I needed help pushing myself in order to lose more weight. I thought, “Wouldn’t it be great if a Christian brother, committed to physical fitness, would take me on as a ministry? In fact, he could start a ‘small group’ that met at the gym.”
• Talents, skills, abilities – The point is that we all have talents, skills, and abilities given to us by God, and we can give those away. In many congregations, we see this with musicians who give their talents to help us worship God. Some may be professional musicians but others are volunteers freely give away their musical talents to bless others.
• Give creatively – The thing is, think creatively about the talents, skills, and abilities God has given you. If you’re a mechanic, you could help single women in your church keep their cars in good condition. If you’re a handy man (or woman), you can do simple repairs for some of the families in your neighborhood. If you are known for your hospitality, you can teach a younger generation how to open their homes to others. Years ago, a lawyer at my church prepared wills for all the young families, doing it in a group setting so it didn’t overwhelm his practice. Think creatively! A great and true friend of mine once flew halfway across the United States to help me drive a moving truck all the way back.
• What can you give? – Ask God what you can do to bless others. Ask him how you can do it. Ask him to show you who to bless with the gifts, skills, talents he has given you. By giving in this way, we imitate our Lord and prove to be his disciples. (Matthew 25:31-40)

Jon Walker is the teaching pastor for “The Purpose Driven Life Daily Devotionals,” and resident writer at www.GraceCreates.com. This devotional is copyrighted 2008 by Jon Walker. Used by permission.

By Jon Walker

Sarah became pregnant and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the appointed time God had told him. (Genesis 21:2 HCSB)

Sarah and Abraham grew weary of the wait, and so they decided to step in and help God fulfill the promise he’d made. Sarah and Abraham thought, just like you and me, “God doesn’t understand our circumstances; his commandments are good guidelines, but they simply don’t work well in the nitty gritty of life.”

And so Hagar gave birth to Ishmael.

Yet the promise had been that Sarah would be the one to deliver a son for Abraham, and the wait continued, long after reaching the point of desperate frustration – the place where you say, “God, I can’t go on any longer!” God still hasn’t answered your desperate pleas. You pray persistently, like the widow knocking on the judge’s door day and night (Luke 18), but the shutters stay closed and the door remains shut.

Sarah and Abraham knocked on that door for another 14 years! (Genesis 16:16; Genesis 21:5) Only then did God open Sarah’s womb so she could bear Abraham a son in his old age, at the time appointed by God. (Genesis 21:2 HCSB)

During those 14 years, God made a covenant with Abram, changing his name to Abraham, which means “father of a multitude.” (Genesis 17) Yet Abraham and Sarah still waited.

It was more than a decade before three mysterious visitors arrived, telling Abraham that Sarah would provide him a son within the year. Sarah laughed, not believing God was about to give birth to his promise. (Genesis 18)

Still waiting, Abraham negotiated with God over the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, and, most likely, soon received the news that the daughters of his nephew Lot were pregnant. Having faltered in their faith, no longer believing God would provide them with husbands, the sisters slept with their father while he was too drunk to realize what was happening. (Genesis 19) Is it possible that Abraham’s heart sank as he realized these young girls also had decided to step in and help God fulfill a promise?

Yet, even with this fresh reminder that there is folly in taking over for God, Abraham was soon lying, not trusting God for his protection, telling the king of Gerar that Sarah was his sister and not his wife, in fear he would be killed so Abimelech could take Sarah as his own wife. Yet the king took Sarah anyway. (Genesis 20)

This time God intervened, and why? Perhaps God was teaching Abraham that God would solve the problem, that a lie from Abraham was not the solution. And perhaps because God was about to fulfill the promise of Sarah bringing forth a son from the seed of Abraham, and if she’d slept with the king, there would have been questions about who was really Isaac’s father.

Finally – after 14 years – the Lord came to Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did for Sarah what he had promised. Sarah became pregnant. And this time Sarah laughed with joy, saying, “God has made me laugh, and everyone who hears will laugh with me.” (Genesis 21:6)

She then added, “Who would have told Abraham that Sarah would nurse children?” (Genesis 21:7) God told her, and God fulfilled his promise.

What does this mean?

• God is on the other side of your wait – God is as faithful with his promises as the sun is faithful to rise every morning. Although we often wonder, during the wait, if God is going make good on his promise, the question we should be asking is why we doubt God will do what he said he would do. This question is not meant to trigger condemnation, rather to encourage growth. God wants you to grow in your faith, and he’ll help you grow – in part, by asking you to wait for the appointed time.
• Nothing to do but wait – Let me be candid and tell you that over the past few months, I’ve been waiting on God to fulfill a promise. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say I am desperately waiting over a desperate need. Perhaps you can empathize, and perhaps you understand when I say that, at times, I’ve been angry, frustrated, depressed. I’ve demanded God provide for the need on my own timetable. Several times I’ve even tried to push the door open in my own strength. Then, a few weeks ago, I realized that there was absolutely nothing I could do to make this thing happen. I was totally and wholly dependent upon God to fulfill his promise. Not dependent because I obediently submitted everything to God, but totally dependent because I’d exhausted every other possibility. (Ha! Perhaps you can relate!)
• Then, I had what I call a “Meshach moment” – A moment where I had to say, like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, “If the God we serve exists, then he can rescue us from the furnace of blazing fire, and he can rescue us from the power of you, the king. But even if he does not rescue us, we want you as king to know that we will not serve your gods or worship the gold statue you set up.” (Daniel 3:17-18, HCSB; emphasis mine) Could God be steering you toward a “Meshach moment,” bringing you to a place where you are wholly dependent upon God and faithful even if the answer does not come?

Jon Walker is the teaching pastor for “The Purpose Driven Life Daily Devotionals,” and resident writer at www.GraceCreates.com. This devotional is copyrighted 2008 by Jon Walker. Used by permission.

By Jon Walker

But Sarai, Abram’s wife, had no children. So Sarai took her servant, an Egyptian woman named Hagar, and gave her to Abram so she could bear his children. “The LORD has kept me from having any children,” Sarai said to Abram. “Go and sleep with my servant. Perhaps I can have children through her.” And Abram agreed. (Genesis 16:1-2 NLT)

And so Sarai took it upon herself to solve God’s problem. After all, God told Sarai’s husband, Abram, that he’d have a huge family, more descendants than there are stars in the sky. (Genesis 15)

Sarai waited and waited for God to provide their first descendant, but the baby didn’t come. She waited week after week, hopeful that God would answer her prayers, that God would make good on his promise. Every day, the tension and the frustration mounted. As the musician, Tom Petty, sings: “The waiting is the hardest part.”

Like me – perhaps like you – Sarai began to wonder if God would ever answer her prayers. She wondered if God had forgotten about her, as if God’s promise had been mis-filed or improperly prioritized in the perceived bureaucracy of heaven. Perhaps – like you, like me – Sarai questioned whether God really knew what he was doing.

It appears Sarai’s thoughts walked as far as her faith would carry her, and then she stood looking at the mountains of her fear. Did God understand how important this was to her? How could God deny her the greatest desire of her heart? Was God even on her side?

Even as Sarai acknowledged God’s ability to fulfill the promise – “The LORD has kept me from having any children …” – yet she denied God’s sovereignty to decide when the promise would be fulfilled.

And so Sarai took it upon herself to fulfill the promise, no longer trusting God to do his job. The waiting is the hardest part, and Sarai was tired of the wait.

Sitting in a humid tent, she hears the support poles creak; she hears, through the open flaps, a camel snort; and she hears … was that a voice, like the hiss of a serpent, saying, “Really? Did God really say your husband would be the father of a family so vast it would surpass the number of stars in the sky?” (Consider Genesis 3.)

Sarai said, “God can, but he won’t.” Or maybe she said, “God can’t figure this out.” Looking through the tent’s door, she saw her servant Hagar, and in that moment she saw the solution, though she didn’t see the Pandora’s Box she would soon open. Perhaps she even though, “Of course! This is probably the answer God meant for me to see all along.”

Her faith was collapsing, but so was Abram’s, for when Sarai suggested the solution was through Hagar, Abram agreed.

So what does this mean?

• Waiting for God is hard – God is not surprised when we’re honest about our frustrations and fears. Often God requires us to wait because he’s trying to show us the end of our faith, stretching our faith, not condemning us for the lack of it. In these moments, seek God and not the answer.
• Whose side are you on? – Sarai believed her assumptions more than God’s promise. She wonders why God was no longer on her side – “Why is the LORD keeping this from me?” – instead of confessing that she was no longer on God’s side. Ask God to help you identify the places in your life where you’re saying, “The LORD is keeping this from me!” What will you do with what he reveals to you?
• God opens and closes doors – Even as Sarai took matters into her own hands, she acknowledged God had the power to provide more heirs than there were stars in the sky. If we could ask Sarai, “Can God?” she probably would answer yes. If we then asked Sarai, “Will God?” her honest answer would appear to have been no. When faced with a delayed answer, do you break with God? What does manipulating an answer to your prayer say about your belief in the character of God? What does “giving up on God” say about the depth of your faith?
• Restoring your faith – Like mastery-based education, God’s interest is that you master the lessons of faith. He wants you to succeed in your lessons, able to walk further in faith each day. So failure is not defeat; he will continue to teach you – and stretch you – until walking by faith and not by sight is as natural as breathing. Tell God, “I believe; help my unbelief!”

Jon Walker is the teaching pastor for “The Purpose Driven Life Daily Devotionals,” and resident writer at www.GraceCreates.com. This devotional is copyrighted 2008 by Jon Walker. Used by permission.

By Jon Walker

“Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults because of your love.” (Ephesians 4:2b NLT)

The more we understand, the more patient we become.

When we see the hurt beneath the anger, or the reason behind the behavior, we’re more likely to “make allowance for each other’s faults.”

The ability to understand is a sign of patience. (Proverbs 14:29) The Bible teaches, “A man’s wisdom gives him patience; it is to his glory to overlook an offense.” (Proverbs 19:11 NIV) God’s wisdom teaches us that love is patient (1 Corinthians 13:4), and that impatience is not love.

When facing a challenge to our patience, it helps to remember God is not asking us to give more patience to others than the patience he gives to us. The apostle Paul uses his own life as an example of this, saying God showed him mercy, despite his many sins, so that “Christ Jesus might display his unlimited patience.” (1 Timothy 1:16 NIV)

We need patience with one another because God created each of us with different shapes, assigning each of us a different mission in life. We all have different backgrounds, and we’re each at a different place in our journey with Jesus. Practicing patience keeps our view on the things above, allowing us to see how God works even in the most difficult of circumstances. It is in patience we often learn that diversity is a strength, instead of a weakness.

The apostle Paul wrote, “Welcome with open arms fellow believers who don’t see things the way you do. And don’t jump all over them every time they do or say something you don’t agree with – even when it seems that they are strong on opinions but weak in the faith department. Remember, they have their own history to deal with. Treat them gently.” (Romans 14:1 MSG)

What does this mean?

• Work at being consistently patient – Anybody can be patient when it’s convenient, but it’s much harder to remain patient when the day is slipping away or when you’re faced with the same mistake for the third time in one week. Patience often comes at significant cost; it requires you set aside your agenda and yield your rights in order to “welcome each other with open arms.”
• Learn to listen – Listening means more than just hearing someone talk; it means carefully considering what the other person is saying and actively trying to understand his or her point of view. The Bible says, “Listen before you answer. If you don’t, you are being stupid and insulting.” (Proverbs 18:13 TEV) That’s pretty clear! It means we shouldn’t evaluate what someone has done or said until we’ve heard the full story. God gave us two ears and one mouth, perhaps to tell us we should listen twice as much as we talk. Ha!
• Ask yourself these questions:
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    • What makes me impatient?
    • What does my impatience say about my priorities?
    • How can I better understand the people who bring out my impatience?
    • Have I taken time to listen to their full stories?
    • In what ways do people have to be patient with me?
    • Do I give the same amount of grace to others as I expect them to give me?
    • “Love is patient.” (1 Corinthians 13:4 NIV) – that means love puts up with a lot for a long time. The next time your patience reaches its limit, remember how patient and understanding Jesus is with you.

Jon Walker is the teaching pastor for “The Purpose Driven Life Daily Devotionals,” and resident writer at www.GraceCreates.com. This devotional is copyrighted 2008 by Jon Walker. Used by permission.