Building Capacity for God
As Christians in the marketplace we are being challenged like never before to bend under the cultural influences of our day. Technology has actually created more issues and less time with God. What is supposed to establish automation and consolidation, along with better communication is actually keeping us from each other relationally and God intimately.
You and I are faced with choices everyday and spending time with God and in His word cannot be ignored. Sermons from a pulpit, by other great men and women of God, two or three times a week is not going to cut it. Capacity (the amount that can be contained), of / for God is at an all time low. There is no margin in our lives because there is hardly any God in our lives. Margin - the space between our load and our limit is thread bare. Conditions of modern day living devour margin.
"So humble yourselves under the mighty power of God, and at the right time he will lift you up in honor. 7 Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you. 8 Stay alert! Watch out for your great enemy, the devil. He prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour." 1 Peter 5
If Christians in the marketplace are too busy to stop, take spiritual inventory and receive their assignments from God - they become slaves to the tyranny of the urgent.
Money and Time are two of our most treasured resources.
We don’t all have the same amount of money, but we do have the
same amount of time. How we use that time resource is a choice.
Decide what’s important. Who are the important people in my life?
And what claim to they have on my time? Find out where your time is going – track it. This will be the only way to make the painful adjustment of where you spend your time and who with.
The world tells us, ‘Why put off till tomorrow what can be done today?’ I like this way of saying it, ‘Why do today what can be put off till tomorrow?’ The world tells us, "Don't just stand there - do something! God says, "Don't just do something, stand there."
"Have you never heard? Have you never understood?
The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of all the earth.
He never grows weak or weary. No one can measure the depths of his understanding.
29 He gives power to the weak and strength to the powerless.
30 Even youths will become weak and tired, and young men will fall in exhaustion.
31 But those who wait upon the Lord will find new strength.
They will soar high on wings like eagles.
They will run and not grow weary. They will walk and not faint." Is. 40
So, what are some keys to creating Capacity for God?
Discern what hinders you – let go of what you cherish now
in order to find out what God cherishes most.
Discover Jesus Christ and make seeking first His Kingdom a joy
and watch as He brings all the needed things into view.
Delegate some of your load and empower others. Perhaps the reason we have so many tired, fatigued, and discouraged Christians is because we think, “It all depends on me.”
Determine how your going to get there by forgetting what is behind
and letting go of what is unnecessary. We can’t make time, but we can redeem it.
Paul declares in Phil. 3:13, “One thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those thing which are ahead, ‘I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.”
What is your one thing?
As you seek the Lord regarding what needs to be removed and let go of in your time commitments - realize that it is the Lord that needs to fill that new space. If we just put another worldly margin devouring task in its place then we've actually made the problem worse.
Needless to say this is not easy to do. However, I have been challenged to sow the Word. We can and should begin to capture the word in our hearts, declare the word over our homes and communities (literally speak scripture over your children as they sleep, over your homes as a family, over your workplace and city) and proclaim that the Kingdom of God is at hand.
Remember Our God is the author and creator of time - He called it forth. He is asking us to redeem it by taking back every area that Satan is currently using for his advantage and bring it back to God. The fourth Transformation Paradigm that we embrace is to take the Kingdom of God to where the kingdom of darkness is still entrenched. This is why as marketplace ministers we must be so intentional in this area.
Finally, I recently heard this from Henry Blackaby -
"All of us are looking for an encounter with God. We want to know Him in a way we’ve never known Him. Hear Him like we’ve never heard Him. We want an encounter with God. Every encounter with God is a moment of judgment.
Whenever God speaks - whatever you do next reveals what you believe about God. When the God of the universe speaks it is not open for discussion. Therefore, when God speaks it is a moment of judgment because it reveals what I believe about Him. What I do will either bring blessings or judgment. The window to respond when God speaks is very, very narrow."
Don't walk away from a word like this discouraged, be encouraged. The ability to respond to God appropriately will have more to do with surrender then it will with performance. God is changing us into His image. The difficulty is believing that the Lord will be on the other side of this trusting obedience.