Last night I had a dream of an earlier time when my kids were young. I remember, in the dream, cuddling with my kids and enjoying them as three and six-year olds. Then today when I woke up and went back to Psalm 65, believing there was another nugget there, I found it: “you choose and bring near.” As a dad I would not have children and then not want to be near them. The older they get the more I simultaneously enjoy them now and I miss their younger days. It is unthinkable that I, an imperfect father, would choose to have children, but also choose to have them far away. Any good parent knows this.

If this is true—and it is—then why on earth do we treat God like some alien? We develop some split-level thinking that says, ‘God has to choose me because that’s his job. But he probably doesn’t want to be near me. I will just be happy with being chosen, and will hang out with the servants in the back yard.’ It sounds ridiculous when one spells it out this way, but I cannot tell you how many times I have heard people say, “I don’t feel near to God.”

If the devil cannot stop you being forgiven he will try his best to stop you enjoying God. And sometimes satan doesn’t even need to work very hard at this because our own performance-driven, earning-oriented, ego-and-accomplishment based wiring keeps us from God. Friends, our God is one. He is not some bi-level, half-hearted, half-baked God. There is enough in who he is and what he has done to both choose us, and to draw us near. Anything that is a potential barrier to nearness has been swept away by the blood of Jesus. There is no veil, no dividing wall, no legal case against us… “nothing can separate us from the love of God.” We are chosen to be near, not just to be saved.

You are chosen: get near! Let this truth wash over you until you know it deep in your soul.

You choose and bring near… you choose and bring near… you choose and bring near.

Application

• How often do you say to yourself, “I don’t feel near to God”?
  
  
• Have you believed the lie that says, “God chose me because he chose the whole world, but he doesn’t want to be close to me.”?

• If you accept that you are chosen but don’t feel near, you may still living under the law. Are you, in some way, thinking that nearness comes from what you do rather than the Father’s desire? If so, repent—change your mind, because it is wrong.

• What steps can you take to soak in God’s decision to choose you, and bring you near?

Let’s face it, we all have days when we feel like we are about to fall over. There are times when we think we are bound to become just another fallen layer in the archeology of life. King David knew that if he didn’t collapse because of his own frailty, then there were plenty of people who were happy to do help him crumble. “How long will you assault a man? Would you throw him down—this leaning wall, this tottering fence? They fully intend to topple him from his lofty place…”  How did David deal with this opposition? Rather than try to pump himself up, he made sure his frail fence was located in the right place.

5 Find rest, O my soul, in God alone;

       my hope comes from him.

 6 He alone is my rock and my salvation;

       he is my fortress, I will not be shaken.

The question is not whether we are a leaning wall; the question is, What is our wall leaning on? You may argue, ‘I am doing fine—my health is good, my finances are great, my wall is sturdy and I have a bright future.’ That’s good, if your wall is in the right place. If your money is your wall, “though your riches increase, do not set your heart on them.” (v.10) If your strength is your wall, “men are but a breath” – two puffs and life is over, your strength is gone. If you come from a noble family, remember “the highborn are but a lie.” (v.9) The posture of your wall is less important than the positioning of your wall.

The enemy knows that the real battle is not for the condition of your fence, but for the position of your fence. Satan tried, through his accomplices, to lure Nehemiah outside the city, but Nehemiah stayed in the right place. Samson had a strong fence, but compromised its position. Job stood firm: “even if he slay me, yet will I hope in him.” (Job 13:15)

If you have your fence in the right place, if it is high up on the rocky fortress, if it is set on a rock, then it doesn’t matter too much if it falls over. If your wall falls, he is capable of fixing it. There is no fear on the rock.

Application

• Are you afraid of teetering, falling? Why? Why not?

• What are you leaning into—God himself, or the things around you?

• What does it mean to “set our heart” on riches? (Verse 10)

It was December and I was preparing for our annual planning meetings. This is easier to do when the year has been good and there is money in the bank. This particular year I was half expecting criticism from my colleagues because things were not as good financially as they could have been. I sensed that people were fatigued and were looking for change. Before the meetings began I sought God and I comforted myself in the Lord, and this phrase is what turned it for me: “my honor depends on God.” Not on the Profit & Loss, not on the bank balance, not on external success, and not on the esteem of my colleagues, but on the Lord.

As it happens, it was not the most jovial of planning retreats. There was somewhat of an air of criticism. I led us through Psalm 62 and we pondered its meaning. Only afterwards did I realize that people were critical, but of themselves, not of me. They had endured a tough year, but many wished they would have had more to show for their efforts. We were close to the edge of looking to our accomplishments to validate who we were, rather than looking to God to defend our honor.

Perhaps you are hard on yourself. You criticize your lack of productivity or accomplishment. If, on the other hand, you are quite content with what you do, others may criticize you for not caring enough about money, not providing for your loved ones, or not stewarding your career.

Friend, there will come a day when your honor is not dictated by the size of your bank balance, the newness of your car, or the title on your business card. There will be a time in each of our lives when we look as if a passing sparrow could cause our whole fence to collapse. There will be a time when your honor on earth is sapped. When our honor is on the line, if we abide in God and are obedient to him, then our God stands on that same line to defend our honor. We can come to our own defense, or we can say with the psalmist, “he alone… my salvation and my honor depend on God.”

Application

• What steps can you take to make God your honor-keeper?
  
  
  
• What will you do when you get to the line and it seems he is not there yet?

What was it that God might have said—what one thing—that would cause David to hear two? I believe what we are seeing here is faith-based implicational thinking. If A is true, then B and C must also be true. Put another way, ‘If God promises me X, then he must be Y and Z, otherwise he could not make the promise.’ It is good to hang onto God’s promises, but it is a deeper thing to hang onto the God behind the promises.

David was not in good shape, it seems, and his enemies were out to cause him to crumble. While he admitted his condition (I am a leaning wall) he didn’t start with himself. He chose to start with God whom he describes this way: “He alone is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress…” He does the Math this way: ‘God is my fortress + I am a leaning wall = I will never be shaken.’ That is a pretty awesome reality! The formula is pretty simple: God + anything of us = Enough. In fact, God on his own is enough, but God + me is enough for me.

One thing God has spoken,

       two things have I heard:

                  that you, O God, are strong,

                         and that you, O Lord, are loving.

I suspect that the word God spoke to David—the “one thing God has spoken”—was the following: ‘You, David, will never be shaken.’ David must have pondered that assurance because he concludes that the God who says this must be strong… stronger than the mess around me, stronger than my enemies, stronger than my circumstances, and stronger than me. If I will never be shaken, then God must be unshakeable. “ that you, O God, are strong”

But why would a strong God want me to never be shaken? This leads David to his second conclusion: “You, O Lord, are loving.” The bottom line is this: we are safe in God. The top line is therefore that he must be strong, and he must be loving.

Application

• When God says, “You are OK with me” do you tend to believe it, or question it?
  
  
• How can you train your mind to ascribe the good implications of things to God?

Have you ever noticed how unhappy people think too much? You could make a case, I suppose, that they are not thinking enough and so they do stupid things and this leads to them being unhappy. But I am thinking about smart, lots-going-for-them people who over-think, and are unhappy. What could be happening here?

• Too much time on their hands is my first guess: “He sledom reflects on the days of his life.” When you are unemployed, between careers, or just making more time for yourself there is a tendency to fill your midnspace with you, yourself, and the big “I” - and it is not healthy.  “Lose your life and you find it.”
• Too much focus on themselves: the thinking goes, “I have been so busy at work these past few years that now I need time for myself.”  Killing yourself at work for 14 hours a day will, of course, wear you down, and scaling back to normal, whatever that is, can help restore sanity.  But unstructured sabbaticals, which can often become meanderig pamper-trails, do not necessarily lead to “gladness of heart.”
• The spiral effect:  I don’t know too many people who get up in the morning and say, “I want to hang out with some unhappy people!”  So, happy people generally avoid unhappy people.  The nicely-mature-spritual happy people will “visit” unhappy people for a while, but it is generally not the chosen activity for the day.  So the consistently miserable find the other miserable folks, and they take some comfort in each other’s misery.  When one of them breaks out of the spiral…guess what?  They leave the Unhappy Club.  The unhappy left-behinds are then unhappy with them and they drift apart.

Solomon was no dummy, and he was the one who made the observation. The reality is that sitting around thinking about what could make you happy is not the road to happiness. I believe a key phrase to being happy is this: “God keeps him occupied.”

So what are we to do? The backplane in your mind should not have the graffiti “How can I be happy?” sprayed on it. The backdrop of our thinking should be more along the lines of “How can I be busy serving God and blessing others today? And how can I take pleasure in the small joys, such as crossing something off my To Do list, or feeling the sunshine on my face, or tidying my desk, or holding the chubby hand of a child?” Whatever you do, don’t think too much.

He seldom reflects on the days of his life, because God keeps him occupied with gladness of heart. Ecclesiastes 5:20

Application

• Who keeps you occupied: your job, yourself, or your God?
• Have you found your time, your space, your job, your apartment, your soul-mate… but lost your joy?
• Are you spending too much time thinking and not enough time doing?

We sat at lunch one day with a team from our office. It was a farewell meal for an intern who had joined us for three or four months. He was a very likeable chap, had a bright mind, and was a genuinely nice guy. For our part, we had put him in tasteful accommodations, given him a car to drive, had him participate in some interesting projects, and given him exposure to life in Silicon Valley when all was well in Dot.com land. So at the end of it all my wife asked, “What did you learn from your time with us?” His answer caused more than one person to nearly choke on their Chinese food: “I don’t like maintenance.” That was it. The grand conclusion from the twenty year old on what he had learned from his work stint: maintenance sucks.

The first to respond was our Information Technology manager (who, incidentally, spent most of his day maintaining other people’s computers). He gently explained how he had married an older woman who already had a child and was, no surprise, grown up. He, on the other hand, came straight from home and his mom was still picking up his dirty laundry and cooking all his meals. There were some tough consequences of not having learned the basics of maintenance.

Others around the table piled on so much maintenance advice that the young intern was quickly regretting his what now seemed less-than-astute observation.

Finally I said to him, “God is a maintainer.” Every day forgives our sin, cleans up after us, renews the cells in our body, causes the sun to rise, sends rain, filters our dirty air and refreshes our spirits. If we want to get into God’s business we need to remember that God is not just an Architect, he is also running Maintenance.

We are staying in a rental house and every day I try to do something for the house. It is an opportunity to grow in stewardship, a way to reflect the character of God-the-maintainer. Left to itself, a house falls apart. Left to ourselves, we fall apart. Don’t wait for some glamorous job to come along: volunteer for maintenance. Is it not ego that says, ‘My skills are so special that I will only do thus and so’?

The new and exciting probably doesn’t get a better reward than the faithful plodding. Cleaning up gets as much kudos as building up. Finally, remember that lack of maintenance will result in a leaky roof and damage to the whole structure. Not sure what grand thing to do with your life? Take care of the maintenance and the big ideas will follow.

If a man is lazy, the rafters sag;
if his hands are idle, the house leaks. Ecclesiastes 10:18

Application

• Are you avoiding maintenance?
• Do you start new things at the expense of the “old” not getting done?
• Have you limited your sphere of influence in the kingdom by being unwilling to do small jobs?

When God drives up at a gathering he can arrive in whatever car he chooses. When God decides to show us a small piece of Who he is, he gets to decide the terms. If he wants to come with thunder and lightning, that is his choice. If he wants to come with some trumpet and fanfare… he can do it! If he wants to be in a still, small voice, the whisper of a child or the guise of a beggar: any of these are options for God. When God delivers a message, he can add whatever packaging he wants to add and it reinforces rather than invalidates the message. John the Baptist’s packaging was different than the Magi. The writing on the wall was different than the plagues in Egypt. Which was right and which was “unbiblical”? Who of us gets to dictate to God how he may or may not manifest his presence? We get so overly righteous assessing whether something was or was not God that we throw the baby out with the bath water. If there is some harmful, clearly devious evidence of a spiritual world that is not God, then weigh it, judge it and avoid it. But if God is wrapping his word in a tangible expression of his presence, don’t stay at a distance.

In the past year we saw God’s presence in ways that were, for us at least, unusual. (At least they start off as unusual.) Someone becomes aware of angels in a room so that what we have sung for decades—“and I know that there are angels all around” —takes on a whole new meaning. Another actually sees angels. What appears to be a fine gold dust appears on one’s face, hands, or clothing. A colleague was moving house and opened the trunk of her car to see a pile of “gold dust”—she called others over to witness it and to take a photo. The laptop on which I am typing was brand new with a mat black finish: now only the topside has a fine spray of gold dust, and it has been that way since April when I was at a conference at Bethel Church in Redding, CA, sitting in the lobby doing emails… when I closed my laptop I noticed the gold. Many have verified that they see it too.

The people said, “This is out of our comfort zone!” and Moses said:

Do not be afraid. God has come to test you, so that the fear of God will be with you to keep you from sinning. Exodus 20:20

Let’s remember the context. God had just delivered The 10 Commandments. The people desperately needed an experience of the supernatural presence of God if they were to comprehend and walk out the heart of these weighty commandments. Instead of saying, “Give us more of your presence or we can never handle these commandments” they said, “We don’t want to deal with the spooky stuff that is outside our comfort zone.”  Yet the manifestation of God’s presence is often proportional to the assignment at hand. God doesn’t dish out jobs without offering to be present in whatever way fits the situation, from trumpets to silence. Don’t run from the smoke and lightning and thunder and trumpets when they may be just what you need to carry out the instruction of God.

The people remained at a distance while Moses approached the thick darkness where God was. Exodus 20:21

Asaph was a writer of popular songs, a lyricist in his day. Just because he was a popular religious artist didn’t mean that he escaped the bad day syndrome. He was in a funk, and he points out why. “For I envied the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.” You might have lost your job while someone you know was promoted. You might be taking steps of faith while others are looking after themselves, and they seem to be doing better financially. You may be hemmed in by limits, while others have no limits. What do you do? What do you say? Much has been said about the pivotal verse in this psalm, which is verse 17: “till I entered the sanctuary of God; then I understood their final destiny.” What I want us to see this time is the key principle that allowed Asaph to even see this truth. It has to do with what he allowed to come out of his mouth.

You may say, ‘I am just being honest… I am not in a funk.’ Being honest is good, but there is a difference between being honest and speaking words that betray you, others, and the next generation.

God is under no obligation to woo me out of a funk. I also have some responsibility. We have, in particular, a responsibility to avoid recession speak. Grumbling is the cement that keeps the stones of discontent locked in our foundations. Praise is the mortar that holds the bricks of the future together.

If I had said, “I will speak thus,” I would have betrayed your children. Psalm 73:15

Application

• What are you allowing to come out of your mouth?
• If you are struggling with what wants to come out of your mouth, have you checked your filter to see if it is still saying “God is good, all the time”?
• Where are you looking for perspective: the media, or God?

I mentioned before that ‘We will not do what we are made to do until we know what has been done for us to make us who we are.’ Once we have soaked in the grace of God then we are ready to do the work of God.

What is the work of God? Rather than choose the standard list from the gospels—heal the sick, set the captives free, preach the kingdom, disciple nations—let’s look at some of the items that follow in Ephesians.

• Remembering. You were separated, and what that separation meant, “without hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus…” Our problem is that we forget, so we take things for granted, and we get into ruts. Remembering keeps us on the trajectory of freedom and keeps us from the dullness of fake familiarity. Remember the miracles
• Living at peace with the rest of the Body of Christ. “His purpose was to create in himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace…” We don’t make ourselves greater by comparison, but by unity.
• Being sons and daughters, “members of God’s household” – we do our best work when we feel part of the family.
• Staying grounded. “…built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself the chief cornerstone…as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to God’s holy apostles and prophets.” The gifts to the Church—apostles and prophets—extend beyond one household to cities and nations at large. Local churches, congregations, small groups, house churches etc. will do better when connected to the foundation.
• Hosting the Holy Spirit. “to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.” This is an awesome “work” – to individually and collectively be the new place where the Almighty God dwells.
• Displaying the billboard. “His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realm.” God wants us to be a boldfaced declaration, a neon-lights announcement of his wisdom and mysteries.
• Approaching God with freedom and confidence. “In him and through faith in him we may approach God with freedom and confidence.”
• Being rooted and established in love. “And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love…grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ.”

These things may not sound like work to you. There is, to be sure, lots of other instruction in Scripture about what we are to do for work. If we start with this list we will work with God rather than for God. Our view of God will be as Father, not a hard task master. And the result will be exponential output.

“Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us…”

There is exponential output when we work form a place of secure identity.

When we lose something, particularly something as big as our livelihood, we think we have lost everything. This can easily lead to inactivity and economic passivity. Hard economic times are nothing new. There were recessions in Bible times, and key characters in Scripture lost their jobs. What can we learn from them about what to keep when you lose your job?

1. Joseph—Keep perspective

You may not be blessing the person who fired you right now, but remember that God is sovereign. Joseph said to his siblings, “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.” Genesis 50:20

2. Samuel—Keep praying

He was an advisor to a king, the transition prophet who installed Saul. When Saul lost his job Samuel did not stop his. “Moreover as for me, God forbid that I should sin against the LORD in ceasing to pray for you.” 1 Samuel 12:23

3. Elijah—Keep resting

Give yourself downtime between your last job and your next exploit. 1 Kings 17:3 “Leave here…and hide at the Kerith Ravine…I have ordered ravens to feed you there.” God had a recipe for Elijah—eat and sleep.

4. Elijah—Keep open

So he did what the LORD had told him. He went to the Kerith Ravine, east of the Jordan, and stayed there. The ravens brought him bread and meat in the morning and bread and meat in the evening, and he drank from the brook.” God may want to provide in a very different way, so don’t chase away God’s provision, even if ravens are not your favorite birds.

5. Shadrach, et al—Keep true

Stick by what you know is right, even if the reason for your lay-off was wrong. “O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and he will rescue us from your hand, O king. But even if he does not, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.” Daniel 3:16-18

6. David—Keep community

You don’t always get to choose your community when you are out of work, but you can choose to be in community. “David left Gath and escaped to the cave of Adullam. When his brothers and his father’s household heard about it, they went down to him there. All those who were in distress or in debt or discontented gathered around him, and he became their leader. About four hundred men were with him.” 1 Samuel 22:1, 2

7. Paul & Silas—Keep praising

The great church planter was in the slammer—that could interrupt a career. It reminds me of our of our rēp clients who was put in jail. After five months he told us, “Stop praying that I will get out prison—I now have a church of 340 people in prison.” In Acts 16:25 we read, “About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them.” Keep singing.

8. Joseph—Keep working

The signature on his paycheck shifted from Potiphar to Prison Warden, but it did not stop Joseph’s work. He had favor, and eventually he was running the prison. “So the warden put Joseph in charge of all those held in the prison, and he was made responsible for all that was done there.” Genesis 39:22 God is not a big fan of self-pity or idleness. Find some work, even if you don’t get paid for it. Busy people get given jobs…use this time to serve, not to self-indulge.

9. Timothy—Keep hoping

“Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment.” Paul gave this advice to Timothy in 1 Tim 6:17. Hope…but hope in the right things.

10. Elijah—Keep moving

1 Kings 17:7 Some time later the brook dried up because there had been no rain in the land. 8 Then the word of the LORD came to him: 9 “Go at once to Zarephath of Sidon and stay there. I have commanded a widow in that place to supply you with food.” We need to know when to rest, and when to move. When God says ‘the move is on’ then be willing to move. Taking a new job might be exactly what he has in mind, even if it means moving to a new city.

I do not know which of these is harder for you—trusting for finances, staying positive, working even when there is no paycheck, staying true to your God and your calling, keeping connected even when you don’t feel worthy of community…each of us is different. We do know, however, that unemployed people should not be idle. This lengthy quote from the working person’s epistle sums it up.

Now we ask you, brothers, to respect those who work hard among you, who are over you in the Lord and who admonish you. Hold them in the highest regard in love because of their work. Live in peace with each other. And we urge you, brothers, warn those who are idle, encourage the timid, help the weak, be patient with everyone. Make sure that nobody pays back wrong for wrong, but always try to be kind to each other and to everyone else. Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. Do not put out the Spirit’s fire; do not treat prophecies with contempt. Test everything. Hold on to the good. Avoid every kind of evil. 1 Thessalonians 5:12-22