New Thoughts (10/2/05-10/7/05)
One simple question that I have about this particular passage is why John tells us that the woman left her waterpot. If it was supposed to indicate a sense of urgency about her, would he not have used a different word to describe her departure towards the city. She went. It is not said that she hurried, or rushed away, or any such description. So, why is the waterpot interesting?
Perhaps it is indicative of her state of mind as she left. Yet, before we can really come to grips with that, we need to try and understand why she left at all. Jesus’ disciples had returned. They said nothing about this situation in which they found their Teacher. Yet, once can easily imagine the expressions on their faces. Some would register surprise, perhaps a hint of disappointment at this lapse of propriety in their Rabbi. Some may have cast a disparaging look upon this woman who was willing to shame herself in conversation with a stranger. Unwilling to cast blame upon Jesus, they would blame this one who was presenting Him with temptation, so far as they could see.
These looks, if indeed they were present, would not be lost on this woman. She was long used to such looks from those who knew her. It was one of two looks she was most accustomed to. There were the looks of reproach and the looks of lust. What had intrigued her about Jesus was not least that He looked upon her with neither of these two attitudes, though He clearly knew her story. It seems probable, then, that having had this brief respite from a rather punishing life, the hurt was greater for her when see saw their looks. Normally, she would have been on guard, hardened against that particular sorrow, but she had just been enjoying open, respectful conversation with this Man, and now all the hurt of life was piling in again. She simply had to get away from it.
This is one alternative, at any rate, for explaining her state of mind. In such a state, it would be easy to understand why she left that jug behind. She had set it down as they talked, as would most any person. In her anxious desire to be away from those accusing glances, she forgot the reason she had come all this way. That in itself gives us an idea of how thoroughly shaken she must have been. Why, when Jesus had offered her the drink to end all thirst, she had still been so focused on her mission that all she could hear in those words was an end to the need to come to this well. Now, she had forgotten why she had come here in the first place!
Alternatively, we could suppose that her excitement at finally understanding Who she was talking to had left her so thoroughly excited that she would have run back to the city anyway. Yet, were that the whole of it, I would expect all the more to read that she was running up to the city, much as the shepherds had run through Bethlehem after meeting Jesus at His birth. This is the excitement one sees in those who have encountered Him, the inability to contain the joy that has suddenly found them out. But, that is getting ahead of myself a little bit.
The particular combination that John gives us in describing her departure really does seem to suggest that the first explanation is the better fit. She is not excitedly running off to tell the world about Messiah. That doesn’t hit her until later. Her immediate concern has been to restore those emotional walls by which she has been protecting herself. The hurts are starting to come in again, and in her pursuit of emotional safety, she knows she must get away from these new strangers. That insistent tug of the emotions so consumes her immediate thoughts that the jug lies forgotten as she leaves. Mixed with the need to guard her heart from the hurtful barbs of her conscience is a need to preserve a bit of pride. It has always been thus with her. She will not be hurt by these men, neither will she allow them the satisfaction of thinking they have shamed her into leaving. She is leaving, but at a regular pace, as though it were merest coincidence that they came as she was leaving. Of course, the forgotten jug will put the lie to all that posturing.
Indeed, that may be the biggest reason John has for mentioning the jug. It is not to tell us about this woman, but more to tell us how the disciples were likely to understand the scene they stumbled upon. Had she merely been leaving with her waterpot filled, they might have written off the whole thing to coincidence. An odd hour to be at the well, perhaps, and an odd well to be at, but who knows? It would have seemed innocent enough, one supposes. But, that she should leave just as they arrive, and that she should leave without the water she came for, well what were these young men to think, after all? They try not to bring this up. How could they have such suspicions about this obviously holy Man? Yet, the suspicions won’t just die away. They turn to mundanities. “Here, Rabbi, have some lunch.” But, when He replies in words that lead them to think He has already eaten, what’s left to think? Clearly, He has not only sat at this well with this married woman, but He has shared a meal with her! Where else would He have found food? They obviously hadn’t given it to Him.
Oh, this was just too shocking! All this hiking through the Samaritan lands, where no self-respecting Jew was likely to go, just so He could have a tryst with this woman. And, how could they not be touched by His shame, who had trusted Him and followed Him on this trail? How would they ever live down their foolishness?
Jesus has fully understood the underlying reason for their concern. It is not really concern as to whether or not He has eaten, but what He has eaten, and from whose hands. At first, I was inclined to think their wonder at who had brought Him food was a sign of jealousy amongst them, but that really doesn’t seem to be the issue. This is one of those rare times when I find myself preferring the NIV on the matter, for it phrases their question along the lines of ‘could it be that somebody else brought Him food?’ And, with that understanding, the point of their concerns becomes clear. For, as it could not have been one of themselves who had somehow gotten food to Jesus, the logical conclusion was that this woman who had departed so abruptly at their return must surely have done so. This could only mean, so far as they were concerned, that the food Jesus says He has had to eat was unclean, coming as it did from a Samaritan.
It is because if this, I imagine that Jesus changes His wording ever so slightly. When first He told them He had food, He said He had broosin, something that He could eat. Now, sensing that He needs to clear away their concerns, He changes to speaking of His brooma. Why the change? Well, because by speaking of His brooma, He brings a subtle accent on the fact that what He has eaten is ceremonially clean and Levitically acceptable. There has been no defilement of the temple of His body, for He has not been speaking of anything so mundane as breads and lunch meats. Rather, it seems what we witness in His work at the well is akin to the adage that says that what God asks of us He equips us for. It is in keeping with the understanding that the work we do for the will of the Father is not such as will burn us out or wear us down. No! It is the very stuff that sustains us!
Now, I hadn’t really thought to go in this direction, but I am coming off of two days of serving to support Jason Upton’s visit to our church. This was an awesome event, and I was truly blessed by the earnestness and honesty of the words he had to speak to our area. It was not – at least not in all parts – a pleasant message to hear, as men measure pleasantness, but it was a necessary and true message. It really struck a chord with me, given last week’s studies no what true worship was all about. However, at present my thought is not so much on the content of all that was said to us. That is something that needs more meditation than I can presently bring to bear. Rather, in connection to this current thought about Jesus, what strikes me is that preserving of strength that belongs to His laborers.
This team had flown in from ministry in some other place, spent the afternoon Saturday discovering and fixing any number of issues with our sound system of which we were only aware in part, and proceeded directly from there into three services across two days that were truly a blessing. Late last night, after the close of the last event, we tore down everything that they had installed, packed it back into their cases, and escorted them back to the hotel from whence they will sally forth this morning to head for the next place of ministry. Now, I won’t lie to you and say nobody even looked tired. I know for certain I did, and I was only helping for the two days of their visit. I can only begin to imagine the strains on them. Yet, their strength did not run out, and their ability to minister was unabated. God does indeed preserve the strength of His servants. Indeed, He tends to prefer them to be in weakness so His strength can be seen more clearly.
I must note that in spite of the tiredness I felt by day’s end yesterday, approaching sleep with a proper frame of reference last night proved most challenging. Yet, this morning I find myself awakened quite as normal at a normal hour. I cannot say that I feel as fresh as if I had been relaxing all weekend, but I do not feel nearly as exhausted as I might reasonably expect to. In this I find a certain reassurance that my labors have not been a matter of pride and vanity, even if such attitudes have inevitably marred the effort. Oh, that perfectionist attitude! How frustrated I get that we have yet again caused these folks more work, more anxiousness, than was at all necessary because we couldn’t be bothered to do it right. Gagh! Yes, my thoughts and emotions can make a mess of things at the best of times, yet I am comforted that my Father is pleased that I did my best for His laborers. I am comforted in knowing by the evidence of my morning that the works of the last evenings were not strivings after the wind, but doing that for which He has called me in this particular time and place.
Now I come to an interesting contrast in the reactions of people. At the opening of this part of the story, we see the disciples returning. They find their teacher alone with an unknown woman by the well, talking, and they are concerned, shocked, offended even. They know nothing about this woman except that she is a Samaritan, and possibly that she presents herself as a married woman. Now, let’s be clear on this: nothing illicit, immoral or sinful has transpired here. We have had the benefit of bearing witness to what they had not witnessed. Unlike the disciples, we have not just stumbled upon this scene, we have watched it unfold. They are offended by what they do not know, but the men of the city, when they hear this woman’s story, remain unoffended by this woman they do know!
Well could we ask why she went to these men in the first place, for they had been nothing but pain and insult to her in the past. However, before I turn to that consideration I would ask why these men were willing to listen to her. They knew her past. They understood full well why she was down at that well at that hour. She had much reason to hide herself away from society, so far as society was concerned. Yet, they listened to her tale. What should we make of this? They knew her reputation, after all. They would not be seen alone with her, lest they join her as fodder for the rumor mills.
It occurs to me, this morning, that they were also well aware of the great lengths she went to simply to avoid contact with them, to avoid hearing their insults and innuendos. That she was now coming directly to them must have given even greater weight to her words. This woman, who had spent so much energy hiding the truth of her existence from herself now came to them and exposed to them all that had been exposed to her. “He told me everything I had ever done,” she told them. Do you know what caused them to investigate her story? It was the very fact that she would come and tell them. It was the fact that this woman who had worked so hard to hide her shame would now come and shout of her shame and of Him who had forced her to face it. Something had changed, and they would see the cause of this change. Her words, in effect, meant nothing to them. It was the evidence given by her very presence in their midst that carried weight.
I need to revisit something in that last paragraph. She had worked so hard to hide her shame. Do you know, this is exactly our problem. This is what we do with our sin. We don’t try and overcome those sins that refuse to leave us, we simply try to hide the shame. It is reminiscent of Israel in defeat. They ran and hid away in the wilderness and in the caves, waiting for the trouble to pass. Then they would come out and go on about their activities just as they had before. They wouldn’t stop to think about why the enemy was being handed this victory. They wouldn’t consider what God was getting at, in allowing this to pass. They wouldn’t face their sin. They would just hide it away until they were pretty sure nobody was watching any longer. They would find a secret place.
God calls us to come away to a secret place, where we can meet with Him away from the prying eyes of strangers. He calls us away to that secret place so that with Him we can face our sins, work out our righteousness in fear and trembling. He calls us to that secret place so that the shame we must face in ourselves need not be a public spectacle. We must face that shame, but He never said it needed to be a case of public humiliation. Not at all. We are privileged to undergo that purifying confession in privacy, one to one with our Father. Our brothers and sisters do not need to know what we have done, though we may, like this woman, find that after facing the Truth, we wish to shout about what is no longer. It is dealt with in that moment. It is past. It has no presence in us any longer. We reach the place where we truly can confess to what we were, because all we see is the opportunity to glorify that One who has made us what we now are.
Suddenly, it’s not about the sin we used to wallow in. It’s all about Jesus. It’s not about our shattered and repaired reputations. It’s all about Jesus. It’s not about what He’s done for me, it’s the very fact that He did it. It’s all about Jesus. This is what changed for this woman as she returned to the city. All her concern for her reputation fled away from her. She had faced that fact that she really had no reputation worth protecting anyway. She had faced the Truth, and the Truth had set her free. Yes, she had done all these things. Yes, there remained a few of them that needed to be put away from her even this day, but it was over. It wasn’t about her anymore, it was about that One who had told her about herself.
Now, these men could have claimed as much, couldn’t they? They, too, had told her about herself. They had pointed her out as she passed, and laughed with their friends over what such a woman was like. They had told her who she was by their rejection of her, by pushing her into that place where she would push all society away from her. She would remain in her sins because her sins were the only company left her. Everywhere else, she had nothing but rejection and ridicule. It took this Jesus to recognize the woman behind those sins, to acknowledge that even in this fallen state, she was worthy of respect for she was yet made in the image of God. Somewhere that truth had been lost to God’s people, and it needed to be re-established.
God hates sin. There can be no doubting that. He cannot abide sin, will no so much as look upon it. However, He is not pleased to punish the sinner for those sins. His just nature requires that punishment be given for the breach of His perfect law. His just nature does not require that He enjoy doing so. If He was pleased to punish sin, there would be no cause for the Christ. But, God is also merciful. He is wrathful, He is jealous, but He is also love. In Him these things are in perfect balance, for they are in Him in perfect wholeness. When He looked upon this woman, He burned with anger against the sin that had so consumed her life that she had come to this. Yet, He did not ridicule the woman for having been caught up in it. He did not shame her in such a way that she felt belittled and hopeless. No, He simply forced her to set aside her self-deceptions and face facts.
She was exposed to the Light and the darkness in her was forced to flee away. The darkness of a mind self-deceived, the darkness of this lonely existence in the downward spiral, the darkness of hopelessness; all these could no longer maintain themselves in the Light of His gracious love. He didn’t look at her and say, “who are you kidding? You’re hopeless and you know it!” He looked at her and said, “OK, you haven’t really lied to me, yet you know as well as I that you run through men like the water you’ve come to fetch.” But, notice this: He hadn’t withdrawn the offer! The cup of living water was still extended to her for the taking. See, sin could be dealt with now, for He who could truly atone for that sin had come. Messiah was here, and hope was once and for all time real.
When she came back to the city, all her misguided concern for her reputation and for her emotions was cast aside in the excitement of knowing Christ. Why is this? When she left the well, it seems pretty clear that all those concerns were still intact. It shows in the fact of her leaving when the disciples returned. It shows in the fact that she left not running, but at a regular clip, so as to hold onto whatever dignity she could pretend to retain. It shows in the fact that as she worked to cling to that dignity, she was so caught up in the internal panic that she forgot her jug. It lay there next to the well like an accusing finger in the sight of those men, but she was flustered, and forgot about it.
Yet, when she has come to the city, all of that is gone. Her dignity is of no concern any longer. Why? Because somewhere between the well and the city she felt the weight of her sins lifted from her shoulders. Somewhere on that road, the work of Messiah was finished upon her, and she knew herself forgiven and free in that moment. It’s not so much that her past no longer mattered. It is simply that her future was suddenly assured. There really was forgiveness of sins! Oh, He had said it was time for worshipers to worship truly and completely, and as she walked up to the city, I think she was transformed into just such a worshiper. By the time she reached the gates of the city, all she could say to those proud men who sat in the gates, “Come and see for yourself this Messiah who rescued me!”
And what has happened to us? How long has it been since we were so excited about the rescue that we simply couldn’t help but tell everybody we met about our Rescuer? Do you see what could have happened? She could have looked at them, knowing that they were as much in their sins as she had been, and she could have gloated over her now superior position. This is what she had been playing at while at the well, and now she could play it in spades, but this urge was no longer in her. She didn’t need to prove anything any more than she needed to deny anything. Yes, I did these things, but come see this Man. He has cared for my greatest need, and you who have been so proud as you compared yourselves to the likes of me, you still have that need. You need the rescue He alone can bring about. Come, see Him. Come be rescued.
Come out of hiding, and lay hold of that victory that is in God. The enemy need no longer ride over you. It is time for us to turn back to our God and be restored into His good pleasures. The armies of the enemy need not gloat over our ravaged lands. He is yet our Mighty One. He is yet willing and able to stand up as a banner over our armies, and He is yet there to bring about victory for His people. If we will humble ourselves and pray…
Hear those words she speaks to these men! “Come and see! This man has got to be the Messiah we’ve waited for.” What has convinced her? Was it His knowledge of her past and her present? No, that only marked him as a prophet, not the Prophet. Was it His bluntly stating that He is indeed the Messiah? Well, I’m sure that got her attention, but it could as easily have marked Him a blasphemer or a madman as shown Him true. No, I think it was that sudden change in her future that she experienced as she climbed back up the hill. There had been a conversion experience for her, although that concept was not known at the time. The course of her life had been shifted out from under her, and she could plainly see that it had shifted for the better. It was the power that changed her, even from a distance that did more for her than anything He had said directly. Suddenly, she could join those who joyfully said, ‘taste the Living Waters and see that the Lord is good!’
Now, I marked out that declaration of hers as the key point of this whole passage, even though verse 34 is perhaps more of interest in discerning our Lord and Savior. While that remains true, this verse is more directly applicable to us. As much as I long to know my Christ more fully as He reveals Himself in these pages, I do well to recognize myself in those He meets, too. I do well to ask myself how much of this woman’s openly expressed change of belief I share. One doesn’t run through six men without developing a bit of skepticism. One doesn’t daily face the barbs of public ridicule without developing a pretty thick skin. But, when that something happened to her, all the self-protection and preservation of self-image fled away, and all she was concerned with was spreading the word about this Man who had changed her.
Somehow, it seems the excitement of Salvation faded in us, if we are not careful. I know it is thus with me. Perhaps it is because the change was so gradual in me. I don’t really recall a moment when suddenly I understood He was real. I remember a journey to that point. I also recognize that even from that point it took many years before I truly began to understand how much I had needed Him all along. It is said that we won’t seek rescue until we realize our danger. That is probably true as far as it goes. But, in this matter of eternity, God isn’t waiting for us to realize. The long road of understanding me and accepting Him was not long because I was seeking and He was elusive. It was long because He was talking to me, seeking me out, but I was ignoring Him, determined to go my own way.
But, I see I am avoiding the question. Where is that overwhelming need to tell others what He has done in me? I don’t really see it. I may dance around the edges of it, but I still have too much concern about the thoughts of others it seems.
How can this be, Lord? What is the seed of change, here? Can it really be that I just don’t care that much about their danger? How can that be a reflection of You in me? It can’t. Is my pride really worth more to me than their eternal security? Am I really so insecure still? Yes, I suppose in many ways I am aren’t I? Oh, God! I feel like one who has lost his first love, and it is, I know, reason to be gravely concerned. I know the dangers, the impossibility of a passionless relationship. I know that there are passions that still burn in me in our relationship, yet that absolute devotion seems lacking. Come, relight the fire in this life. I need to know passion for You once again, like I can remember feeling it before. I need to know that passion, Lord, that will once for all overcome my pride of image.
God, all this stuff I’ve been doing in service, what is it really worth in Your eyes? Who is being changed by it? Father, am I really serving Your interests, or am I doing nothing more than distracting myself from what You would really have me to do? How does it measure up with You? God! I don’t want to come before You only to find I’ve been doing my own will all along, never really having got the message. What a horror that would be! Yet, You have put that warning out, that many will be found in just that situation – a lifetime spent deluding themselves. I’m not interested in deluding myself, Holy One. If that is what I have done, I pray You open my eyes to Your Truth.
Am I still in need of that encounter with Truth, after all these years? Am I so caught up with my own understanding of Scripture that I can find no error in myself? No, I don’t think that’s the case, really, yet I know I can become overly pleased with ‘my’ discoveries. Oh, Holy Spirit, teach me to walk fully in that way that You desire: humbly, loving righteousness, doing justice. Bring me, push me if need be, to that place of finding the accomplishment of Your will for me to be the most satisfying of foods.
Though I pray to be one who accomplishes God’s will for me, I must at the same time recognize that God’s will has already been fully accomplished. It was accomplished by the Godhead Himself, having dwelt among men bodily in the person of the Son. See through the pages of Scripture how this unfolds before the eyes of man! The purpose of God upon the earth can be heard there at the expulsion of our parents from the garden. “I will cause you and the woman to hate one another. The spawn of the devil and the sons of man will ever be enemies, and in the end the Son of man shall crush your head, though you shall have snapped down upon His heel” (Ge 3:14). Again, as Moses led Israel out of the desert, the promise was reinforced. “God will raise up a prophet like me once again. He will raise up a prophet from amongst yourselves, to whom you must listen” (Dt 18:15). Yes, and God confirmed the words of Moses. “I will raise up this Prophet, and He shall speak what I tell Him to speak, and He shall speak it all. I will require the just punishment of any who do not heed My words as He speaks them” (Dt 18:18-19).
Through long years, it seemed the Promised One was not coming. The people of God were inclined to lose hope, though in their foolishness and blindness, they would not look to themselves for the reason. They thought God had gone off and forgotten them, that perhaps they should have chosen a more local deity to honor. After all, He had had long centuries in which to bring this Prophet, and where was He? Oh, there were indeed prophets in Israel, both true and false, but the Prophet like Moses was not to be found even in the best of them. Into this drifting people, God spoke words of assurance through Isaiah. “Remember this, and be assured,” He cried out. “Remember this, you sinners. Forget not your legacy, for I AM. There is no other God. I have declared the end from the beginning. I have told you that My purpose will be established because I Myself will accomplish all that I please…I have planned it, and I WILL DO IT!” (Isa 46:8-11).
Now, we come to this moment in Samaria, and we hear the Promised One, the Prophet like Moses, declaring what is transpiring in Himself. “My food is to fully complete the work of God, to do to the uttermost the will of the Father who sent Me for that purpose” (v34). Now, notice this: How did Jesus introduce this thought? The disciples wanted Him to eat, but He declined saying in effect that He had already eaten (v32). Understand, then, that Jesus did not come simply to move the plan of God forward a bit. This might have been said of any number of God’s servants from Adam right through to this day we live in, although in that context, we should have to change our understanding of what we mean by the will of God somewhat. But, Jesus makes it clear as crystal here. “I do His will completely. I am sustained by fully and perfectly completing every aspect of the work He has done in creation.”
Well and good, you may say, but the desire of Jesus to do such a deed is no assurance that He did it. We all know that old adage about the best laid plans. Indeed, we know Jesus’ own teaching on the audacity of thinking you can assure yourself of tomorrow’s activities. Yes, but we have not only Jesus’ declaration of what He would do. We have also His declaration of what He did do. Come! Look forward to the end of the story, and we shall find Jesus and His Father talking. We shall find Him reviewing what He has done in the course of ministry. What is it we read? “I glorified You here on earth, Father.” How so? “I glorified You by perfectly completing the work You gave Me to do” (Jn 17:4). What was that work? To do His will completely. Now notice, when Jesus laid out His mission, He did not so restrict the idea of God’s will. His food was not to do all that God had in mind for Him to do. His food was to do all that God had in mind period, without exception and without limit. See, to do all of God’s will was God’s will for Him.
There is a distinction to be made here, and hopefully we can see it. There is God’s will for you, and God’s will for me. Then, there is God’s will as a whole, in its entirety. We cannot possibly consider these as one and the same thing. God’s specific plan and purpose for your life is not going to coincide perfectly with His specific plan and purpose for my life. He who created us each uniquely, has created us each with a unique purpose. We have this in common, though. Our purpose is to satisfy the purpose for which we were created. The utmost goal of each of our lives, then, is the same, but the details of what is entailed in that utmost goal is assuredly not the same. Were every man made with the same purpose then we should have the same purpose as did the Christ Jesus when He walked the earth. We must each have that purpose of completing God’s work, and offering ourselves as the substitutionary sacrifice for all of mankind. But, if we are all designed for that purpose, who is left to stand in for? If we are all of one detailed purpose with Christ, what reason remains for His having come amongst us?
No, we are each provided with a distinct purpose, designed particularly for us as we were created particularly to satisfy that purpose. And, God declares that the purposes for which we were created were determined and set on their course long before we were born! Yet, in our distinctiveness, there remains the overarching, uniting Purpose of God. There remains the Will of God of which the will of God for Jeff, the will of God for Jesus, and the will of God for you are subjoined details. Here is the fundamental difference between the Will of God and God’s will for so and so: The Will of God has been perfectly completed! Jesus accomplished it, thereby fulfilling the prophecy of God. “I have planned it and I WILL DO IT”, sayeth the Lord. And a short time later, as eternity is measured, He concludes what He began to say with those words by saying, “It is finished!” (Jn 17:4). All God’s good pleasure was accomplished as Jesus, God incarnate, completed the purpose of His earthly life. In that moment was the serpent crushed. Oh, we see the writhing of his dying body even today, and must yet take care lest we are harmed by his lashing about. But, the battle is already over, and the work completed. Jesus came to finish the job, and He did so!
As worked up as we get about doing great things for God, as worked up as we get about the obvious presence of great evils in the world, we must retain this truth within us: It is finished! Only Jesus could declare this to be true, for only Jesus had the power to do all God’s will. It is upon that completed work of His that we depend for our salvation. It is on the basis of that completed work that we can hope to face the final tribunal in the courts of heaven. Jesus, alone amongst men, could complete all God’s will. However, each one of us has it in his power to complete all God’s will for us, personally.
Indeed, we might consider the very definition of sin to be not completing what God has willed for us. Sin is, after all, missing the mark, and the mark for us is all that God purposes to see accomplished in us. Insofar, then, as we fail to accomplish what we came for, we miss the mark, and we must acknowledge this as sin. We must also be ever mindful that God’s particular will for us is not necessarily going to coincide precisely with His will for the next man. There are certain characteristics that will be common to all as His will applies to them, for His particular will for each man is of a piece with His Perfect Will completed in Christ. Yet, the details, the specific acts He has in your plan are not the same as are in mine.
We have a habit of wanting everybody to be as absorbed with our particular purpose as we are. If we are called to missions, we tend to think everybody should be. If we are called to study, we tend to think that the most important thing for a Christian. If we are called to exceeding great prayer, we think everybody should be making such prayer their priority. Whatever He has called us to in our specific role within the charter of His kingdom, our strong inclination is to try and get everybody else doing it, too. Yet, this is not what He has commanded, is it? What He has taught us is that we are all parts of one body, guided and motivated by one Holy Spirit. We each of us, as unique parts, have unique functions which other parts are not fit to perform. We are each of us called to perform our particular function in the kingdom, neither jealous of the next man’s function, nor pridefully requiring everybody else to come join us in ours.
It’s really not about the next man. It’s about you. It’s about me. God’s will for me is a matter between Him and me. It’s not a topic for bragging. If I am doing what is required of me by my Master, what cause is there in that for bragging? Neither is it my concern in any deep sense what He requires of you. I may rejoice with you as you fulfill your own purpose, and I can certainly enjoy your rejoicing over me fulfilling mine. It is the poison of pride and envy that cause us to get this so consistently wrong. It is pride over what we are doing for God, and envy over what He is giving you, and it is so very wrong! It is poison to our souls to allow this to continue.
God! Make plain to me the specifics of Your will for me today. Yes, I know that You have revealed Your will in the Word You gave, but it is a general will, and I am wondering, just now, about the particular things that You prepared for my doing today. So often, I have not noticed these things until it was too late, to my sorrow. So often, I have simply neglected to bother You with the question of what You would like done. Forgive that pride in me, Lord. Help me to know the balance point between willful ignorance of my need for You and the maturity You seek of me. If I have slipped over the line into willfulness, and I doubtless have, forgive me, I pray. But, more than that, I pray that You would cause that line to burn in my thoughts, lest I step over again. Hedge me in, oh Father, by the fires of Your holiness. Constrain my steps, oh God, that they may only pursue Your purposes, only walk where You say, ‘Go.’ Purify my heart more completely, oh, my Lord, to follow You alone. Let my will be found to be Yours in all things, for You are my God, and I am Your servant. So let it be found at the end of my days. Amen.
