Opportunity Knocking

“Therefore, whenever we have the opportunity, we should do good to everyone—especially to those in the family of faith.” – Galatians 6:10.

You have probably heard the name Peter Drucker. Peter Drucker was a management consultant, educator, and author, whose writings contributed to the philosophical and practical foundations of the modern business corporation. He once said that “Progress is obtained only by exploiting opportunities, not by solving problems. When you solve problems, all you do is guarantee a return to normalcy.” Now before you stop reading, let me say this: problem-solving is important, even crucial, but it is not always progress, it is usually returning us to here we started before we had the problem. Real progress usually comes from coupling opportunity with initiative.

I have never met anyway who did not miss at least one opportunity. The most common reason for missing opportunities is because we are overly cautious, or risk adverse and prefer a wait and see attitude. We choose to be a spectator. The problem with remaining on the sidelines is you cannot take advantage of the opportunities God gives you. We have the power to make a difference in other’s lives– it’s just a matter of getting off the sidelines and getting involved.

 In 2 Chronicles 15 we read the story of King Asa.  2 Chronicles 15:17 says, “Although the pagan shrines were not removed from Israel, Asa’s heart remained completely faithful throughout his life.” That is a very rare and difficult compliment to achieve from the Bible – yet Asa achieved it. But right in the next chapter we can see that Asa made some wrong decisions. 2 Chronicles 16:7 says “At that time Hanani the seer came to King Asa and told him, “Because you have put your trust in the king of Aram instead of in the LORD your God, you missed your chance to destroy the army of the king of Aram.”  The back story is that King Asa defeated a much bigger army with the help of God, but rather than go to God again when another problem arose, he turned to the king of Aram for help. Simply said, he “missed his chance.” He missed an opportunity.

Opportunities do not wait around for the overly cautious nor the slow to move. They must be seized. Opportunities are being presented to you on a daily basis. You will either seize them or you will let them slip by.  Many times the reason we let them slip by is because we are not interested in them. It’s work. “There is a wide-open door for a great work here, although many oppose me.” (1 Corinthians 16:9) The Amplified Bible says it this way, “For a wide door of opportunity for effectual service has opened to me there; one great and promising and many adversaries.”

Don’t let the fear of falling short deter you from trying. You will make mistakes. You will mess up. You may have to admit defeat. Keep going. Use them as opportunities to discover what doesn’t work, but always persevere. Because despite the risks and messiness of it all, my hope is we become fearless and dare to take the plunge, even when it means risking failure. Philippians 4:13 reminds us: “For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength.” 

Discussion Questions

  1. How do you define opportunity? 
  2. Was there a time when you felt that God wanted you to act and you failed to do so? How do you feel today about that lost opportunity? Did God use someone else to do His work?
  3. What are some of the promises of God that you can trust as you embrace the opportunities that God gives you? 

Does God Really Need Our Help?

“These are just the beginning of all that he does, merely a whisper of his power. Who, then, can comprehend the thunder of his power?” – Job 26:14. 

Does God need our help? In a word, no. We can’t even begin to comprehend the power of God. We have an omnipotent God. He has the ability and power to do anything. God’s power is unlimited.

The Bible says that the faith of any believer should not be founded in religious reasoning, but on the power of God: “And my message and my preaching were very plain. Rather than using clever and persuasive speeches, I relied only on the power of the Holy Spirit. I did this so you would trust not in human wisdom but in the power of God.” (1 Corinthians 2:4-5)  God does not need us, yet the Bible has numerous stories of how ordinary people participated in His purposes. In fact, God went to amazing lengths to include people in His purposes.

God rarely did anything by Himself. It would have been much easier for God to do everything on His own. Instead, he involved people in almost everything He did. God regularly turned spectators into participants. God did not afford people the luxury of sitting back and watching God do stuff. The Bible is full of examples.

Right from the start, God put Adam in the Garden of Eden and gave him a job: naming the animals. (Genesis 2:19) God could have named the animals Himself. But He chose to give Adam that assignment. When God wanted to get His people out of Egypt, He drafted Moses at the burning bush to pry the people away from Pharaoh. Moses dug his heels in and resisted taking on such a risky project. God persisted until Moses became a participant.  Why didn’t God simply give Goliath a heart attack? It would have been easier. But instead, God sent David into the valley to kill him with a slingshot. When Jesus wanted to start churches, He knocked Saul of Tarsus off his high horse on his way to Damascus and shaped Paul into a church-planting machine.

The list is endless. All through the Bible, God relentlessly involved people. He turned them from spectators into participants. God can use us if we choose to move from the sidelines into the game. It is simply being open to what God wants us to do. 

Discussion Questions:

  1. Why do you think God chose to involve people rather than simply doing everything Himself?
  2. Why do you think God designed for us to serve and give rather than simply consume?
  3. What is the biggest challenge in moving from a spectator to a participant?
  4. What can you do this week to get involved in the local church?

Why Does The Church Exist?

“So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” – Matthew 28:18–20.

Why does the Church exist? It’s a simple question, but do we know the answer? There are lots of good reasons, but for us at Northstar, it boils down to one idea — to see one more life touched, saved and transformed by the grace of God.   

C.S. Lewis had to this to say in Mere Christianity: “It is easy to think that the Church has a lot of different objects—education, buildings, missions, holding services … the Church exists for nothing else but to draw men into Christ, to make them little Christs. If they are not doing that, all the cathedrals, clergy, missions, sermons, even the Bible itself, are simply a waste of time. God became man for no other purpose. It is even doubtful, you know, whether the whole universe was created for any other purpose. It says in the Bible that the whole universe was made for Christ and that everything is to be gathered together in Him.”

But how do we ensure we will continue to draw people to Christ and make them “little Christs?” It is easy to default to the idea that making “little Christs” is the role of the church. But as I said in this week’s message, we are the church.  A church is a congregation of people united together in the love of Christ and devoted to His mission. We aren’t an audience every Sunday. Our responsibilities did not end the day we were saved. Each of us are an essential part of the church, and each of us have a job to do. We each have responsibilities.

First, each of us have a responsibility to serve God through His church. God created the church, and He owns it. The church is the body of Christ. As His body, we are responsible for being good stewards of His body. Second, we have a responsibility to obey Christ and be His hands and feet in our world. Our neighbors cannot see our faith, but they can see our works. They can’t see our love for God, but they can see whether God is glorified in our lives.

If Lewis is right that “the Church exists for nothing else but to draw men into Christ, to make them little Christs,” that has to be the sole focus of our journey and the mission of Northstar. We can have the best intentions, but without the involvement of church members and regular attenders, we will never achieve our mission. 

That is why the church exists.

Discussion Question:

  1. Why do you think the church exists? How do I fit into the church? What do I contribute?
  2. What does it mean to make little Christs?
  3. Pray for Northstar that we will make “little Christs” each week?

A Mission To Make A Difference

“And don’t forget to do good and to share with those in need. These are the sacrifices that please God.” – Hebrews 13:16

The gospel is about life and transformation. When we accept Jesus as Lord and Savior, we are transformed and have the power to transform the world in which we live. The amazing mystery of God is that He has chosen to fulfill His plan through His Church –  ordinary people who can do extraordinary things through the power of God. “We now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure. This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves.” (2 Corinthians 4:7)

God is looking for people who will make a difference in His kingdom. He is not looking for those who have wealth, He is not looking for those who have dynamic personalities, He is not looking for people with great social backgrounds. God is looking for people who He can use. He is looking for people that want to make a contribution.

To make a contribution means we cannot simply be spectators. The gospel of Jesus Christ should inspire us to take action, to get involved. I don’t think God ever intended the pews or chairs in church to be padded. Our lives should consist of a whole lot of action verbs like go, speak, pray, etc. But too often we leave things to God. 2 Timothy 1:7 says, “For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.”  God did not design us to be static or paralyzed.

In Luke 22:39-46, Jesus is spending hours in prayer. Something terrible was going to happen. Jesus knew it. In fact this is His final act, before He is arrested, tried, and put to death. “Father, if you are willing, please take this cup of suffering away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not mine….He prayed more fervently, and he was in such agony of spirit that his sweat fell to the ground like great drops of blood.” (Luke 22:42,44)  Soon the Son of God walked the rocky road to Calvary.

Jesus so loved the world that He did something. He made Himself nothing for us. He obeyed His Father and He went to the cross. It was no easy task. He was beaten and broken. He was crucified. This was the single greatest contribution in the history of the world. But what if Jesus prayed about going to the cross, but never went? What if churches opted to meet every Sunday, but never to take the gospel outside the walls? What if nobody volunteered to serve at church? What if parents only prayed their children would follow the Lord, but you never did anything to train them? 

Nothing much happens in any walk of life until somebody gets involved, until somebody makes a contribution.

Discussion Questions:

  1. How do you define getting involved? How do you define making contributions to the Kingdom?
  2. How much time do you typically invest in serving the church on a weekly/monthly basis?
  3. What area is God pushing you to serve in the church? 

Is Your Faith Big Enough To Share With Others?

“Instead, you must worship Christ as Lord of your life. And if someone asks about your hope as a believer, always be ready to explain it.” – 1 Peter 3:15.

The phrase, “sharing your faith” can bring up all kinds of emotions. It might trigger excitement and gratitude or nervousness and anxiety. We sometime have it in our minds that sharing our faith requires public speaking and extensive Biblical knowledge. And people are concerned that if they couple public speaking with Biblical knowledge, inevitably awkward conversations are going to occur. Sharing your faith may require you to step out of your comfort zones and yes, it may end up being awkward. But let me remind you of a few things to keep in mind as you consider when or how to share your faith with others.    

First, we need to remember it is only through the power of God that people are saved. It simply doesn’t happen through human effort or ability or knowledge. The bottom line is this: if people are not responding the way we want, we are not responsible, God is. That should help take some of the pressure off when we are concerned we are not saying the right things or when we don’t have enough Biblical knowledge.

Success in evangelism is measured not in the outcome, but in your obedience to the command of Christ. The story of Jesus and the rich young ruler in Matthew 19:16-30 is an example of this point. The young man approached Jesus, interested in hearing about how to get to heaven. You would think that any encounter with Jesus, the Son of God, would have been a sure-fire conversion. This was not the case. After Jesus told him the cost of discipleship, the Bible says, “when the young man heard this, he went away sad.” If Jesus was rejected, we can be as well. But that does not mean it was a waste of time. You could be planting the seeds that God could water and grow in the future.

God will be with you. After He gave the Great Commission to go and make disciples in Matthew 28:18-20, Jesus did not leave His disciples alone but said, “I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” (v. 20). Going out on your own can be a frightening thing, but that is never the experience of the Christian. Christ promises to always be with you.

Finally, trust God. The journey this person is on will have twists and turns you and I could never imagine. God will bring the right people at the right time. For now, we are privileged to be one person on that journey, telling our story and pointing our friend or relative or even acquaintance to the God who died for them.

Discussion Questions:

  1. What are some of the obstacles to sharing our faith with others?
  2. What are the risks as you see them? What are the benefits?
  3. In this devotional I said it is not about the outcome, but about obeying God. Agree or disagree and why?
  4. Is there someone this week we need to share our faith with?

Is Your Faith Big Enough To Take Risks?

“ And it is impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who wants to come to him must believe that God exists and that he rewards those who sincerely seek him.” – Hebrews 11:6.

Most people who are followers of Jesus will exercise two levels of faith at one time or another. One level is to be inactive and wait patiently for the Lord to move. This level of faith involves believing that God will bring about a solution apart from any effort on our end. It is predicated on being still and waiting for God to act. The second level of faith is being proactive and assertive. We take the initiative to find the answer to a need. And by moving forward, we force ourselves to a dependence on the Lord that wouldn’t be possible if we merely sat still.

In verse 6, the writer of Hebrews says it is impossible to please God without faith. Now most people do not start with great faith. Most people start their Christian journey still in the batter’s box in their Home Run Life. Faith is a work in process. It is fine to start with the little things. The goal is to move around the bases and grow our faith.     

Every Christian’s life is marked by windows of opportunity that demand that you take a radical step of faith in order to follow Christ and fulfill His purposes for your life.  And what makes that step radical is that it always involves significant risk. But listen carefully, where there is no risk, there is no faith. We find so many impressive stories in the Bible of individuals who took great risks. Moses returns to his home to deliver God’s people.  Can you imagine the risk that he felt?  The last time he was in Egypt he had killed someone. David fights a giant that others refuse to face. There were hundreds of other people in the army that looked at that giant about 9 foot tall and they said, “Hmm, yes he’s sure insulting God’s name and character and I wish someone would do something about it.” But not a single person stepped up to the plate and took the risk of his life. Esther confronts evil in the highest position of authority. The last queen had a bad day and she was gone. Still Esther risks her life to save her people.

So when does God want us to operate at level one faith and when at level two? If we are facing a seemingly insurmountable problem–a situation that we believe we are powerless to influence–we should be still and wait on the Lord. But there will also be times when action is required, where we may be asked to take bold steps, and yes, to take some risks. Faith is simply doing what God tells you to do whether you feel like it or not, and in fact, especially when you don’t feel like it, regardless of the circumstances because He said it and His Word is true. 

Discussion Questions

  1. Why do you think God asks us to take risks? What do we learn about ourselves, and how do we grow by taking risks?
  2. What are the obstacles to stepping out of our zones of comfort and taking risks?
  3. As you’ve taken risks of faith, did God’s path seem impractical, at first? In what ways?
  4. What are some of the promises of God that you can trust as you take risks?

Is Your Faith Big Enough To Trust God For Your Needs?

“And if God cares so wonderfully for wildflowers that are here today and thrown into the fire tomorrow, he will certainly care for you. Why do you have so little faith?” – Matthew 6:30. 

I think it is safe to say that everyone has a story, everyone has a struggle, and everyone has needs. There will be times in every one of our lives when we will experience a need of some type. Perhaps that need will be material in nature, or it may be emotional and, at other times, needs of a physical nature will arise. Or we may have spiritual needs.

The natural reaction is for us to try to meet our own needs because we live in a very self-sufficient world. But when we have the ability and the power to help ourselves, then we do not really have a need, do we? But what happens when we can’t meet the need? When we have exhausted every resource and we are left with the reality that this is beyond us, what then?

The answer to getting the needs of life met comes from Jesus Himself. His answer was this, “And Jesus answering saith unto them, “Have faith in God.” Mark 11:22-24 says: “Then Jesus said to the disciples, “Have faith in God. I tell you the truth, you can say to this mountain, ‘May you be lifted up and thrown into the sea,’ and it will happen. But you must really believe it will happen and have no doubt in your heart. I tell you, you can pray for anything, and if you believe that you’ve received it, it will be yours.”   

In 1 Kings 17 we read the story of Elijah and the widow. Imagine how Elijah felt when his brook dried up and the ravens quit bringing food. So in 1 Kings 17:8-9, “the Lord said to Elijah, “Go and live in the village of Zarephath, near the city of Sidon. I have instructed a widow there to feed you.”  That didn’t seem like much of a solution. Widows were poor, and had enough trouble feeding themselves, let alone feeding others. But, Elijah knew that God knew more about taking care of prophets than Elijah did and he just went. If we sit around and worry about what’s happening in our life and trying to figure out what God is doing, we will go crazy. We can’t understand God and we can’t figure Him out. Isaiah 55:9 reminds us of that: ”For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts.”  

In 1 Kings 17:14, Elijah gives the widow woman an 11 word promise, “For this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says…”  In other words the widow had the promise of God to back up her faith. And so do we today. David in Psalm 37:25 says, “Once I was young, and now I am old. Yet I have never seen the godly abandoned or their children begging for bread.” If God said that He would look after your need, then you can have trust in Him to meet those needs, protect you, rescue you, be with you, answer you, satisfy you, and give you eternal life. 

What else do we need?

Discussion Questions:

  1. Is the whole idea of what we want and what God gives us difficult for you to comprehend? Why?
  2. It is important to base our faith on the promises of the Bible rather than on our own feelings, needs and wants. Why is that so important?
  3. Read Philippians 4:9. What does God supplying all your needs mean to you? 
  4. What can we do this week to better trust God to meet our needs?

Is Your Faith Big Enough To Not Be Afraid?

“The faithful love of the Lord never ends! His mercies never cease. Great is his faithfulness; his mercies begin afresh each morning.” – Deuteronomy 3:22-23. 

What do you do when you have a problem that is just too big? Our immediate reaction is to try to fix the problem or at least to make it smaller. It is hard to resist trying to take care of it. But sometimes the challenge in front of us is way too big for us. It is in these times when faith is tested.

The prophet Jeremiah had some hard times. Jeremiah preached for 40 years, and not once did he see any real success in changing or softening the hearts and minds of his people. The difficulties he encountered, as described in the books of Jeremiah and Lamentations have prompted scholars to refer to him as “the weeping prophet.” Jeremiah was called by God to give prophesy of Jerusalem’s destruction that would occur by invaders from the north. God kept His promise to bring disaster on His rebellious people.  The King of Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar, sacked and destroyed the city of Jerusalem. Jeremiah was there. He saw it with his own eyes. And his eyes were full of tears.

And Jeremiah wrote about his suffering in the book of Lamentations. Lamentations 3:20 says, “I will never forget this awful time, as I grieve over my loss.”  Most of us have been in that position once in our lives. Many of the characters in the Bible stand as a stark example that life following Jesus will not be a bed of roses. The Bible paints a realistic picture of life which includes suffering and sadness. But then you come to verses 21-23: “Yet I still dare to hope when I remember this… God’s faithfulness is great.

Maybe you don’t feel like that right now and it is affecting your faith. Maybe God seems distant.

Even when it doesn’t feel like it, God’s faithfulness is great. And His faithfulness never fails. Verse 23 says, “Great is his faithfulness; his mercies begin afresh each morning.”  Every morning even weekends and holidays, God has promised new mercies every morning. We know they are there. We can count on them. So we have to go looking for them.

Not just on Sunday when you attend church, but every day. God keeps His promises. Whatever He has said, He will do. It may not be in our preferred time period. It may not even be what we asked for. But He is faithful and we need to have the type of big faith.

Imagine how different your outlook on life would be if you had absolute confidence that God was with you? Imagine how differently you would respond to difficulties, temptations, and even good things if you knew with certainty that God was in all of it and was planning to leverage it for good. In other words, imagine what it would be like to to live a faith-filled, big thinking life.

Discussion Questions:

  1. What is your standard reaction when challenges become too big for you to handle alone?
  2. In all the ways that you could respond to God, the most important thing that God is asking you to do is to trust Him. Agree or disagree and why?
  3. Is faith the same thing as trust?
  4. What can we do this week to have a faith filled, big thinking life? 

As Big As Life Faith

But the Lord watches over those who fear him, those who rely on his unfailing love. He rescues them from death and keeps them alive in times of famine. We put our hope in the Lord. He is our help and our shield. In him our hearts rejoice, for we trust in his holy name. Let your unfailing love surround us, Lord, for our hope is in you alone.” – Psalms 33:18-22

If you were asked to rate your faith, how would you rate it on a scale of 1 to 10 (“1” means your faith is hard to find and “10” means it manifests itself in every aspect of your life). Does it depend on your circumstances? Or on your day? Or your feelings? Or does the quality of your faith depend on the object of your faith.

You may rate your faith small as a “2” or “3” but God is infinitely big. He is the one that can move mountains, not us. We may rate our faith as small because of circumstances or feelings. Those things change constantly. But faith is not grounded in the size of our faith, but the size of our God. It is not my faith that resists temptation, obeys God’s will, or moves mountains. It is God working in me. A big faith will not make me believe better. But faith in our big God will. 

Just how big is our God? He has all power. Scripture tells us He hung the moon and stars in the sky (Psalm 8:3). He has measured off the heavens with his fingers and weighed the mountains and hills on a scale (Isaiah 40:12). Nothing is too hard for Him (Jeremiah 32:17).

Faith is focusing on Jesus and not on the problems we face. In Matthew 14:29-31 we read the famous story of Peter attempting to walk on water: “Yes, come,” Jesus said. So Peter went over the side of the boat and walked on the water toward Jesus. But when he saw the strong wind and the waves, he was terrified and began to sink. “Save me, Lord!” he shouted. Jesus immediately reached out and grabbed him. “You have so little faith,” Jesus said. “Why did you doubt me?”  Peter was able to walk on the water when he focused on Jesus, but when he began to focus on the physical situation, he began to doubt and to sink. Fortunately, he knew who to look to when things looked bad. 

Big faith in a big God makes such a difference in people’s lives regardless of their circumstances. For example, God told Noah to build an ark because He was going to bring a massive flood. God told Abraham to go out to a place that he would receive as an inheritance. Abraham took God at His word, left his familiar surroundings, and he went. Faith in a big God is also the reason “soul surfer” Bethany Hamilton got back on her surfboard after a shark bit off her arm. Bethany takes the shark bite as God’s test, and credits her survival to prayer. “From what seems like such a horrible thing, God has just brought glory to Himself,” she says.

Discussion Questions:

  1. How would you describe your faith today? 
  2. What circumstances tend to bring out faith in you? What circumstances tend to bring out doubts for you regarding Jesus?
  3. How have you seen the Lord be faithful in the past? In the present?
  4. What can you do this week to grow your faith?

Fast Talk

“Why have we fasted,’ they say, ‘and you have not seen it? Why have we humbled ourselves, and you have not noticed?’ “Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please and exploit all your workers. our fasting ends in quarreling and strife, and in striking each other with wicked fists. You cannot fast as you do today and expect your voice to be heard on high. Is this the kind of fast I have chosen, only a day for people to humble themselves? Is it only for bowing one’s head like a reed and for lying in sackcloth and ashes? Is that what you call a fast a day acceptable to the Lord? Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter— when you see the naked, to clothe them, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood? – Isaiah 58:3-7.

Over the last few years we have conducted a fast in January to start the new year. Let me remind you why you should fast, and what the practice is. There are so many misconceptions about fasting, I first want to clarify what biblical fasting is not. Fasting is not merely going without food for a period of time. That is dieting. Nor is fasting something done only by fanatics. Fasting is not to be done only by religious monks or by pastors or religious leaders on special occasions. Stated simply, biblical fasting is refraining from food for a spiritual purpose and is intended to build an intimacy with God.   

There are three reasons starting the year with a fast is a good practice. First, by doing so, you set the course for the rest of the year. Just as beginning your day seeking God sets the course for the rest of the day and covers anything that may happen, the same is true of beginning the year with a fast. You set the course for the entire year by what you do with those first few days of each new year. You can carry that even further to give God the first part of every day, the first day of every week, the first portion of every dollar and the first consideration in every decision.

Second, blessings will happen for you and your family throughout the year because you fasted in January. Even in April, June and August and into November when you have Thanksgiving goodies on your mind, blessings will still be finding their way to you because of your sacrifice to the Lord at the beginning of the year.

Thirdly, when you fast at the beginning of the year and seek God, you release the principle found in Matthew 6:33: “Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need.’” If you seek Him first in the year, get ready for all these “things” to be added to your life. 

Discussion Questions:

  1. What are some of the factors that keep followers of Jesus from fasting?
  2. What is the difference between abstaining and fasting?
  3. Under what circumstances might fasting be a helpful spiritual discipline for you?
  4. How has this devotional changed your views on fasting?