Doing God’s Job

For those of you who do not know, CrossPoint’s staff meets every Tuesday morning. Steve Parr, CrossPoint’s Executive Pastor, leads the meeting, which is divided into three segments. The first segment includes praying over the needs of the church as communicated through the Communication Cards, reviewing the calendar of events and assigning guests contacts. The second third of the meeting includes week-to-week administrative items in addition to staff reports. The last third of the meeting is left for me to lead in discussion of specific topics.

The topics I discuss in staff meeting are divided into a four-week cycle. The first Tuesday of the month is “Big Staff Day”. This is the day every paid employee of CrossPoint meets to ensure we are all on the same page. The second Tuesday of the month, we examine CrossPoint’s vision. The third Tuesday of the month, we evaluate CrossPoint’s process. The fourth Tuesday of the month, we discuss a book or a specific topic of study. And, we use the fifth Tuesdays that roll around each quarter to catch up on other issues.

Since yesterday was the third Tuesday of the month I facilitated the staff in a discussion about our process. The result of that discussion was eye-opening.

While concluding our process evaluation, I reminded the staff that their job as the leaders of CrossPoint is basically two-fold. (Let me add, these two items are not in order of importance. They both carry equal weight.) First, the staff members must recruit and develop leaders. Additionally, the staff members must ask God to provide the leaders necessary to recruit and develop. In short, we talked about developing the leaders God provides.

Where we went next was spiritually enlightening.

While discussing the balance between recruiting and developing leaders and asking God to provide leaders, I commented that sometimes we do for God what God wants to do for us.

This observation came to me a few weeks ago while praying for the members of CrossPoint by name each morning. While working through my particular list that day I weighed in my mind how much I try to make something happen in our church instead of asking God to do it. Another way of saying the same thing would be to ask how often or in what areas of life do we take the place of the Holy Spirit.

Jason Motte, our Student Minister, asked me for an example. I jumped quickly on an example of a family who recently joined CrossPoint. Last fall I dropped them a few notes in the mail. I even approached them in the hallway, and asked when they planned to join. When they did not respond to either effort, I quietly placed that desire in God’s hands. In short, I turned the matter over to God. A few months later, without my prompting, they approached me about joining.

I could site several other examples where I have tried to do something for God that God wanted to do for me.

How often do you take the place of the Holy Spirit? In what areas of your life do you take over for the Holy Spirit? In what ways do you do for God what He wants to do for you?

I think many of us get in God’s way by doing for ourselves what God wants to do for us. And I think the way we do that is by doing things for God without first asking God to do them.

There are many sentences in the bible that teach me to call on God to do things rather than me doing those things in my own strength. Listed below are three such examples:

“If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.”
John 14:14

“Call to me and I will answer you, and will tell you great and hidden things that you have not known.”
Jeremiah 33:3

“Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.”
Matthew 6:8

I am not sure what I wrote for you today is sensible. I am blindly trusting God to use this blog to prompt you to think more seriously about allowing God to do things for you that most of the time He allows us to do for ourselves because we do not ask Him.

One more thought and I am done.

Let me add, whenever we do things for ourselves or in our own strength, they will always fall short of what God can do for us. Sure, we may be able to accomplish some things on our own for God. But just imagine what God could do for us in His own strength.

I think today I will ask God to do some things for me I typically try to do in my own strength.