I have written in other posts about the fact that I am a word person. I love words. I love turning a series of words into a memorable phrase. Sometimes it is for the sake of humor, other times to make a point, and other times to define a purpose. And yet for all the time and energy I put into crafting sentences (yes, that includes when I'm simply having a conversation; I'm always searching for the best word for that moment), there was a glaring mistake in a key area of language in my life - my mission statement.
I fashioned my mission statement over five years ago after going through a series of classes/lectures/discussions at my church on leadership. I spent months reading and gathering phrases that truly captured my heart for why I am here and what I am here to accomplish. I had pages of quotes and even more pages of ideas, key words, random thoughts, all compiled so that I could sit down, take a 50,000 foot fly-by view of them and latch onto the theme of my life's purpose. Then I sat down and wrote it all out.
And I fully believed I'd nailed it.
My mission has been this: To be joyfully spent making others glad in God.
It's short. It's memorable (for me and others). It uses words that are important to me and how I am wired. It puts forth the notion that I desire to tirelessly work for the advancement of the Kingdom of God and seeing others fall in love with Him. It was perfect!
.....or so I thought. Recently, as I hinted at in my previous post, I was awakened to the fact that something was amiss in my well-crafted, pithy mission statement. Take a look at it again and ask yourself this question: Based on that phrase, whose responsibility is it to see others made glad? For those who are not so grammatically inclined, the answer is - me. My mission statement would have you believe that I am responsible for others becoming glad in the Lord. Let me be very clear at this point: that is utterly and completely impossible.
I cannot make someone glad in God. I cannot incline their hearts toward Him. I cannot overcome sin and death and the enemy in someone else's life. I cannot do that for even my own life! I could certainly spend myself attempting to do this, but it would lead to failure after failure because that is a mission that I cannot accomplish. If I never changed this phrase, I would live a life wherein my mission would come to nothing.
I was shocked as the Lord revealed this to me. You see, I was placing to onus of responsibility on myself, when in reality, only God can make someone glad in God. Only He has the power and love and grace and mercy to change a man's heart and renew his mind. No amount of human effort will ever soften a heart to the point of turning to God. 'There is none who seek God; no, not one.' No matter how eloquently I speak, without the anointing of the Holy Spirit, no one's ears will be unstopped so that they can truly hear the message of the Gospel. It is God's job, and only His, to transform people.
Some of you reading this might be thinking, 'Gosh, Joe, take it easy. So you phrased something wrong. It's not that big of a deal.' I would say in response the same thing Bill Hybels leads with in his book Axiom: language matters. This seeming slip of grammar actually revealed my heart's true position. I wanted to be the one to see these things happen. I wanted to be the teacher, preacher, counselor, mentor, friend who saw people's eyes opened to the beauty of the Gospel and the joy and peace found only in Christ. Is that a bad thing? On the surface, no. But it shows a tendency to place that pressure on myself rather than humbly submitting all things to the Lord and getting out of His way to move in people's lives. I was taking the posture of the little train that could, 'I think I can. I think I can. I think I can.' I am guilty of a Superman complex, attempting to do far more than what He would have for me to do.
Please hear me well and clearly on this: I do want to see all of these things happen. I want to be used by God for great things. I want to see many and more people freed from guilt and shame and rejoicing in their joy and freedom in Christ. More than anything, I want that. What I have realized is that I want to see that happen, whether I am directly involved in the process or not. Thus, I have rephrased my mission. The difference may seem slight, but for me it's like jumping over the Grand Canyon using a pogo stick. This was a revelation only God could have brought about in my life. Here is the updated version:
To be joyfully spent seeing others made glad in God.
Do you see it? I am effectively out of the picture with this. I still want to give everything I have to God with joy ('joyfully spent'), but I am not making others glad. I am seeing them made glad. Which means what I am committing myself to is keeping my eyes open for wherever God is working and putting my energies there, joining in where He is already at work, giving the gifts He has given me back to Him for His people, and standing back to see what He does with it all. I fully believe my joy in Him will be magnified all the more as I remove myself from the scene and watch Him work out 'all things for the good of those who love Him.'
0 comments:
Post a Comment