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Below is the text for the devotional/teaching that I did at Joy in the Evening this past fall. Just one piece of background information before moving into it: We were asked to speak on different aspects of how God shapes and molds us, based on the acronym given in "The Purpose Driven Life" by Rick Warren. The acronym is this:
- S - Spiritual Gifts
- H - Heart (or passions)
- A - Abilities
- P - Personality
- E - Experiences
One final note--this devotional was very much an exercise of how God works "in spite of". If I could relay all of the obstacles that came up while preparing this message, I would. But I don't want that to be the focus. The focus should be on how God worked in spite of all of those obstacles.
He continues to amaze me with how He makes a way for us to follow the dreams that He has implanted in our hearts. Even the ones that we thought were long dead and gone.
*****
In the process of developing this talk for you, there
were several things that I wanted to share with you about. Things like how our experiences are really what ties everything else (our Spiritual Gifts, Heart & it's passions, Abilities, and Personality) together. How our experiences are our way to test out the things that God has given us and help mold us into the people we were meant to be. How, in God's economy, there is no such thing as a wasted experience. But God had something a little different in
mind.
Living Out Our
Gifts
Tonight, we are going to be taking a look at one of the
women in the Bible and some of her key experiences with a prophet named Elisha.
We find their story in 2 Kings, chapter
4.
8 One day Elisha went to Shunem.
And a well-to-do woman was there, who urged him to stay for a meal. So whenever
he came by, he stopped there to eat.9 She said to her husband, “I
know that this man who often comes our way is a holy man of God.10 Let’s
make a small room on the roof and put in it a bed and a table, a chair and a
lamp for him. Then he can stay there whenever he comes to us.”
~ 2 Kings 4:8-10
Now, it was pretty common in those days
for prophets to travel from place to place, giving God’s message. While traveling, they often relied on the
kindness of others to feed and shelter them.
But take a look at the passage again—it says that she
told her husband that they should go ahead and open up a specific room in their
home to Elisha. Something special that
is set aside just for him. This was
going above and beyond the call of duty.
Now many of you who have the gift of hospitality are
probably thinking “What’s the big deal?
If I had the means and resources,
that’s what I’d do if I had someone come by and visit often.”
And if you were to ask her, she would probably say the
same thing. But as we have been learning
over the course of this session, some of the things that we think come
naturally to us and think that everyone should do as well are actually special
skills, traits, and giftings that God has placed within us.
This is where the Shunammite woman is when we find
her. Working through each day of her
life, exercising her gifts, but not really giving thought to the fact that God
has something more in store—just for her.
Everything’s
“Fine”
Take a look at the next part of the passage:
11
One day when Elisha came, he went up to his room and lay down there. 12
He said to his servant Gehazi, “Call the Shunammite.” So he called her,
and she stood before him. 13 Elisha said to him, “Tell her, ‘You
have gone to all this trouble for us. Now what can be done for you? Can we
speak on your behalf to the king or the commander of the army?’”
She
replied, “I have a home among my own people.”
~ 2 Kings 4:11-13
When I have read this passage in the past, there were two
things that I thought were strange.
Number 1, Elisha and the fact that he chose not to speak directly to the
woman. In Jewish culture at that time,
it was considered taboo for a man to speak directly to a woman, particularly if
one or both of them were married. So in
a way, this complicated game of telephone was Elisha’s way of respecting that
law.
Also, I often thought that she gave a strange response to
his question. “I have a home among my
own people.” What is that supposed to
mean?
From what I could find, it’s simply her way of saying
“It’s all good…My needs are all met. I’m
just fine.”
Oh, how I hate that word.
In our house, that’s code for “DANGER!”
But oh, how I say that word so very often in response to
others when they ask me how things are going.
Or, like in this case, if they can do anything for me.
Sometimes when we get going in life and think that all of
our needs are being met, we lose sight of just how needy we really are. And when opportunities come up where someone
would like to serve us in some capacity, rather than saying “Yes, please, this
is how you can help…” we instead turn them away saying what my nephew says: “I
good. I got it.”
It is during those times where everything seems to be
“fine” that we need to stop and examine ourselves by asking a few questions.
1)
Is everything truly “fine”? Because if we are being really honest with
ourselves, we will probably find that it is not.
2)
Am I saying “I got it” because of pride and I really
don’t think I need any help? Or is there
some way (even a small way) that they can help me?
3)
By my saying “No,” am I denying them an
opportunity to exercise their gifts and gain some experiences they can use
later on in serving others?
In answer to the first question, I’ll confess I’m one of
those people who would tell you that everything is fine and my needs are all
met because I am (at times) content to stay blind to certain things that are
really not okay in my life. This is often because things that are not okay take
time and energy (particularly emotional energy) to deal with and I don’t want
to go through all of that.
Sometimes saying “I’m fine” is a way for me to cope with
something that I have resigned myself to—something that isn’t good but I don’t
see how the situation could get any better or be any different.
But, at times, it is a matter of pride for me. I want to prove I can handle different things
that are thrown into my path and that I can do things better or faster than
others.
But here is something that I am learning—particularly
with regards to having 3 year-olds in my life—when I say “No”, I’m not only
denying myself an opportunity to be humble and show that I need help from time
to time and that needing help is okay.
I’m also denying that person an opportunity to learn and grow.
While I try to justify denying them this opportunity by claiming
I can do it faster without their help or it will never be done right if I don’t
do it myself, that really isn’t the best way to go about it.
As God has been working with me on this, I’ve come to the
realization thatI don’t want to be the one to tell someone else “No” out of
pride or a lack of authenticity because in doing so, it actually can do some
things to them that can be extremely detrimental to their growth.
1)
It can make them feel that they are not needed
or have nothing good to offer
2)
It can make them reluctant to try again
(especially if you are saying no in an ungracious manner)
3)
It can cause them to resent the way God designed
them and make them try to live in a way that contradicts the SHAPE that God has
for them (causing them to want gifts or abilities that they just don’t have and
were never meant to have)
Let me ask you—is this something that has happened to
you? Can you see how this has played out
in your life, whether you were the one denying someone else the opportunity (like
the Shunammite woman was here) or someone else was denying you an opportunity?
Unwanted “Gifts”
Remember, the Shunammite woman has told Elisha that she
doesn’t need anything—that it’s all good in her ‘hood (so to speak). But Elisha is a persistent man.
14
“What can be done for her?” Elisha asked.
Gehazi
said, “Well, she has no son and her husband is old.”
15
Then Elisha said, “Call her.” So he called her, and she stood in the
doorway. 16 “About this time next year,” Elisha said, “you will hold
a son in your arms.”
“No,
my lord,” she objected. “Don’t mislead your servant, O man of God!”
~ 2
Kings 4:14-15
At first, I was a little taken aback at reading her
response. My understanding of Jewish
culture at that time is that a woman’s worth was judged based on how many kids
she can bear. Especially sons, who would
(ideally) be able to take care of her needs, should her husband pass away.
There could be a lot of different reasons for that kind
of response from her. She could have
tried having kids in the past and (for one reason or another) was not able
to. Those experiences may have been
painful for her and she might not have been willing to try again because they
had been so hard.
Maybe she was scared of losing the child—perhaps she had
gone through several miscarriages and knew the pain that came with that kind of
a loss.
In spite of her objections, God fulfilled the prophecy
spoken through Elisha. The woman did
become pregnant and gave birth to a son.
But then (perhaps just as she had feared) something
tragic happened.
Coping with
Shattered Dreams
The Bible tells us that her son was out in the field with
his father, when he started complaining that his head hurt. His father had him brought in from the field
and taken to the Shunnamite woman. The
child passed away in her arms. She went
and set him on the bed in Elisha’s room and then set out in search of Elisha.
Let’s pick up the story from here…
27
When she reached the man of God at the mountain, she took hold of his
feet. Gehazi came over to push her away, but the man of God said, “Leave her
alone! She is in bitter distress, but the Lord has hidden it from me and has
not told me why.”
28
“Did I ask you for a son, my lord?” she said. “Didn’t I tell you, ‘Don’t
raise my hopes’?”
~ 2
Kings 4:27-28
Can you sense the heartbreak? Can you sense the anger?
One time when Beth Moore was sharing on this particular
passage, she said there are times in our lives where we say “If I can’t keep
the gift, I’d rather not have it at all.”
The pain, the sorrow, and the hardship are all too much for us to try
and deal with, should a time come when the gift is taken away from us.
You and I may have been given dreams of some sort. Something that we absolutely would love to
do—something that ignites our passions, falls in line with our abilities and
personalities, and helps us to exercise our spiritual gifts in a meaningful
way. And things may be going very well
for quite some time. We may be thoroughly loving it. But then something comes and robs us of that
thing. Something comes along and steals
our joy or (as LysaTerkeurst puts it), “Bumps into our happy.”
And suddenly we feel like it would have been better for
us, had we never known what that experience was like. It would have been easier for us. And we would have been content to live our
existence where everything seemed just “fine”.
But that is not what God wants for us.
And that, my friends, is what we have to
trust--especially during those times when things are not going as we had hoped.
I think that (aside from wanting to lash out at someone) this
trust is what drove the Shunammite woman to Elisha’s side. She knew he was a prophet of God. She had sensed there was something authentic
in his faith. And she knew that he, of
all people, could do something to help her in her time of need.
Resurrecting The
Dream
Her dream was dead—literally. But, thank the Lord, God is in the business
of resurrecting dead things.
29
Elisha said to Gehazi, “Tuck your cloak into your belt, take my staff in
your hand and run. If you meet anyone, do not greet him, and if anyone greets
you, do not answer. Lay my staff on the boy’s face.”
30
But the child’s mother said, “As surely as the Lord lives and as you
live, I will not leave you.” So he got up and followed her.
31
Gehazi went on ahead and laid the staff on the boy’s face, but there was
no sound or response. So Gehazi went back to meet Elisha and told him, “The boy
has not awakened.”
32
When Elisha reached the house, there was the boy lying dead on his couch.
33 He went in, shut the door on the two of them and prayed to the
Lord. 34 Then he got on the bed and lay upon the boy, mouth to
mouth, eyes to eyes, hands to hands. As he stretched himself out upon him, the
boy’s body grew warm. 35 Elisha turned away and walked back and
forth in the room and then got on the bed and stretched out upon him once more.
The boy sneezed seven times and opened his eyes.
~ 2
Kings 4:29-35
The Shunammite woman’s dream of
having a son had been revived. And I
would hazard a guess that she would say the gift of his life was more precious
to her, having lost him before, than it had been prior to that moment. And she wouldn’t have traded the hardship
that she had gone through for anything else.
Perhaps you are at a point in your life where everything
is “fine”. You don’t feel like you need
anything from others or you have nothing special to offer. Life, for the most part, seems to be going
along okay. So why try anything new? If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Maybe you’re like the Shunammite woman,
having resigned yourself to the idea that nothing was ever going to change and
you have managed to convince yourself that it would be okay.
But perhaps there is this little whisper in your heart, a
small voice that is telling you “There has to be more than this.”
Maybe you are at a point in your life where you have
tried exercising your gifts and have been denied in one way or another. Maybe you have been given some sort of gift
and then suddenly had it ripped from your hands. Maybe
the pain from that denial or that separation has left you so bound up that you
have resolved not to try again.
But there is something inside of you that knows that
something isn’t quite right—that you aren’t meant to be bound up in those
chains.
Tonight, I want to offer you what I think of as a grace
moment. Here is your chance to get rid
of the things that have been keeping you back from fully living out your
shape. Take the opportunity to embrace
the gifts that God has given you in your Spiritual Gifts, your Heart and its
passions, your Abilities, your Personality, and even in your Experiences (good,
bad, or otherwise).
God has been walking me through this process of taking
those things that I have experienced and using them as lessons. Taking those old, shattered dreams and
breathing new life into them. I would
like to share with you a song that has been encouraging to me in this process.
While the song is playing, please take some time to
reflect on what God is trying to say to you.
If you feel the need, the front will be open for you to come and
respond. If you feel like you need to
talk to someone about what God is showing you or would just like someone to
pray with you, there are leaders at the back of the fellowship hall who would
love to do that with you.
Normally, I would say that you can stay in your seat as
well. There are some people who may not
be moved at this moment by this message.
But if you’re one
of those people who are bound up by fear of some sort—be it fear of
experiencing that kind of pain again, fear of failure, even fear of success…know
that you are in a safe place. I dare...scratch that, I triple-dog dare you...(and you know that you can't back down from a triple-dog dare) you
to break out of that comfort zone. Know
that you can do it. That you can move
out of the existence of “Fine” and step out in faith.
By Group 1 Crew
(from their
album Fearless)
I feel called
to something more
Beyond what I
have known
I keep shutting
out that voice that cries
Deep within my
soul
"I have
more to give"
But I have been
afraid
And then I hear
You say
It's still not
too late
I'm steppin'
out to take a chance
and if I fly or
if I fall
It's in Your
hands
You're the
maker of my dreams
And You'll make
a way for me
So I'm steppin'
out
I'm steppin'
out
To take a
chance
To take a
chance
I'm alive, I
want to live
And I am not
content
To keep holding
back all that I am
The way that I
have been
I am Yours to
use
And when I am
afraid
You'll come
close to say
"One step
is all it takes"
CHORUS
I believe in
the grace You've shown me
I believe in
the words You say
I believe
there's an untold story
That You're
telling through me
I believe in
the grace You've shown me
I believe in
the words You say
I believe
there's an untold story
That You're
telling through me
CHORUS
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