Thankfully, another pastor who served on the Board, encouraged me to look at what I was doing. In my efforts to get through the next checkpoint on my way to my goal, I was missing much of the blessing that came with the journey. It was, and is, important to have goals and pursue them, but not at the expense of living in the moment with God.

Along my journey, one of the voices that has helped me find my balance is that of Henri Nouwen. In his book, Bread for the Journey, he reflects on what it means to cultivate the virtue of patience, “Patience asks us to live the moment to the fullest, to be completely present to the moment, to taste the here and now to be who we are.”

There is great truth in his words, and wisdom for leading our lives from reflecting in them. The real value of patience is not in the waiting, but in being fully alive and alert in the present. This way, we do not miss the treasures of God waiting where we already are.

In Psalm 34:8, the psalmist declares we should, “Taste and see that The Lord is good.” It is a call to savor the richness of God in the place he has us now. There is no place we can go, no situation we can be in, where the greatness of God’s presence is not there to enrich our lives. To hurry past the moment we are in, to get to something that lies ahead, robs us of the blessing God intends for us to experience where we are.

As we press on to embrace the opportunities and goals that await us in 2014, we must also plan to feast on the marrow of each day, each moment God gives us on the way. If we learn to experience the fullness of each moment with God, we will be training ourselves to capture all of possibility that is yet to come as we fulfill our God-given destiny.

I invite you to pray with me,

“Creator God, you planned this day before you knit me together in my mother’s womb. You chose me before the creation of the world to be adopted in your family. Help me to discover all that you have for me, today. Let me see all of the hidden treasures along my path, and more importantly, be aware of your presence with me along the way. I choose to be fully alive, and alert to the leading of your Spirit, so that I can savor every moment of this day with you. Amen.”

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Prior to his crucifixion, Jesus went to the temple in Jerusalem. There he found, not only worshippers, but people exploiting the spiritual needs of many who were there by using that experience to make a high profit. The faithful were not permitted to pay the temple tax in the common currency of the day. Instead, they were required to exchange it for the currency of the temple. It was at the point of this exchange that people would be gouged with an unfair exchange rate.

Seeing this travesty, Jesus turned over their tables and declared, “Is it not written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations’? But you have made it a robbers’ den.” It is one of the few times we see Jesus angry, and there is no mistaking his concern. Clearly, the money changers missed the point of worship and were exchanging the gift of God for the trappings of profit.

In our journey of faith, we too can miss the point. We may not be hurting others for our profit, but we can lose sight of the real gift of being the Church of Jesus Christ. We can replace an intimate walk with the Savior and with the world, for ritual and routine. We can replace the “house of prayer for all nations” with the “house of getting my needs met,” sacrificing the call for our comfort.

We are meant to be the church for the sake of the world and to the glory of God. Prayer and ministry for our community, region, and the nations of the world is at the heart of our identity. Called to lift Jesus high we need to come in low, as John the Baptist did saying, “I must decrease that he might increase.”

The good news is that when we embrace our true calling as the body of Christ we find the blessing of God. Like the child who learns to appreciate and value the gift more than the packaging, we discover that the valuable gift of God is found beyond the trappings of religion. In our faithful embrace of God’s vision for his church, we find the joy of a personal relationship with Jesus, the beauty of community, and the power of a dynamic relationship with the world.

Let’s not settle for the box and paper, but search deeper for the real gift of God. Let’s be the house of prayer for all nations and see the world transformed by the love and power of Jesus Christ!

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I already indicated my desire to stay where I was and the church shared their hope that I would remain their pastor. We were comfortable with each other and enjoying ministry together, then God stepped in with another opportunity to follow into something new.

Most of us enjoy being comfortable. We like the familiar and the predictable. There is a sense of peace that comes from knowing what to expect and where we fit in. In short, we don’t like to change, yet change is a given and can be one of God’s exciting blessings.

The church I serve, and the one I will be serving, are both facing a myriad of questions as we enter this transition. Likewise, I have questions of my own. In the past few days, as I began my advance planning, I realized I have little idea what my new worship services look like. I do not know what my weekly schedule will be, nor all of the expectations that will be awaiting me. I have only begun to become acquainted with the community and region and will have a list of questions when I arrive. My friends, my family, and everything I’ve known since I began my ministry will be hours away. My life is going to change.

It would be easy to be intimidated by all of the unknowns, but it is equally possible to be excited and energized by all of the changes. There will be new people to meet and minister with, new treasures to discover, new opportunities to share my gifts and to grow, and new encounters with God. The familiar will give way to the fascinating, and the comfortable to the creative. It will not easy, but it will be good, fun, and life-giving because God is at the center.

Too often we run from the blessing of being with God on the journey, by entrenching ourselves in what we already know and have. When we open our lives to God’s ideas and plans, the possibilities are endless.

Two scriptures have been on my mind though this transition. The first has carried me though from the beginning, “I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for good to give to you a future and a hope.” (Jeremiah 29:11) the second, is also a favorite, “Glory to God, who is able to do far beyond all that we could ask or imagine by his power at work within us.” (Ephesians 3:20)

With the truth of these two wonderful promises at work, and placing all of my hope in God, how can the future be anything other than amazing?

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Sometimes, it seems as if the nature of this call upon the church is lost behind a myriad of programs and good ideas. If we look carefully, it seems that we are more inspired by the classic Field of Dreams quote, “If you build it, they will come,” than we are by Christ’s call to, “Go into all the world.”

We wait inside our building, our services and events for people to come to us. We make our buildings larger, more accessible and more attractive so that people will notice and come running to join us. Sadly, when they do not come, we tend to blame them or the culture, but we rarely consider that we may be the problem.

King Solomon wrote,

“Out in the open wisdom calls aloud, she raises her voice in the public square; on the top of the wall she cries out, at the city gate she makes her speech.” (Proverbs 1:20-21)

The wisdom of God calls aloud in the public square, on the top of the wall and at the city gate. It is vocal, reaching out to others, and it is certainly not meant to be kept to ourselves. Our experience of God is immensely personal, but it is never private. Our faith is meant to be shared. The Gospel is meant to be proclaimed, not only within the walls of our churches, but in the midst of the daily lives of others.

Jesus’ very ministry reflected his view of the Great Commission. Most of his ministry recorded in the gospels did not take place in the synagogues or the temple. Rather, he was found teaching on the hillside, conversing with people on the streets, near the shore, and even beside community water wells. Jesus made himself available to people wherever he was, and clearly proclaimed, “the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”

There is certainly a place for church buildings, worship services, and special events. We need Sunday School classes, Bible studies, and fellowship. But, the call upon our lives is not to live within the walls, waiting for the world to come and visit. Instead, we are to go into all the world and share the Good News of the love of God and salvation in Jesus Christ.

Today, let’s take up the call of Christ to go; to get out there. Let’s go out to where broken, lost and hurting people are and be the city set on hill that cannot be hidden and the light that is placed in the open so that everyone can see. Instead of waiting for others to find us, let’s go to find them so that we can share the gift of God in Jesus Christ and see the world transformed through him.

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The real challenge is keeping that focus. Every day, I try to put those three things first in my thoughts and then in my actions, but there are often so many distractions that it is easy to lose focus. The denomination has paperwork it wants. There are meetings to attend, calls to make, and emails to write. Occasionally, there are small fires to put out, and there is the reality that other people think they know your job description better than you do. It the midst of it all, it is hard to attend to what is truly most important.

At one point, early in our ministry, my wife gave me a small cartoon of a man (clearly a pastor) sitting in his chair looking quite frazzled as his wife smiles at him and says, “Always remember dear, Jesus loves you and everyone else has a wonderful plan for your life.” It made me smile, but there was truth in the humor.

Don’t get me wrong, I love what I do and these are just the challenges that come to cloud the more significant responsibilities of ministry, and more importantly, what happens to me, happens to you too. Every calling from pastor to parent, evangelist to engineer, has it’s core foci and its distractions. Each of us must take responsibility for our calling and see that we do not lose our true focus in the midst of a pile of daily details.

Here are some of the tools I use to keep my focus:

1. Put first things first. Make a plan that schedules time for what is most important. There will always be a litany of urgent requests crying out for your attention, but the loudest voice is not always the one to be listening to.

2. Set times each day to check your course. Just like navagaing a trip, it is important to check your position and the path you are taking.

3. Never stop taking direction from God. It is easy to trust in our own management skills to get us though, but God’s way is not always our way, and while we may “get through” on our own, we may miss the greater blessing God has in store if we follow his path.

4. Learn to say, “no.” All of us want others to like us and we can give in to unnecessary, and sometimes unrealistic, expectations in order to make others happy. It is good to care about other people, but only we can take responsibility for our calling. We must do what we were called to do and that may mean not doing some things others think we should do.

5. Learn from mistakes and practice grace. At the end of the day, if you realize that you lost focus on your way, discover what pulled you away and prayerfully discern how to bolster that part of your life and ministry to protect it from another occurance in the future. Don’t give up or give in to frustration. Accept that you are human, trust in the love of God and look to the Holy Spirit to guide you forward.

My grandfather used to say, “Charlie, what gets your attention, gets you.” Since I want God to have me in his hand, I want to give my attention to God. I trust you do too. That is what makes the effort worthwhile.

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With all of those considerations in mind, I still believe that the most meaningful part of God’s character to my life is the abundance of patient grace. I look back over my life and I am amazed how overwhelmingly patient God was, and is, with me. I am struck by what a slow learner I can be, and by how easily I am distracted from what I’ve been taught by God. I wonder if I have even a portion of that patience with the people in my life.

I am struck by how that patient grace shapes my life as God gently, and sometimes not so gently, guides me along the right path and brings me back to it from my occasional departures. It would be so easy for God to grow weary with me, yet that never happens. In fact, it seems like the more I chafe, wander and struggle, the more God steps in to remind me of his love, forgive me of my sins, and empower me to take the right, next step.

Often others, the devil and even I, speak words of judgement and defeat over my life, yet God, like a gentle, loving parent, chooses a different path – the path of patient grace. His words are filled with compassion, hope and promise. God sees what I cannot always see in myself and calls it forth from within me.

I can only speak for my own journey, but I know that I will be forever grateful for the blessing of that grace. I know that when I am aware of it working in my life, I feel God’s divine strength enabling me to become who I was made to be in him. Many people I know struggle with their past and their failures, but I thank God that we are not defined by them.

God said, and says, “Behold, I make all things new.” The Holy Spirit working in us can overcome our past and our present and lead us into the future we were destined to live. Won’t you join my in confessing with so many others like us, “I may not be where I want to be, but I’m sure not where I used to be! Thanks be to God!”

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Some people never realize their potential in Christ. Carrying wounds and lies from the past, they hold fast to the belief that they have nothing special to offer to God or to the world. They pass through life filling the time, but avoiding the deep questions of purpose and meaning. Meanwhile, others grab hold of a personal mission that serves them well, but ignores the call of God on their lives. They invest deeply in themselves and their success, yet opportunities to make a deposit in the lives around them go unnoticed, leaving their true success hidden of buried.

God knows that we are counting on Him, but He is also counting on us. We have a special part to play in His plan. We are coworkers with Him in the process of bringing His purposes to fruition. Even more exciting is God’s desire to grow fruit within us, to make us more than we ever thought we could be. God wants us to connect with the purpose He placed within us so that we can, “have life and have it to the full.” (John 10:10) And that is the promise that accompanies our living out of our purpose. When we connect with this God-given destiny, we find meaning and fulfillment we never dreamed possible. We experience greater clarity in decision making and planning for the future. We see the power of God at work to produce miraculous results in our families, work and relationships. We are blessed and we become a blessing to others.

What has God made you to do, that no one else can do like you? Who has God called you to be that makes a mark that represents Him in and to the world? These are questions worthy of a quest, for when the answers are found, a destiny is formed. You are not your job, your church, or your linage. You are more than your pedigree or any list of accomplishments. You are a child of the living God with a special place in Christ that only you can fill. It is a place that has meaning at home, at work and at play. Everywhere you go, your purpose goes with you. It is greater than titles and positions. It is not affected by retraining or relocation. It supersedes all other job descriptions, yet it seasons every facet of your life.

Above all, knowing and living from your purpose leads to fulfillment and meaning, wonder and blessing, and in levels you never imagined before. God wants you blessed and alive in Him. God wants you to have His wisdom and insight and we are encouraged to ask for it because He promises to give it liberally. Today, will you seek God for your life purpose? Will you call upon God to reveal your unique place in the kingdom and then order your life around His vision for you? Will you embark on the quest whose treasure is beyond measure? I pray you will and that God will reward you as you diligently seek Him.

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