“For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” Ephesians 2:10
Whenever I read this verse, I am comforted that my life has been created for a purpose. But when I start to really put my weight on this verse and say, “Your purposes, not mine, Lord,” it sparks two competing thoughts in my mind:
1. I fear that the purposes and plans you have for my life are too big for me.
2. I am discontent that today’s good works aren’t big enough.
Part 1: This Is Too Big:
But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt? He said, “But I will be with you…” Exodus 3:11-12a
Five years ago, I read a book called, “Rees Howells, Intercessor,” by Norman Grubb. It is a biography of a man in Wales who started a prayer meeting in a neighbouring village and eventually founded a bible college where he led many through intercessory prayer during World War II (with a radical faith-led life all the way through).
This. Book. Is. Bananas.
I remember thinking: Oh my goodness, Jesus, please don’t ask me to do this stuff! I can’t do it!
And I remember the Spirit pointing my attention to the page number of my outburst: It wasn’t page 1. Page 1 wasn’t Rees Howells living off of a handful of rice and traveling to an island with a man with consumption while he lived in a basement on 10p a day. The story starts with simple obedience to walk with three others into a village to pray and invite others to pray with them.
Even small steps of obedience are uncomfortable and sometimes intimidating: When I look at the last three years of my life, that woman who was reading that book five years ago couldn’t have imagined she’d live out of a car; that she’d drive around the US and meet strangers who were divine appointments; that she’d watch God provide daily when a job, a place to live and a working car never seemed to happen all at the same time. It was too big five years ago. But God led me every step of the way, even when it was uncomfortable and scary and I didn’t know what would happen next.
When God shows me even a glimpse of the plans He has for my future, I must still come back to: What are you asking me to do today?
He has planned good works in advance for me to do, and yes, some of those plans seem impossibly huge for where I am right now: But what is my good work for today?
Even the good work of obedience I do today is dependent on the power of the Spirit, the provision of the Father and the victory of Jesus, and if the good work for the day seems too big for me, it is not too big for the Spirit who lives in me, sent by the Father who is the power that raised Jesus from the dead.
I can choose to make decisions in trust and follow Him in obedience, even when it scares me.
Part 2: This Is Too Small:
And he who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five talents more, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me five talents; here, I have made five talents more.’ His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ Matthew 25:20-21
Every morning after I read my Bible and drink my coffee, I wander over to the plants I am fostering: I examine each one before praying for them to be a blessing to whoever receives them when I am able to give them away as gifts.
After waiting two and a half years to return to Glasgow, I had finally arrived in February, a couple of weeks before lockdown. In America, I was looking after children; living with close friends and their children; holding babies; working with children at my job; and I was able to tap into untouched realms of nurturing I didn’t even know I had!
And now…I have plants.
I have big dreams of managing an estate where I can welcome in sojourners and care for children and steward a home and tend to the land and share the Gospel through compassion and hospitality!
But that’s not the good work God has planned for today.
It is so good to have desire – as long as I submit those desires to God to allow Him to conform them to His own. My mission is not to snuff out my desires, but to surrender them in faith and live in hope that God’s plans and purposes for me are beyond what I could imagine. It doesn’t mean they will be easy. It isn’t a prosperity Gospel. It is trusting that God knows more than I do and my story is just one thread of a much larger, incredibly beautiful story.
Part 3: A Little Made A Lot
He put another parable before them, saying, “The kingdom of heaven is like a grain of mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his field. It is the smallest of all seeds, but when it has grown it is larger than all the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches. Matthew 13:31-32
When I am stuck in my own finite mind, confined by my incomplete understanding, I get lost in both of these lines of thought. But when I choose to lift my eyes and surrender today to Jesus, I am met with a gentle challenge:
“Can I trust you with a little?”
Whoa. Can He? Is my life surrendered to Him? Is He my prize? Or am I just using Him as a means to get what I want in a way that seems holy?
The God of the Bible is the God who sees in secret; the God who looks at the heart; the God who does not despise, but rather notices and celebrates the small things, making them the means through which He does great things. Can He trust me with a little? Will I be faithful to be obedient and steward a little, trusting He is using it for a lot more than I can see?
I want to invite you to ask God similar questions, whether you are looking up at a purpose that seems too big or looking down at a good work that seems too small: Father, what are you giving me to care for today? What good work do you have planned in advance for me today? What is my responsibility for today?
“For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” Ephesians 2:10
