Annie
Scriptures: John 5:17-30 Matthew 4: 1-10 Ephesians 2:10 Acts 1:4-8
As I write this, I am listening to a song “The Lord is My Salvation” and, as always, I feel so unutterably grateful that this is a song I can sing with absolute certainty. Without the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ I could never claim this; through Him I have been redeemed, I am saved by His Grace alone. Yet, how often do I think or speak about the work that He did while on earth?
When Jesus was berated by the Jews for healing the man at the Pool of Bethesda on the Sabbath, He reminded them that His Father was continually working and, therefore, He too would work. Basically, behind the scenes, our Father God never stops working, His Kingdom work never ceases. So what is it that we, if we are citizens of the Kingdom of God, need to be working at, not to gain Salvation, but to imitate Christ who imitated His Father?
Let’s start with what we do not need to be doing. Often, as new believers, we may feel we have to jump in to every ministry, every outreach programme, every pastoral or evangelistic opportunity that we possibly can. Forgetting that Jesus made it very clear that He could do nothing of Himself, but only through His Father. His relationship with His Father was so pure, untainted by any selfish desire to rush ahead, that He expectantly waited for God to point Him to exactly where He needed to be and what He needed to be doing and saying. Before we can launch into any Kingdom works, we need to be learning what it is to hear the prompting of Holy Spirit, to know that intimacy for ourselves.
After Jesus was baptised by John, He was ledinto the wilderness by Holy Spirit. It was in this place of solitude that He was tempted by the devil, but, because of His relationship with His Father and His knowledge of all the scriptures of the time, He was able to counter these temptations. Jesus when He was born into time, took on the flesh of humanity while still remaining totally God. It was this flesh that needed to learn to submit to His Divinity. We are in so much more need of this learning time so that we can be fit to then work in God’s Kingdom wherever He has already planned for us to work.
Before we were ever created, God had already planned the good works He wants us to perform here on earth, not to earn our Salvation, but to fulfil His will for us. What we need to do is learn to listen with our spiritual senses to find out what these works are. Jesus told His disciples what they had to do in the broadest of terms, He left it to Holy Spirit, the Teacher and Guide He promised would come to them in power to give them the specifics.
As we go about our daily lives here on earth, learning to submit and surrender to Holy Spirit’s teaching, we reflect our Lord and Saviour in all we do. But there are times when His prompting takes us out of our comfort zone, times when we end up walking on the water holding on to our Saviour’s Hand, performing things we would never have seen ourselves doing. And this is it, of ourselves we cannot do Kingdom Works, it is only through the Power of our God that we can do anything and thereby bring glory and honour to Him alone.
Prayer: Father God, give us ears to hear and hearts to obey, willingness to do only what will bring glory to You as we carry out the Kingdom Works already prepared for us. Amen.