- Initiative: Dependence On Grace

At the start of any undertaking for the Master is one essential characteristic: The adventure is living in dependence upon God more than our abilities.  He is not only our reason for what we what we are doing but in addition that He is also our inspiration.

While we can often be drawn into something by “Religious Zeal”, the need to do a thing for God because we feel it is the “right thing to do.”  We need to ensure that our inspiration comes from Father, not because we feel it is a good idea.  Jesus told many stories about flawed starts, the rich man who expanded his storage facility and then died is one, and then there is the story about the two house builders the one built on the rock and the other on the sand.

Today we have an understanding about the foundations for our constructions so that the only way we would build on sand is if there was something binding the sand together, we call it cement.  In Luke 14 Jesus goes even further that these stories when He tells a group the importance of counting the cost of commitment.  This is where we need to be aware of the consequences of our actions.

The pivotal point in the exercise is the cross road where initiative and intelligence underwritten by the Masters grace which enables us.  Of course we have to use the wisdom which is provided in His race when we count the cost as Jesus calls us to.

The commencement of any work for the Master is just that, only the beginning.  As we get started we need God’s Grace but as we get deeper into the work we are supported by that same grace from God.  However I do need to moderate this statement.  God is not obligated to support us an any undertaking.

I once thought that God was calling me to setup a Mission Support Agency.  I even constructed a Mission Statement and developed a ministry method and a pamphlet for publication.  The problem was that while I thought it was a good idea that was as far as it went.  Step one was to find a house in town to run the organization from, but that house never was provided.  This is significant in that when we run ahead of God with our own agenda it is His reputation which gets a bloody nose, not us.

We have a responsibility to use our initiate and our intelligence for the Master.  We also have to be tuned into the Lord so that we do that which He wishes and not what we think is a good thing for us to do for Him.

The problem is that if we do what we think is good for the Kingdom there are two possible outcomes. One is that we may run out of steam and not finish that which we set out to and the other is that we may create the shell of an organisation that seems like it is something that is of God but isn’t.

Father is capable of working in our lives even better than we are. He is even capable of reaching out to others through our lives even when we aren’t doing anything.  What we should be focussing on as we work to extend the Kingdom is in doing the Father’s will and being so tuned into His will through prayer and obedience that our initiative becomes the demonstration of God who acts through us.