Wednesday, March 11, 2015

A chain reaction of obedience...




Perhaps one of the biggest questions I'd like to ask God is why in the world He gave man a free will.  He's omniscient, He knows everything. He knew that Adam and Eve would choose to sin, introducing sin into the human bloodline and the effect of sin upon His creation.  He knows us and our tendency to choose self over Him, the easy way out over the way of the cross.  

I understand the concept that He wanted a family of voluntary lovers, not of robots.  I get that.  But I still think giving us a free will is pretty risky business.  After all, what if we mess the whole thing up?
For instance, what if Mary had told the angel Gabriel no?  What if she had used her free will to bow out of God's plan for her to be the mother of our Lord?  What if Joseph had told the angel that he didn't care about this whole "she's a virgin and pregnant with the Son of God" thing? What if he had chosen not to participate in the whole scandalous situation?

I look at events in our life, recent events.  I see the meticulous details that God wove together to make His will happen.  Yet, I want to break out in a sweat when I think how necessary it was for  the individuals involved to obey God, how one person's disobedience could have messed everything up.

My son-in-law and daughter had been our associate pastors/youth pastors for over ten years when they came to my husband, the senior pastor, saying they wanted to leave our church to plant a church of their own.  They told him where they wanted to go.  My husband had the audacity to tell them no.  To tell them it wasn't the time and it wasn't the place.  Now, I know that authority is a dirty word in our culture.  Because some have abused authority, we run away from that word and from anything that smells like submission,   But, my son-in-law, though it wasn't easy, submitted to my husband's decision.  He trusted God to deal with my husband if he was wrong in not letting them leave. 

 In the meanwhile, we were pastoring two churches, one in Portland, Oregon and one across the Columbia River in Vancouver, Washington.  On Sundays we would drive to Vancouver and have church then hurry back to Portland and have church.  A year or so after my husband told my son-in-law no, God have him a dream of him letting our son-in-law go.  He knew that he had to obey God.  So my son-in-law and daughter started taking training and preparation for church planting and started driving hither and yon to see if God would reveal to them where He wanted them to plant a church.  The only problem was that over ten years before God had specifically called them to Portland, and God hadn't changed His mind.  

My son-in-law convinced himself that he couldn't plant a church in Portland, since my husband and I already had a church in Portland.  He feared that it would be too divisive, a breeding ground for a church split.  So, he began to pray and asked God that if He really wanted him to plant a church in Portland He would confirm it through my husband . My son-in-law made a list of things he felt my husband would have  to do and say before he felt right to plant a church in Portland, and he laid the list before the Lord.  The least likely item on the list was that my husband would choose to merge the Portland and Vancouver churches into one church and move our ministry to Vancouver.  And that's just what happened.  My husband came to my son-in-law with a plan to merge the two churches to Vancouver and to give our son-in-law a year to form and train a team from our church to start a church in southeast Portland.  They discussed details of how our church would spiritually and financially cover the new church until it got on its own feet.  When my husband was done with his proposal, my son-in-law showed my husband the list that He had written down and given to God.  My husband had covered each item on the list without having seen it before.

As advertising went out into south east Portland for the opening Sunday of my son-in-law's church, a young man who had wandered away from church and from a vibrant walk with God saw a Facebook post about the new church.  This young man had godly, praying parents who had been praying for their son.  The first day of the new church, their son went.  He's been there ever since and is active in serving God and ministering in the children's ministries and the mission's outreaches of the church.

Meanwhile, my youngest daughter was living in Missouri, and was a part of the International House of Prayer in Kansas City.  God began dealing with her about moving back to Portland and about getting involved and helping in the new church, which she did.

The young man and my youngest daughter, both in their thirties, had sought God for so long to bring the right person into their life to marry, that they both had pretty much given up on the idea all together.  They both decided that the single life wasn't so bad after all, and poured themselves into their jobs and their ministries at church.

Can you guess the end of the story?  Yes, that young man and my youngest daughter will be getting married this May.

But here's where the whole scary tapestry of God's will and our will to either listen and obey or not to, could have unraveled.  What if my son-in-law had told my husband, "I quit!" and just stomped off and did his own thing in spite of my husband's wishes?  What if, when God gave my husband the dream to let my son-in-law go, he had ignored the dream and just decided it was the pizza he had eaten the night before?  What if my husband had just stuck with what we were doing, and not decided to make a huge change and take a big risk by merging two very different congregations into one church?  What if he had refused to leave Portland and go to Vancouver?  What if my son-in-law hadn't listened to God to wait until he had a green light to plant a church in Portland?  What if he had impatiently decided one place is a good as the next and started the church somewhere else? What if whoever decided to post to Facebook about the new church starting up in southeast Portland hadn't done it?  What if my future son-in-law hadn't listened and obeyed the promptings of the Holy Spirit to "go check this new church out"?  What if my daughter, who was well established in Missouri, hadn't obeyed God's promptings to move back to Portland?  Do you see how there were many, many, many individual acts of obedience that were necessary to the answer to the cry of my daughter's heart to meet the man God had for her?  Not to mention, necessary to my future son-in-law getting back on track in his walk with God and to the couple of hundred people who have made decisions for Christ through the ministry of Hope City church.

My point in all of this?  Our obedience, or lack thereof, just doesn't affect us and God.  We are intricately connected one with another, like a tapestry.  Our acts of obedience can have life changing consequences for others.  The scary thing is, so can  our disobedience.  I think we need to handle the power of our free will very carefully.  I sure wish Adam and Eve had, don't you?

still following,

  


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25 comments:

  1. THAT is a remarkable story. Remarkable, Elizabeth. (I wondered who was getting married...now I know.)
    What a powerful testimony--God is so amazing (and so is your husband and son in law).

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  2. What a powerful post! It is so easy to forget in our egocentric world that what we do has a rippling affect far beyond what we can imagine. Thank you for having the courage to post what God puts on your heart!

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  3. What a story, Elizabeth. We serve a God of order who goes before us in the finest details - it's incredible. You are so right, our choices, our obedience or lack there of can really have far reaching consequences. Such a testament to prayer and seeking God's will. Thank you for sharing ... and congrats on the upcoming wedding - that's a testament to waiting on God!

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    1. Thank you so much for your kind comment. I, too, am glad that our God takes care of the details of our life with such care and lovingkindness.

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  4. Amen Elizabeth,
    What a great story of God's amazing Grace..............and the obedience of the people involved. You are so right, that we all have to learn at some point that
    life is not all about us, our decisions good or bad can affect many others and
    the course of history, I am with you.......wish Adam and Eve had obeyed,
    it would have been Heaven on earth if they had..........

    Blessings, Nellie

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    1. Nellie, you are so right, it is so key to forsake the mindset that life is all about us and our individual rights. Thank you for your wonderful comment.

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  5. Wonderful post, Elizabeth! We only have the desire to be obedient through much prayer and understanding that God is sovereign in all things.

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    1. Anne, that's a good point, how our understanding and trust in God's sovereignty is key.

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  6. Wow!!! Blessings follow obedience. Thank you for sharing this with us!

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    1. Yes, blessing follows obedience. Thank you for that reminder and for your encouragement to me!

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  7. God is amazing in weaving details and direction. When nothing seems to be happening, it's tempting to think otherwise. What a great observation about keeping emotions and impatience out of the decision making process. Blessings from Coffee for your Heart.

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    1. Ginger, I wish I could say that I've always kept emotions and impatience out of my decision making! Thanks so much for stopping by.

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  8. Hi, Elizabeth. You're one of my very favorite storytellers and testimony sharers! I was filled with thankfulness reading this post. I appreciate knowing, too, some of the things you question or with which you wrestle. I'm so thankful for what free will I have been granted. Thankful that He's allowed me to choose Him, and thankful, also, that He's allowed me to participate in His plan in some small way. I think it's logically fallacious to assume that His plan hinges on the obedience of any given person. I'm not trying to undermine the amount of God's power that can be unleashed through a person, but it's God's power, and He's bigger than one person's obedience or disobedience. Having said that, I know I've missed out on blessings because I haven't done what I was supposed to do. Thankful for you!

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    1. Brandree, I don't have clear and full understanding on the power of one person's obedience or disobedience and its affect on others. I know one man's sin caused all of Israel to lose the battle at Ai. Yet, in the story of Joseph, his brothers' disobedience actually worked out for God's purposes. It really does cause me to wonder! What I do know is that listening to and obeying God is always the wise and best choice.

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  9. Elizabeth,
    I am once again awestruck with your writings. This truly is a beautiful story of how God's will is so perfect for our life. May just one person who reads this wait upon the Lord before they make unguided steps into the wrong choices. May I too, possibly be that one person. Amen!!!
    Thank you sweet sister in Christ,
    Addie

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    1. Thank you so much, Addie! "To wait upon God before we make unguided steps", your words expressed it perfectly.

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  10. What a beautiful tapestry of God's artistry to weave all the bits and pieces and details together to make something so right - in His time!
    ~Adrienne~

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    1. Adrienne, you are so right my friend. Life is too busy. I miss you!

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  11. Our choices weave and color many lives. I'm thankful for the submission and yielding of your children. xoxo

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    1. Lisa, I'm thankful as well! God weaves beautiful tapestries, yet we so often just see the knotted up underside!

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  12. This is just a fantastic post and what a blessing for you to see how it unraveled or maybe joined together. Congrats to your daughter and future son-in-law what a blessing. You are so right, we need to be obedient and really in tune to God's word in our lives. Thanks for sharing this part of your journey with us at Good Morning Mondays. Blessings

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    1. Thank you so much, Terri, and thank you for hosting each week!

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  13. This is an excellent post. Our choices in life affect not only ourself but those around us, but so many people think it only affects them. Thanks for this reminder!

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