DISCONNECT
Verse of the week: 1 Corinthians 13:1-3
These past few weeks, we’ve discussed how God has equipped us with gifts and called us to use them for His glory. Sometimes, however, we can get so excited about the gift we have that we become focused on what we can do rather than the purpose behind it. This can cause us to completely miss what it means to walk in God’s call for our life.
Well, you may be asking, what is God’s call for us? The call of God is closely connected to the heart of God, which becomes evident as we dive into His word. God tells us to love Him and love people.
If we want to walk in the call of God, we need to be closely aligned with His heart. So often we can fall in love with the mission – using our gift – and not the purpose behind it – the people. Serving can become about the assignment. And as Paul writes in 1 Corinthians, if we miss love, what we do is for nothing.
With all that being said, Pastor Andy took the stage this week and preached about three things to avoid so our call is never detached from love:
1. Comparison
Comparison may be more prevalent in our world today than any other time in history. Our grandparents maybe compared themselves to 100-200 people in their lives – we can scroll through that in 30 seconds! With social media, we compare ourselves to thousands of people, most of who we don’t even know. And we’re just seeing their highlight reel – people online carefully choose what they want others to see, and it’s doing something to our hearts.
For one, it’s creating a massive anxiety problem in our generation. We want others to see that we’re something, that we’ve made it, so it changes our hearts into one that is never satisfied. Instead of using our gift to walk in God’s calling, we constantly compare our gifts to others, and question how we can get another calling. We look for an upgrade instead of using what we’ve been gifted.
One Biblical example is found in 1 Samuel 18. It tells of the relationship of comparison between King Saul and David. Even though Saul was king, and in his own right a great warrior, David was given credit for being even better than Saul. Saul’s response is noted in verse 8 and 9: “They have credited David with tens of thousands,” he though, “but me with only thousands. What more can he get but the kingdom” And from that time on Saul kept a close eye on David.
Saul became disconnected from using his gift to serve the Lord, and instead fixed his eyes on David, and focused on him. We can do that in our world even today, looking at other people for meaning and purpose. However, be careful of this trap – as Christians, we’re called to fix our eyes on Jesus (Hebrews 12:1-2)
2. Chasing the credit
The second way we can become disconnected to our calling is by making it about us. The Bible teaches us to have a kingdom mindset – which means our reward is in heaven, not on Earth – however, that can be really difficult to live on a daily basis. When we use our gift, we often seek the credit. In fact, our entire system of work is tied to this process of “provide something of value -> get rewarded.”
Don’t get it twisted, it’s important to celebrate people. But we need to celebrate what God is doing more. Because when we celebrate our accomplishments without God, we become selfish and prideful – and that’s the opposite of love. The credit isn’t important. Our hearts need to get to a place where we’re happy in our circumstances as long as God gets the glory.
3. Control the calling
Control is a vicious cycle of planning and worrying. It’s trying to place limits on our destiny, based on our own understanding of our own capacity. In short, it completely leaves God out of the equation.
We can see in 1 Samuel 18:12-16 that comparison drives Saul to anxiety and bitterness, and he tries to control David’s calling. He sends him away. And guess what? David ended up becoming king.
Like Saul, by trying to perfectly control everything in our lives, our fears will win, and we will be dragged through seasons of anxiety and turmoil trying to hold things together. Thankfully, God wants to bring us peace, and He can hold everything for us.
Have you submitted your fears to the Father, and fully trust in His calling? Or are you trying to control?
There are many ways to be disconnected from our calling – the world is full of distractions, and it’s important to be aware of them. We all think we’re immune, that it’s someone else’s problem. But the truth is, we need to work together to identify where there are unseen issues in our lives that are trying to derail us from love. Because without love – loving God, and loving people – it’s easy to detach from God’s calling.
Make sure to check out the full message below!
