Obedience Unlocks
My last blog entry was 6 months ago. Unacceptable, if you ask me. Yes, it has been a wild year.
New baby
Shutdown
Quarantined
Racial Tension
Getting Covid
Everything else in between
It has been A LOT.
But…
Here is the thing, at the start of 2019 God spoke to me and told me “Write. No matter what it looks like.”
I wrote.
Into 2020, I knew the mandate had remained the same.
Write.
I wrote and then stopped.
I mean, I didn’t stop completely, I wrote in my journal nearly everyday, wrote my hubby love notes and texted every day (that counts as writing, no?).
Point is. I know what God means when He says write. He means, put your words out there. That can be tough because that means getting my thoughts together, creating an outline, writing it out, proofreading and lots and lots of editing and rewrites (in midst of everything else in between).
Truth is, I wrote a bunch of posts for the blog since the last one, but none of them seemed good enough. None of the posts seemed worthy of making it on to the blog.
Fast forward to this week and many of us are reflecting on our year and goals. I have my vision board for 2020 posted in my bedroom right by my nightstand. I look at it every night. This week, I began to reflect and acknowledge all the words on there that have come to pass and the ones that did not.
I thanked God for all the ways He showed up and then I wondered about the ones I knew I fell short on.
What happened? How did I miss it? How could I have pursued that differently?
Then during my secret place He answered by taking me to the book of Haggai.
Haggai is a super interesting book, but to sum it up, the people of Israel had just been taken out of exile and brought back home. They were able to begin rebuilding. Rebuilding their community, their homes, but most importantly the Temple, where the Spirit of God dwelled. (Super important because that was their only access to God, unlike today, where He dwells within us once we accept Him.)
Long story short, they get called out for focusing on their homes instead of God’s Temple (aka their personal agenda vs. God’s agenda.) The people repent and choose to obey God by beginning to rebuild the Temple.
This is where it gets interesting....
12 “Then Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, and Jeshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and the whole remnant of God’s people began to obey the message from the Lord their God. When they heard the words of the prophet Haggai, whom the Lord their God had sent, the people feared the Lord. 13 Then Haggai, the Lord’s messenger, gave the people this message from the Lord: “I am with you, says the Lord!”
14 So the Lord sparked the enthusiasm of Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the enthusiasm of Jeshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and the enthusiasm of the whole remnant of God’s people. They began to work on the house of their God, the Lord of Heaven’s Armies”
Haggai 1:12-14
The bible tells us that they first OBEYED and once they obeyed they were filled with ENTHUSIASM.
Man, did this hit me.
See, here is the thing, I have resisted the call to write. I know I am meant to do it, but I have come up with very valid and “hard to knock down” excuses for why I cannot write in this season.
I just had a baby
We are in a pandemic
I am a new pastor in the midst of a pandemic
I don’t have time
I am exhausted
I am a full time mom and pastor
I wrote. See? I am just not feeling it.
However, here is the reality.
I am called to write. I am called to write and share. I am called to write and post it here.
My job is to obey.
Yet, here is the good news.
If I obey, God will provide the enthusiasm to do it.
How dope is that?
I don’t just have to obey and get it over with, but I can obey and enjoy it. I’ll enjoy the call. I’ll enjoy the obedience.
So, here’s our challenge:
Reflect on your 2020.
What did He call you into?
What did you accomplish well?
What is left undone?
Resolve to obey and trust Him to provide the enthusiasm to get it done.
Believe that obedience will unlock the enthusiasm needed to follow through on God’s call for your life.
He is with you.
Until Next Time,
We are Ecclesia
