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We are God's instruments, His hands and feet in this world. I find it quite incredible that God chose to use us as His instruments, since He is all-powerful, omnipotent, and He rules the whole world. How gracious is He that His plan to spread the word is through ordinary human beings who have been created by Him.
As I consider my responsibility as one of God's instruments, that I should honour and glorify Him, I can’t help remembering the many times I‘ve fallen short, behaved selfishly, been lax, forgotten about Him or tucked Him away in a back pocket, to be pulled out only when I needed him most. It’s not my intention here to beat myself up in public, but I wanted to get that out of the way before turning this into an uplifting, encouraging blog that hopefully will contain a seed or two for you to take away and enjoy.
To do that, I’ll begin this blog by quoting an inspiring and thought-provoking verse from Ephesians:
For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. (Ephesians 2,10)
The idea expressed here about us being God's instruments, ties in with my last blog, ‘Who’s Plans?’ which is about God’s purpose for our lives.
Most of us like to be so independent, to plan our days, weeks, months and even years according to what we want to do, how we would like to run our lives, in which direction we would like to be moving. Therefore, it’s very refreshing to meet people with totally different priorities, who are so focused on running their lives according to God’s priorities that they literally shine for God.
At our local church, for example, we have so many service teams, people who serve tea, others on the welcome team who greet and smile, making newcomers and regulars alike feel welcome, members of the congregation running Bible study groups, people making sure all the technology goes smoothly, people on the music team. The list of volunteers extends to helping the local community outside the church: we have visiting teams for the elderly and the sick, knitting groups providing blankets for the needy, a food storage space for weekly donations, amongst other initiatives.
However, it is so good to remember in the busyness of carrying out various tasks and responsibilities that we didn’t even plan these ‘good works’ ourselves; that long before we even pour the first cup of coffee after the service, smile at one person coming in at the door, prepare one Bible study session, connect one wire or play one song, that it was God who prepared all these ‘good works’ for us to do in advance. That He actually created us so that we can be His hands and feet in a broken world. And that profoundly, beyond our understanding, we were created ‘in Christ Jesus’, which I find both daunting and encouraging.
For we have an exceptional Master to follow, a Master who lived in this world as we do being tempted in every way, but not ever sinning. Jesus Christ is the ultimate shining example of perfection, and although we will constantly fall short of the high standards He set for us when He lived on this earth more than two thousand years ago, we can attempt to follow in His footsteps.
There is a Sunday school song I used to sing as a small child which is coming to mind now:
Follow, follow, I will follow Jesus,
Anywhere, everywhere, I will follow on.
Follow, follow, I will follow Jesus,
Everywhere he leads me I will follow on.
I’ve only just discovered now, all these years later, that there are many words to this hymn and this is only the chorus, but to my recollection, we only used to sing the chorus. But I’m reflecting now on how wonderful it is to commit one’s life to such a perfect Master and role model. And how much better the world would be if more people believed in Jesus and did exactly that: followed Him.
A Christian friend I speak regularly to told me that her group leader said the pendulum is turning. There has certainly been extraordinary things happening to the American youth at certain USA universities.
So as I pray, read my Bible, go into schools, do readings, teach, write and welcome at my church door, I’m going to consciously try to remember that all these ‘works’ have been prepared a long time in advance for me by God himself, and that I am ‘God’s workmanship’, created by Him to carry out His purpose for my life. And I will remember that I am one of many of God's instruments in the world.
