The Space

My recent "blog" about the view from the pastor's home created a wonderful conversation. One person asked a great question. "Does living in a third world country mean one serves God better?" That may not be he exact question but it is close.

Where I live does not prove anything about whether I am serving God better or worse. The will of God is not a place. The will of God is a disposition or what I call "cooperating constantly with God's intentions." I can be in the will of God at any place and in any time if I am in harmony with the God's intentions and can, by His grace, sustain those intentions which began in Him. That sounds complicated!
In reality it is not if we use a metaphor. I love metaphors.

Think of a flower that is in my office at church. Poor flower! I am terrible with flowers. They all suffer if they are in my "care." Yet, I have never seen a flower stop being what it was made by God to be even though I mistreat it. It is what it is by its creation blueprint. It never fails to sustain its intention as begun by the Creator. No matter what I do. it keeps glorifying God where it is. It is what it was made to be no matter what I do or do not do. It suffers and may even die, but it will remain true to its Creator. That is why it is beautiful.

We humans have the capacity to choose. Someone once explained this to me in a helpful way. They said there is a "space" between stimulus (externals) and response (actions). In that space we live and make our choices. People who are successful in some way have mastered the space in such a way that their responses are predictable. We can count on them.

When I try to be "successful" in doing God's will I hear Jesus saying "without Me you can do nothing." He is so right.
I am far less successful than the flowers! I cannot sustain God's love toward my neighbor. I cannot cooperate with God's intentions like the flowers always do. The stimulus (externals) stop me. What can I do?

I must "abide in the Vine" in the space between stimulus and response. I must learn to let God's blueprint for humans (the life of Jesus) be my life. I must live in "oneness" with Jesus and then I will release the fruit of God's intentions no matter what the stimulus may be. Only then will I be predictable like the flower.

I do not believe my pastor friend in the poor area of Brazil is doing more of the will of God here than my pastor friends in the U.S.A. I believe my pastor friend here is like a beautiful flower where he has been planted by God. For me it was obvious that he abides in Jesus in the space between stimulus and response. I was impressed with Jesus' beauty in him where he lives.

Poverty is a powerful stimulus. Wealth is a powerful stimulus. The love of wealth is the more powerful stimulus in the world for wrong responses. (Remember that "love of money is the root" verse?) Since it is such a powerful stimulus, the toughest place to live God's will may be in the presence of great wealth. I do not know for sure if it is harder to do God's will in abundance or in lack. All I know is we must abide wherever we live in order to do God's will. First world or third world it is all God's world. With money or without it is still possible to abide.

The place where we should serve best will take care of itself as we abide. The Vinedresser will decide where we can best respond to the stimulus of this world and bear the most fruit. The point is, I saw a "flower" ( my pastor friend) in a place where I did not expect to see a flower so I pointed to him and said "Wow!" It was a lack of faith on my part to be so surprised. Why should I be surprised to see the power of God's will manifested in a poor neighborhood or on Wall Street? Abiding can handle it.

The will of God is to abide wherever we are. Be like the flower.

I pray you don't get assigned to a place like my office. If you do, God knows. Abide there even to the death. His will is the most important thing in the world--not the stimulus. Somehow I believe flowers who give their lives in my office receive special love from the Creator. I believe those who live near great and difficult externals receive special love to see them through.