Readings for today: Luke 14-15
I am sitting at the airport waiting for my flight to East Africa. Over the next two weeks, I will have the privilege of training indigenous church planters in two different countries in the Horn of Africa. It’s an honor to spend time with these men and women. They come from nothing and yet have everything. They not counted among the rich and powerful and yet are more wealthy than the world could ever know. There is a power present inside them that drives them to take the gospel to some of the most dangerous places on earth. They are my heroes and have taught me much over the years. Perhaps the biggest lesson has to do with humility.
Years ago, I was spending some time in prayer after one of these trips when I heard God speak. Not audibly. More of a voice in my mind. An undeniable impression God laid on my heart. He didn’t speak for very long. Just three words. Obscurity. Anonymity. Insignificance. Part of the reason I knew these words were from God is because they aren’t words I spend anytime thinking about. They aren’t words I would associate with my life at all. But as I received these words and meditated on these words and asked God for wisdom to understand these words, I realized God was challenging me through my relationships with my brothers and sisters around the world to think more deeply about the way I live. He was calling me to labor in obscurity, embrace anonymity, and pursue insignificance. Basically the opposite of how I’d been living my life. I am, by nature, an achiever. A high performer. I’ve been blessed to have a lot of success in my life. It would be easy for me to make the mistake of the man in the parable Jesus tells in our reading for today and seek the highest place of honor. But the one who exalts himself will be humbled and the one who humbles himself will be exalted and that’s the lesson God was trying to teach me.
I’ve never forgotten those words. In fact, I often associate them with this particular parable because I was reading it around the same time the Lord spoke to me. I realized I had spent my life chasing the place of highest honor. Trying to outperform my peers. Achieve success. Become a person of influence. Sure, it was all for God or at least that’s what I told myself. But in reality I was trying to exalt myself. So when I received those words, I took a step back. I let go of my need for affirmation and recognition. I let go of my need to be perceived as a success in the eyes of the world or the eyes of the church. Titles and position became meaningless to me. I committed to never seeking another position nor asking for another raise. I intentionally sought to serve rather than be served. I wanted to seek the place of lowest honor and trusted God to raise me up as He saw fit. The result was an overwhelming sense of peace and contentment.
Ever since that time, God has exalted me over and over again. He has given me positions of leadership that I did not seek. He has blessed me financially in ways I would not have thought possible. He has allowed me the blessing of serving Him in a variety of capacities not just locally but nationally and even internationally. Again and again, the Lord has come to me and said, “Friend, move up here to a better place.” (Luke 14:10b NET) This was not my goal. These are not accolades I earned or achieved. They are simply blessings from God’s own hands as He fulfills His promise to exalt those who humble themselves under His mighty hand.
Readings for tomorrow: Matthew 19, Mark 10:1-31, Luke 16, 17, 18:1-30