Reclaiming Your Joy

Finally, all of you, live in harmony with one another; be sympathetic, love as brothers, be compassionate and humble. Do not repay evil with evil or insult with insult, but with blessing, because to this you were called so that you may inherit a blessing. (1 Peter 3:8-9).

All week long Lorraine Hill is calling us to forgiveness.  Today we are reading about repaying evil with good. True confession: this really gives me heartburn!  This is the place where God is wanting to grow me now, as in right now.  Here is what He has been telling me: stop expecting other people to meet your needs – look to Me instead.

And my God will supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus (Phil 4:19).

I think a lot of my problems with other people have come from expecting them to meet my needs.  Maybe I want their approval or for them to do things my way.  Maybe I want them to do for me what I would do for them (that would be a sort of Reverse Golden Rule – something man devised, not God).  But God wants me to look for ways to serve others rather than having them serve me:

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.  In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness (Phil 2:3-7).

When we have expectations of people, they are bound to disappoint, some more frequently than others.  But God says,“In your anger do not sin”: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold (Eph 4:26-27).  In order to do this find myself having to reframe the way I look at others.  If I am really interested in serving God I must do it through the people He puts in my life. This is part of accepting His will and His plan for me, over mine.

If you love those who love you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. And if you lend to those from whom you expect to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to get back the same amount. But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil. Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful. Luke 6:32-36

The act of submitting to God requires us to submit to others.  This runs in direct opposition to the Flesh.  But I am finding I am able to do this when I remember two things:

1. Everything and everyone I encounter is part of God’s plan for me so it is for my good: And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. (Romans 8:28).  So if someone doesn’t do what I want, or does what I don’t want – I try to remember that God’s plan for me cannot be thwarted by man, so He will work it out for me, even if it does not look like the plan I had for myself. The heart of man plans his way, but the LORD establishes his steps (Prov 16:9).  I don’t need to contend with man, just to accept that somehow God is exerting His will for me: What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? (Romans 8:31)
2. My real purpose in life is to serve God.  In serving others, I am serving Him. ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’ Matt 25:40  When I forget this, it is because I would rather put my own agenda before God’s and that is a huge mistake.

As I said, God is working these things out in me now.  And that means it is not always so pretty.  But the wonderful thing is how He uses everything in my life to teach me.  He is determined to have me be the person He knows I can be – even if I can’t see myself getting there now.  And in the meantime, while I am on my way to Reclaiming My Joy: As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him; for he knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust (Ps 103:13).