Doing God's Work Just Might Be God at Work in You

"I don't have a problem doing God's work; I just have a problem dealing with it." 

My husband uttered these words to me a few years back. I knew what he meant then, and I can still remember the frustration he was feeling. Working for God is not always easy. Or clean. Or simple. Or straightforward. Or without a great deal of hidden cost. Working for God can be extremely messy.

Mark 10:17-22, records the response of a rich young king who asked Jesus what steps were necessary to inherit eternal life. Foregoing a discussion of this young man's punch list approach to faith, or his arrogance, let's skip down to verse 21, and the final "requirement" that stopped him I his tracks:

"Then Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said to him, 'One thing you lack: Go your way, sell whatever you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, take up the cross, and follow Me.'”

The following verse reveals the sad outcome:

"But he was sad at this word, and went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions."

This man might have been young, but he wasn't born yesterday. Sell? Give? Heavenly treasure? A cross, and a preacher who was admittedly homeless (Matthew 8:20)? That didn't sound very appealing, or even very wise. Of course, this man saw eternal life as just another thing to possess, like the robes, or livestock, or jewels he already had in his possession; but even if he had truly been seeking some spiritual encounter, throwing away all he had and wandering the countryside hardly sounded like the right way to do that.

But real service, real surrender to the Lord requires giving all we have -- including our will, including our way. "The Lord's work" is by definition, what He designs, what He calls us to do.

We used to drive our ten year-old car and our twenty year-old truck to the food bank where we served. We'd call one another on our outdated flip phones to discuss our dinner plans afterward; it usually involved some discussion of the scant leftovers we had sitting in our fridge, and maybe, a store brand frozen pizza. Late afternoon would arrive, and we'd leave the food bank, stopping on the way to deliver to a few clients. At our modest little row home in a modest little neighborhood, Scott would linger in the shower, his back aching from a years-old injury; I would barely make it though dinner, exhaustion from putting in a full night's work prior to serving others all day finally catching up to me.

What a wonderful feeling to be used up in such a way! That's what service is all about! Gratifying! Fulfilling! There's almost a romanticism to it! Doing the Lord's work! What a privilege.

But there was more. Some of the clients pulled up in vehicles just a couple years old. Most busied themselves waiting for their turn by playing games on their brand new smart phones. Others complained, whining about how long it was taking to get their free food. I'd schlep boxes of groceries to their cars where their able-bodied 16 year-old sons were standing about smoking cigarettes and talking on their smartphones about the latest gaming system they spent all day worshiping. And their daughters? Uggs, Juicy Couture, need I say more? When we delivered, most clients lived in better houses in better neighborhoods than the one we were going home to; and their live-in boyfriends would make some crack about having to move out now so Girlfriend wouldn't get kicked off the free food list. "Thank yous" were rare. And when I shopped throughout the week to restock food bank shelves, the head of the program told me explicitly name brand products were preferred because "clients won't take generics."

Our definition of "hunger" and our methods of "helping" in this country notwithstanding, this is what doing the Lord's work looked like for a period in our life. Don't get me wrong, there were those desperately in need and as equally grateful; but those who obviously knew how to play the system, who traveled from one giveaway to the next and called their friends to "get over here, they've got turkeys!" -- those were the folks who really made serving messy; who really made the Lord's work hard to deal with.

After many late night discussions about the program and its obvious faults, Scott and I believed God had a great love for these people, and wanted us to love them as well. They were facing a much more nefarious type of hunger, a hunger they didn't even know they had, a hunger that Jesus fully satisfies; it had more to do with what was in their hearts than what was on their plates. It is because of this we agreed to stay until God removed us in His time -- and He did. Although working for God can be messy and unromantic, it is never without purpose, and "dealing with it" can be God's way of dealing with us. And just like the rich young ruler, God had a heavenly treasure for us if we simply laid down ourselves.