GET OUT OF THE WAY

Our elders at Memorial, as well as our staff, have an unofficial motto: Get Out of the Way. 

I like it a lot.  It fits us.  More exciting to me is that it seems to fit the kingdom work here.

When the Psalmist wrote Be still and know I am God, I didn't take note of that being anything special.  The side note in the NASB for be still is Let go and relax.  For a championer of causes this struck me as cotton candy insignificance in my earlier years.

So, God let me go forward with my ambition and energy and religious exercises.  It turned out I wasn't as much as I once thought I might be, could be, should be.  Hmmmm.

It took a few failures for me to awaken to the Psalmist's urging.  My arms weren't strong enough.  Nor were my feet fleet enough.  I needed bigger help.  The way to attain it seemed so backwards.  This should have been my first hint I was nearing the proper procedure.

Sharon Hersh wrote, The gift of powerlessness is that it can compel us to let go.  Right on!  Powerlessness is not our handicap.  It is a gift.  Awaken to its beauty.

Of course the kingdom needs more workers.  Jesus is about the grand life-walk.  We are to follow such a course.  But recall his statement that apart from the Father he could do nothing? 

The secret to Jesus' effectiveness (and ours) is to realize we are powerless and He owns the power.  Yes, we need more workers to let go....to let go of our weak-armed, slow-footed, try-harder dispositions and lean into the glory of this wonderful gift we each posses labeled powerlessness.

When we at Memorial quit plotting, planning, and controlling (when we got out of the way), it seems the church began to breathe deeper than we had ever seen.  Works and results keep sprouting at a rate that we can neither track nor take credit. 

We don't understand it; but getting out of the way has become a source of leadership among us that, to many, could appear weak and silly.  Yet, He seems to be willing to work this terrain. 

Our job? 

To give God the glory...and we do.

It took me a bit to grab the parallel truth in Romans 9:16; yet it surely fits.  So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy.