Tuesday, September 11, 2012

Cry Out in the "Surprise"

This week, I will be surprised.

Life is fluid. Change is thrust upon us. Part of who you are in Christ is how you react to surprises.

Just when I think I’ve got everything figured out, something changes.

And that happens just about every day!

We look at a river, and it seems to flow along exactly the same route day after day, year after year. But in reality, the route of the river is always changing. The hardness of the rock that forms the channel, or the wind direction and velocity, nudge the water-flow against the edges of the channel. Gradually the pressure carves out a new route.

Or — suddenly — a tree falls, or a boulder tumbles down a mountain, and the water is forced to re-route instantly.

In any event, the pressure is constant, the change is constant, and our inability to prevent it is constant!

As ministry leaders, we tend to want to control events. We want to minimize risk, maximize positive potential — chart the course, see it through, celebrate success. It’s not a “power trip”; it’s passion for the mission!

But even so, it’s hopeless. The river is shifting its course. The lay of the land is different every day. A worker moves away; a terrorist act makes donors quit giving; another ministry pops up and somehow overlaps your mission.

How will I react to the surprises?

Dr. Darryl DelHousaye of Phoenix Seminary says the way to tell what’s really inside a Christian is to bump him and see what spills out. When someone yells “Surprise!”, what do I yell back?

Change is often — maybe even usually — painful. But pain is the most effective growth device in the world. The apostle Paul observes in Romans 5:3,4 that we can “rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.” He’s mapping out the ideal spiritual growth curve of the Christ-follower’s life. To make me more like Christ, more like God’s ideal for me, he starts with a secret ingredient: pain!

The challenge of change has an equally potent side-effect: It more or less forces us to keep turning back to God for direction. When Jesus in Luke 18 tells the parable of the pushy widow and the unjust judge, he holds up the ideal of talking with God about our problems “day and night.” Jesus isn’t giving us carte blanche. The promise of this parable is for his followers who are willing to “always pray and not give up” (Luke 18:1), “who cry out to him day and night” (Luke 18:7).

Ministry leadership is a wonderful source of pain, because it’s more than just new: It’s ever-new. It’s a constant source of the character-building pain of change! (Somebody say “Hooray.”) This week, someone will yell “Surprise!” I need to be ready to “cry out” to God — not just with a yelp for help in that first moment of shock, but “day and night”!

My Prayer for the Next Seven Days... God, please fill me up with your Spirit, so fully that when I’m bumped this week, it will be your Spirit that people see spilling out! Amen.


1 Peter 4:12-13
Dear friends, do not be surprised at the painful trial you are suffering, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice that you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed.

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