The Rest of the Story

This past weekend our pastor shared the theme for our church this year, and imagine this: it goes right along with what God has been doing in my heart. How cool is that! I just love when God does things like this.

So what is our theme at DC for 2011? EPIC. Basically, don't be ordinary. Live extraordinary lives. How exactly do you do that? Make God the center of everything you do and say, invite Him into every single situation, big or small. Have your entire life revolve around Him.

Our pastor spoke about Jesus when He was 12 years old and got "lost" and His parents spent days searching for Him. Of course He was in the temple, listening to the teachers and asking them questions. According to Jesus, He had to be there, in His Father's house, doing His Father's business. During the sermon, an artist was painting what she thought would capture the main point of the message. To depict Jesus' intense focus on God, the artist painted a picture of an eye with a cross in the center of the pupil (or iris, but that's not the point). At 12 years old, Jesus already knew His mission and His mind was completely set on accomplishing it. The practical application for us today: what we think about will determine how we live. If God is the center of our thoughts, if doing His will is our ultimate goal, then our lives will show that. Not only will how we live each day change, our perspective (and certainly attitude as well) about what happens to us will be greatly affected.

Recently, I got to have coffee with a good friend. We discussed the hardships of life, the unfairness of experiencing unexplained pain or difficulty. She made a good point though. She had been reading through the Old Testament and kept seeing time and time again how "famous" characters endured quite the trials. In fact, she couldn't think of one single person who had life easy. For you see, the concept of being "epic" erases the entire idea of "easy." If you choose to live epically, you are willingly forfeiting an "easy" life. You are choosing the "road less traveled," and that will make all the difference (as Robert Frost would say).

As I thought about the Old Testament and some of the familiar stories, three kept coming to mind. Growing up I saw these characters' lives depicted on flannel graph; I knew the stories by heart. But given our recent loss, I have come to see (and appreciate) these men in a whole new light. I can relate to them in a new way. And I hope that I can respond to pain and difficulty the same way they did.

First up is Joseph. He was the favored son, but the resented brother. He didn't elect himself to this position. It just happened. In addition to being picked on daily (I am guessing), he was eventually thrown into a pit while his brothers decided if they should kill him or sell him into slavery, neither very good options for Joseph, but then again he wasn't really in a position to offer any suggestions. Thankfully for Joseph, his brothers spared his life, but he would live as a slave.

Good fortune seemed to shine on him (really God was doing His thing), for Joseph was placed in charge of Potiphar's house. Then along came Potiphar's jealous wife who went and ruined his reputation. Prison wasn't all that bad though (yeah right!), after all Joseph was put in charge there too. He spent way more time there than he expected since the chief cupbearer got all caught up in celebrating his restored position and forgot all about Joseph back in prison.

Finally, Joseph is given a second chance when Pharoah has a dream and the chief cupbear's amnesia suddenly disappears. Joseph is immediately elevated to the second in command and basically ends up saving all of Egypt, not to mention those nasty brothers who thought he wasn't worth more than a few pieces of silver.

After all that he went through, you would think that given the opportunity, Joseph would want to ring his brothers' necks. Instead, we see that he chose to live epically. His mind was set on doing the will of God, which affected how he saw and responded to everything that happened to him. This is the only reason why Joseph would be able to say to his brothers, "You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done."

Great, we think. Of course God intended it for good. He had to get you to Egypt so you could think up a plan to keep everyone from starving during the famine. Makes perfect sense! Yeah, to us, who know the whole story from beginning to end. Joseph didn't know the end of the story when he was in the middle of it! He only knew what was taking place right then, and I am sure it didn't seem fair to him at the time (it wouldn't have to me)! I would have wanted to yell at God, to give him a piece of my mind and ask Him why after I had faithfully served Him was He allowing me to experience trial after trial. Not until Joseph saw his brothers was he able to see and understand the full scope of God's plan. Only then did he know the rest of the story (as Paul Harvey would say).

But because Joseph had chosen to be epic, he was, without knowing the end of the story, able to accept whatever God brought His way, invite God into that situation, and trust that He would use it for His good, somehow, sometime. He trusted that God would complete the story, for he had fixed His eyes on God, believing that He was the author of his faith, from beginning to end (Hebrews 12).

My practical application: I don't know what God is doing in my life right now. I don't know how He is using my present situation to bring about good. I don't know how He is going to accomplish that good thing. I just know He is. I don't have the advantage of knowing the end of the story. Like Joseph I have to accept whatever God brings my way, invite Him into this situation, and trust that somehow, sometime He will finish the story. Like Joseph, I have to fix my eyes on Christ, believing that He is the author and perfecter of my faith, from beginning to end, whenever that may be.

My next two examples are Daniel, and his three friends: Shadrach, Meshach, and Abendego. But given the length of this post already, I think I will save my thoughts on them for later. I guess you will have to wait to hear the rest of the story...