I am currently reading through the New Testament with the Message Bible
What I’m trying to do here is get you to relax, not be so preoccupied with getting so you can respond to God’s giving.
Luke 12:29
It seems to me that when I am focused on getting, I often miss what God was trying to give me.
I can remember times I was so focused on what I wanted and how I could get it, that I was blinded to the fact that God was answering my prayer in a better, but different, way than I expected. In fact I would say that most of my great breakthroughs were delivered by God in a way I was not expecting at all. He seems to get a kick out of doing that.
Getting often involves taking something with force, rather than receiving what God has given us. God loves to give us gifts and wants to bless us. The challenge is to wait to receive from Him rather than taking things in our own energy with our own force.
I wrote a post about this a while ago. In it I talked about how using credit cards could be robbing us of a blessing. If we pray and ask God to provide something for us, we could be stealing an opportunity for God to bless us in a special and unique way if we just run out and charge it just because we don’t want to wait. The keys, of course, are trusting God and having the patience to wait for it. I know I have jumped the gun and missed it more times than I can count, but it is a personal goal of mine to become more of a receiver of God’s blessings and less of an impatient taker.
I know the lines between the two can often be very fine and shades of gray, but what do you think?
Related posts:
- Budgeting for giving
- Finding the will of God for your life (and job)
- The Biblical Prosperity debate
- Who really brings the financial increase?
- Getting out of Debt : It’s not about you (Part 1)
- Trash cans and giving
- Giving quotes
- 6 reasons for giving more in 2009
{ 1 trackback }
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
I love how God blesses me! Once, I was playing bingo at a charity event and I wanted to win a book (money wasn’t the prize but rather books and promotional items). I never won and I kept praying and praying. I was getting myself into a tizzy over it and finally stopped the stress I was putting myself in and the demands I was making on God. I then enjoyed playing and getting to know my tablemates. At the end of the evening, a total stranger walked up to me and asked me if I wanted a book he had won since he already had it. You guessed it: it was the book I had prayed to win. God wanted to GIVE it to me and I learned a big, big lesson about NOT putting God into a box or make demands on how I want Him to move in my life.
Steph,
that is a good illustration… I find myself in situations like that so often – it almost always seem that the blessing follows me letting go…
It’s funny how when we just give in to God and are obedient that he blesses us in ways we couldn’t have imagined. My wife and I hadn’t regularly tithed at our church until we felt prompted to do it earlier this year. After we started tithing, my income actually rose more than twice the amount that we were tithing, and we were blessed in other ways. When we’re obedient God is faithful
Good reminder. With these crazy times ahead, not to rely on my strength but put my trust into the creator. I hate to just wait though.
Thank you so much for this post. I am going to stumble it. You are so right! Letting go is the most important thing we can do!
What Bible translation is that? I’m familiar with NASB, NIV, and KVJ, but this looks a lot different.
Peter,
I have said this many times, the giving away actually facilitates the receiving of blessings from God. It is our sin nature (pride) that makes us close out hands rather than open them up and share.