Food and Friends |
Mar 25, 2010 |
As I opened my refrigerator door the other day there was something that jumped out at me as if I had never seen it before. No, it wasn’t the gallon container of milk, the tub of sour cream, the egg carton or the five new flavors of yogurt my wife had just purchased…..what jumped out at me was that each one, and many other items, all had expiration dates on them.
Each of these products is beneficial as long as they are utilized. And, if by chance, I would fail to acknowledge there was an expiration date on any one of these, I would soon know their worth was no longer any good by the many other external factors that can take place. Go ahead…take a moment to visualize that grayish green color fuzzy thing with that strong musty smell that only mold can produce..I didn’t think you wanted to go there!
You see, for me these things are motivators. These motivate me to engage and put to good use each item before it might spoil and have no value. At times I will drink another cup of milk, or have the extra egg, because I would never want to be viewed as a bad steward of those things God has allowed me to posses.
Yet as I sit here and ponder how I care for my stuff, I am saddened to think that there are things that are much more valuable that God has entrusted to me to care for which are not things at all but are people. These individuals who I may not have seen as helpful, who I may have failed to connect with, engage or disciple as I should have, are of great value…they're priceless. Yet somehow I seem to continually leave them on the shelf and don’t allow them to be useful for the purpose that they were created.
It is up to me to engage those people God has allowed to come into my life. I should never expect them to take the initiative, and jump in front of my face and say, “use me!” But, that I need to set up some motivators that remind me to engage those people God has entrusted to me.
At Mission Increase Foundation we refer often to our “Ten Principles of Transformational Giving” which are the very core of all we teach and coach. But what these really are for each of us are motivators which remind us that God is the one who has sent these individuals to us. I have found that Transformational Giving Principle Six is a core motivator for me where it states, “The champion, not the organization, is called to be the primary means of advancing the cause within the champion’s sphere of influence. So, if I am going to have greater impact for the cause I care so much about, I must connect with those God sent champions and allow them to be active as long as they are able.
No I don’t plan on printing numbers on the foreheads of my friends, and I wouldn’t think God would appreciate me trying to estimate how long my relationships with others may or may not last. But what I do think God would appreciate, and feel was honoring to Him, was that I prayerfully consider how I ought to connect with each of these that He has allowed to come into my life.
My challenge for us today would be that as we seek God's direction for our lives that He would show us some of those who have connected with us that we have failed to engage. And that those faces would remain in our minds and be used as a motivator until we would not only have a conversation with them, but that we would engage them for that purpose which God has so graciously equipped them.
