Ready or not . . .

“The truth about being ready is you’ll never be ready.”- John Ortberg

As John Ortberg continues Chapter 2 of All the Places to Go, he notes that there’s a whole syndrome around the fear of not being ready for life, opportunities, or challenges.  It’s called “failure to launch.”  The problem is that life, opportunities, and challenges all have a way of saying, “Ready or not, here I come.”

Pastor Ortberg states that “feeling ready” is not the ultimate criterion determining our readiness for God’s open doors.  We place too  much stock in “feeling ready.”  If we are to enter an open door, it has to be by faith.  Our faith grows when God tells us to “Go” and we say yes.

John adds that no one in the Bible responded “I’m ready” when God called them to do something.  Take Moses when God called him to speak to Pharaoh: “I have never been eloquent. . . . I am slow of speech and tongue (Exodus 4:10).”

Until we actually do something, we truly do not know what we can do.  And if we’re already moving, “ready” comes much faster.  What matters is not whether we’re ready.  What matters is that Jesus is ready.  John concludes:

“And you and I never know when he’s ready.  He’s in charge of that.”

Today’s question: What Bible verses have strengthened your faith and obedience to follow Jesus’ leading?  Please share.

Coming Tuesday; the new Short Meditation, “Turn around”

Tomorrow’s blog: “Coming from and going to”

 

 

Ready or not . . .

Staytheists

In Chapter 2 (“Open-door People and Closed-door People”) of All the Places to Go, John Ortberg draws upon the research of Carol Dweek, who came to the conclusion that human beings possess one of two differing and almost opposite mind-sets about life.  Pastor Ortberg categorizes them  as “closed mind-sets” and “open mind-sets”.

1.  Closed mind-set.   People with closed mind-sets believe their worth is directly connected with how talented they are.  Generally, going through open doors is to be avoided.  Every time there is a challenge one’s worth is on the line.  A successful life is devoid of failure.

2.  Open mind-set.  People with open mind-sets believe that growth trumps raw ability.  Growth always is possible.  Commitment to growth means embracing challenge- growing beyond where one is today.  Failure is absolutely necessary and something to learn from.

John notes that closed-door thinking may masquerade as prudence or commonsense.  In reality, it’s refusing to trust God due to fear.  It’s claiming to believe in God.  Yet, when God says “Go”, they stay.  They’re Staytheists.  Open doors are scarier than closed doors because we never know for certain what will happen when we walk through.  Even though we want to know what we’re getting into, we never will.  Pastor Ortberg thinks that’s a good thing, because if we did know, we’d never get into it in the first place.

Today’s question: Which mind-set most characterizes your current thinking?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: Ready or not . . .”

Staytheists

Moments of divine opportunity

John Ortberg concludes Chapter 1 of All the Places to Go with the observation that God’s primary interest is character-formation, not circumstance-shaping:

“God’s primary will for your life is not the achievement you accrue; it’s the person you become.  God’s primary will for your life is not what job you ought to take; it’s not primarily situational or circumstantial. . . . God’s primary will for your life is that you become a magnificent person in his image, somebody with the character of Jesus.  That is God’s main will for your life.  No circumstance can change that.”

Because God is in the open door business, that means a new way of (a) looking at God; (b) looking at life; (c) looking at myself; and (d) choosing.  Every moment provides the opportunity to find a door that opens into God and His presence.  Even though we may go through the “wrong door” with the right heart, God can use that experience.

Pastor Ortberg states that we need to train ourselves to search for and respond to moments of divine opportunity if we want to experience more of the Spirit of God in our lives.  God’s open doors must not be met with our closed hearts.  The open door leads to the place where God guides.

Today’s question: What moments of divine opportunity have you experienced following your vocation loss?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Staytheists”

 

Moments of divine opportunity

Opened doors

“What matters is not a guarantee about the outcome.  What matters is the adventure of the journey.”- John Ortberg

John Ortberg observes in Chapter 1 of All the Places to Go that often God does not tell us which open door to choose.  For us, this can be quite frustrating.  We want assurance that we’re making the right choice.

Pastor Ortberg states that it took him many years to understand that God may have great reasons for leaving open door choices to us.  Open doors help us struggle with our true dreams and motives.  When John was contemplating leaving California, his wife’s home, to accept a call to Willow Creek Church in the Chicago area, a friend gave him Dr. Seuss’ book Oh, the Places You’ll Go!  Dr. Seuss provided John with the following career guidance:

“You have brains in your head

You have feet in your shoes.

You can steer yourself in any direction you choose. . . .

Oh, the places you’ll go! . . .

Except when you don’t.

Because, sometimes, you won’t.”

Oh, the places you’ll go!– the promise of the God of the open door.  God rarely interrupts someone and asks them to remain in comfortable, safe, and familiar surroundings.  This very moment is alive with opportunity.  In Revelation, John wrote to the church at Philadelphia that what stood before them was an opened door- God was at work.  The opportunities before us aren’t merely human.  They are not open doors, but opened doors.

Today’s question: What opened doors has God provided during your desert, transitional time?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Moments of divine opportunity”

 

Opened doors

Divine opportunity alertness

John Ortberg continues Chapter 1 of All the Places to Go with the observation that often an open door begins with discontentment about the room we’re currently in.  Although our strength may be small (Revelation 3:8), Pastor Ortberg states it’s comforting to know that God can open a door for anyone, not just the talented or extraordinarily strong.  Furthermore, God can open a door in any circumstance.  While in a Nazi concentration camp, Viktor Frankl found an open door his guards didn’t know existed:

“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of human freedoms- to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to chose one’s own way.”

John defines divine opportunity alertness as “the ability to discover the range of possibilities that lie before us in every moment and in any circumstance.”  Divine opportunity alertness is a skill that can be learned.  Yet, open doors don’t exist solely for our benefit.  They are opportunities to bless someone else.  Open doors also involve a good not yet fully revealed.

Pastor Ortberg cautions that an open door is neither a blueprint nor a guarantee.  It doesn’t come with a detailed set of instructions from God.  An open door is . . . an open door. If we want to find out what is on the other side, we have to go through it.

Today’s question: What has enabled you to cultivate divine opportunity alertness?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: the new addition to the Annotated Bibliography, The Grave Robber

 

Divine opportunity alertness

Six words

“See, I have place before you an open door that no one can shut.  I know that you have little strength, yet you have kept my word and have not denied my name.”- Revelation 3:8

John Ortberg’s latest book is titled All the Places to Go . . . How Will You Know?  Pastor Ortberg begins Chapter 1 with this question: If you had to summarize your life in six words, what would they be?  The six-word limitation challenges us to focus on what matters most, to briefly capture something of significance.  John reports that Winston Churchill once sent back a desert pudding because “it lacked a theme.”

None of us want our life to be like Churchill’s pudding.  Yet we aren’t the authors or the pawns of our life stories.  We have an unseen Partner- God.  One of the pictures of God-inspired opportunity sprinkled across Scripture is that of an open door.  Although the image of a door can mean safety, hiddenness, rejection, or rest, in Scripture an open door is symbolic of boundless opportunities, as John defines:

“An open door is an opportunity provided by God to act with God and for God.”

An open door means the possibility of being useful to God.  God’s offer of an open door, and our response to it, comprise the subject of this book.

Today’s question: How would you describe your life in six words?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Remember the resurrection”

Six words

Remember the resurrection

“Lord . . . if you had been here, my brother would not have died.  But I know that even now God will give you whatever you ask.”- John 11:21-22

Mark Batterson states in Chapter 23 of The Grave Robber that many Christians only remember Christ’s resurrection at Easter.  The other 364 days they live as if Jesus still is nailed to the cross.

If we feel as if our dream is dead and buried, we have forgotten about the resurrection.  Yet God has us right where He wants us.  Pastor Batterson notes that the litmus test of a dream is its death and resurrection:

“If it’s not from God, it’ll stay dead.  If it is, it will rise again.  But you need to pray through until you get a breakthrough.”

Mark emphasizes that while most miracles take longer than we want to wait for them, the longer we wait the greater our appreciation of those miracles: “Miracles happen when we’re good and ready, and not a moment sooner.”

Martha’s statement in John 11:21-22, Mark observes, reveals two types of faith:

1.  Preventative faith– believes God can prevent adverse things from happening.

2.  Resurrection faith– believes God actually can undo what’s been done.  It puts commas, rather than periods, at the end of disappointments.

Jesus’ raising Lazarus from the dead demonstrates that when God takes something away from us, it doesn’t always mean permanently.  God often takes things away with the specific purpose of giving them back.  When He does, we see the miracle for the blessing it is.

Today’s question: What Bible verse enable you to remember the resurrection every day?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Six words”

 

 

Remember the resurrection