Taking a Closer Look at the Big Picture

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1. 

   Dennis Owen

   01/20/2011

   God has a plan—a GOOD plan—and we need some insights in how we should live all the time. First, it takes discipline. Central to our faith as followers of Jesus Christ is that “God is our Father.” Paul wrote: “…You received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, ‘Abba, Father’” (Romans 8:15). A good father disciplines and teaches his children. So need to take a closer look at the big picture.

   What insights can we gain from Joseph’s life that will help us to live lives that are more pleasing to God? Proverbs 12:1 tells us, “Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge, but he who hates correction is stupid.” And Proverbs 13:18 warns us, “He who ignores discipline comes to poverty and shame, but whoever heeds
   correction is honored.”

   I believe there are two types of discipline: correction and direction. Correction is God’s way of getting our attention! Jesus says to the church in Laodicea, “Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline” (Revelation 3:19). And in Proverbs 3:11 we read, “My son, do not despise the Lord’s discipline and do not resent his rebuke, because the Lord disciplines those he loves, as a father the son he delights in.”

   Throughout the Bible we read about how God used famines, wars, captivity, wanderings in the desert, and other hardships to discipline the nation of Israel. None of the Old Testament prophets or the New Testament men and women of God were spared hardship.

   Joseph was sold into slavery in Egypt by his own brothers, but he did not indulge in self-pity or try to point blame. Rather, he continually saw God’s hand on his life and sought to serve Him. He eventually became
   the second most powerful man in Egypt, second only to Pharaoh. Many years later, when he was reunited with his brothers, he was not filled with anger and a desire for revenge. Rather he said, (Genesis 45:8)
   “…It was not you who sent me here, but God.”

   In this life we see through a glass darkly. We cannot see God’s overarching plan from our limited perspectives. However, it is wise and biblical for us to view this current difficult situations as an opportunity rather than a calamity. We do well to accept it as discipline from the Lord and use it as a catalyst for examining our lives and returning to biblical precepts in areas where we have strayed. In Psalm 119:71-72, the Psalmist says, “It was good for me to be afflicted so that I might learn your decrees. The law from your mouth is more precious to me than thousands of pieces of silver and gold.”

   So let’s look at some things God might possibly be teaching us through this time of trial. Paul wrote to the Church in Ephesus Ephesians 4:22-24: “You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.” God’s word warns us that the way the world does business is not always the way God does. There are attitudes and habits that God may want us to “take off” and some we may need to “put on.” So discipline is not just punishment, it is training.

   Indeed, God is at work and doing so much more than our immediate perspective allows us to see if we’re only focused on the injustices committed against you your own mistakes and sins or the normal tragedies of life. Like Joseph, the pathway we walk as Christ followers is often strewn with rocks and stones. Scripture talks about “a rock of offense,” something to be careful of so it will not cause you to stumble and fall. “Behold, I lay in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense…” (Rom 9:33; 1 Peter 2:8) is a prophecy that Jesus Himself, but also the word of God, can cause us to “fall” if we are offended by Jesus Himself or by being identified with Him, or for adhering to the Word of God when others are not, so that we suffer persecution as a result. To “fall” is always a picture of falling away from God and His righteousness.

   “Injustices committed against you; even your own mistakes and sins, even in the midst of the normal tragedies of life” may make us want to go hide somewhere we think is safer, Angel. Abraham did it and Israel after him had a habit of heading for Egypt when trouble came. God warned, “Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help, and rely on horses, and trust in chariots because they are many, and in horsemen because they are very strong, But they do not look to the Holy One of Israel, nor seek the Lord!” (Is 31:1-3). We may want to head for Egypt or for where we think there will be no “offense,” but ultimately there is no safety other than in the Lord really.

   We must take a closer look at the big picture of God’s intentions in our minds, our hearts and our spirits. The above verse about laying in Zion a stone of stumbling ends with, “and he who believes in Him will not be disappointed.” Never disappointed when we are trusting in the Lord! If we’re experiencing disappointment, we’re being short-sighted; we’re focused on the rocky path only just below our feet and not on all that God has promised to us. He is always at work and it is always redemptive. We see what He’s doing by faith. Psalm 34:5 tells us that if we look to Him we will never be ashamed but radiant instead. It’s all in the perspective. We get to choose how to look at things, and what we’ll focus on. Life happens. Sometimes critical issues come up that we have to deal with. But the Lord has made us a promise we “know” we can depend on: “We know that to them that love God all things work together for good, even to them that are called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28).

   God will use whatever is happening in our lives as sculpting tools to carve us into a vessel worthy of honor. We give Him praise and it is He that keeps us on the trail in the midst of our trials while we’re trying not to tread on any rocks of offense.

   Offenses also, as we know, can come from people whom the devil is trying to use to get us to be oblivious to the bigger picture of what God is doing and to get us to focus inwardly at our own painful rock-induced injuries or at what the devil is stirring up (secretly — he never tells us its coming from him.) He wants us to think we are each other’s enemies. But that’s a lie. We’re really one in Jesus with a common enemy — the devil.

   But we are not subject to the devil’s plans for us, nor are trials or “rocks of offense” going to derail us from getting to the top of our mountain. Yeshua is Lord of our lives and He is watching over us. So our perspective for the here and now and for the future is to fully trust in “…Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy” (Jude 1:24). To that I say a resounding….Yes!

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