Jesus' 'program'

I was once invited to a house meeting where a Bible school professor spoke about her new book. I gladly came because I had read the book and was excited about her insight into the biblical matters she had written about. At the end of the author’s brief lecture, encouraged by the enthusiastic feedback of her audience, she said she had been privately brainstorming some of the ways her book could be applied to the boardrooms of various companies. She asked what we thought.

There was mostly silence from the audience, as we all perhaps felt out of our depth. Finally, one man in attendance, another professor, gently commented that in general he rather feared the tendency to quickly turn good spiritual insights into programs.

I never forgot that comment, and it has subsequently ripened in my mind, with Scripture, into an understanding that the Lord’s work is not about programs but about the humble and (by grace) doable matter of living every hour in obedience to the promptings of the Spirit.

Or to put it another way, if you want a program, here is a program for you:

“… Morning by morning he awakens; he awakens my ear to hear as those who are taught. The Lord GOD has opened my ear, and I was not rebellious; I turned not backward. I gave my back to those who strike, and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard; I hid not my face from disgrace and spitting. But the Lord GOD helps me; therefore I have not been disgraced; therefore I have set my face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be put to shame” (Isaiah 50:4-7).

You will recognize this as Jesus’ “program.” And now He passes the baton to us and it is ours.

Obey the Word of the Lord daily and you will have enough program to work on to last a lifetime.