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May the Lord direct your hearts into God’s love and Christ’s perseverance. (2 Thessalonians 3:5 NIV)
God’s love and the patient steadfastness of Jesus is the winning combination, and is the prayer Paul desires us to pray for ourselves and others.
I like some of the aspects of this verse that are amplified in different translations:
May the Lord direct your hearts into realizing and showing the love of God and the steadfastness and patience of Christ and in waiting for His return. (AMPC)
May the Lord lead your hearts into a full understanding and expression of the love of God and the patient endurance that comes from Christ. (NLT)
And check out what Jesus said to the Church at Ephesus about not losing hold of their first love as they patiently endure (Revelation 2:3-4).
The agape love of our Heavenly Father
+ The patient endurance of Jesus
+ The instruction and encouragement of the Holy Spirit
= My loving endurance which is a testimony to others
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Colossians 3 is a catalog of heart changes that reveal themselves as behavior changes. Intermingled in these instructions Paul gives some summary “whatever you do” mile markers.
Whatever virtues the Holy Spirit is developing in my life, my motivation for sticking with the sanctification process must be love. Love for God and love for those around me must be my motivator. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity (Colossians 3:14).
Whatever behaviors the Holy Spirit is prompting me to add, or change, or remove from my life, I must be able to say “yes” to each item on this list:
Am I doing what Jesus would do?
Am I thankful that I am doing what I am doing?
Am I doing what I am doing wholeheartedly?
And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him (Colossians 3:17).
One attitude check—am I operating in love?—and the three behavior checks listed above, should be something I regularly review. I want to make sure that whatever I do, I am working at it with all my heart, as working for the Lord, not for men (see Colossians 3:23).
It’s wonderful to make changes in my life, but I have to make sure that whatever I am changing is supported by the right attitude and pursuing the right goal, so that Jesus is glorified in my life.
In my book review of Spiritual Leadership, by Henry Blackaby and Richard Blackaby, I commented that this book combines two of my favorite topics: Leaders and the Bible. I highlighted so many passages in this book, but here are a few quotes that show that merging of leadership and biblical studies.
“Spiritual Leadership is moving people on to God’s agenda. … Spiritual leaders cannot produce spiritual change in people; only the Holy Spirit can do that. Yet through the Spirit, God often uses people to bring about spiritual growth in others. … That is the crux of spiritual leadership. Leaders seek to move people on to God’s agenda, all the while being aware that only the Holy Spirit can ultimately accomplish the task.”
“Spiritual leadership is taking people from where they are to where God wants them to be. Because God’s agenda drives spiritual leaders, it is God, and not the leader, who determines when His will has been accomplished (1 Samuel 15:13–24).”
“An important truth that is often overlooked is that spiritual leaders can influence all people, not just Christians.”
“According to the Bible, God is not necessarily looking for leaders, at least not in the sense we might think. He is looking for servants (Isaiah 59:16; Ezekiel 22:30).”
“It is generally in tumultuous times that people make the greatest difference in their world. The greater the crisis, the greater is the opportunity for leaders to make a difference. Those who complain about their difficulties or shrink from crises prove they are not leaders regardless of whether they hold such an office. But people who recognize the opportunity history affords them and boldly accept the invitation will change their world. … True spiritual leaders do not wring their hands and wistfully recount the better times of days gone by. Genuine leaders understand they have but one life to live and so they expend it with purpose and passion. God placed you on the earth at this particular crossroad in history. You live in a time of great challenges but enormous opportunity.”
“God has the vision of what He wants to do. God does not ask leaders to dream big dreams for Him or to solve the problems confronting them with their own best thinking. He asks leaders to walk with Him so intimately that when He reveals His agenda they immediately adjust their lives and their organizations to His will and the results bring glory to God.”
“Leadership development is synonymous with personal development. As leaders grow personally, they increase their ability to lead. As they increase their capability to lead, they enlarge the capacity of their organization to grow. Therefore, the most crucial objective for any leader is personal growth. … The most important thing spiritual leaders do is cultivate their relationship with God (John 15:5; Jeremiah 7:13).”
More quotes from this amazing book are coming soon, so stay tuned!
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An old Sunday School song had me joyfully singing, “I’m in the Lord’s army!” I loved playing “Army” with my friends and I also loved this song and the idea behind it, but it seems like many seasoned saints today get a little uncomfortable with the idea of a militant Church. But military-like precision was drilled into everything the Church was taught from the days of Moses all through the end of the New Testament.
Let’s just consider the precision of the movement of the tribes of Israel. For 40 years in the wilderness they were an army on the move, and they moved with precision that was drilled into them.
Numbers 2 lays out the precise encampment arrangements.
Numbers 10:14-36 tells us precisely how they marched out with the vanguard, supporting troops, and rearguard.
Charles T. Crabtree wrote, “As spiritual people we are to understand spiritual warfare. We are to be alert to the devil’s devices. We are not to be obsessed with demonic strategy; we are simply, through God, to understand it and be superior to it.”
We are in a spiritual battle that requires spiritual armor (Ephesians 6:11-13), and we must practice for precision in which armor and which weapons to use (2 Corinthians 10:4; 2 Timothy 2:3-4).
My friend Dan Chastain spent more than 20 years serving in the US Army, and he notices several parallels between what the Bible says about military leaders and what he learned in his long military service. He shared four key characteristics of warriors:
Dedication to honorable service
Obedience and loyalty to whom and what they serve
Integrity at all costs
Selfless service
Dan also shared the US Army’s model of Be, Know, and Do. Which is also vital for Christian warriors today.
When Joshua—the general of the Israelite army—took over, he was given this directive by God: Meditate on God’s Word so that you can live by it (Joshua 1:6-8), and the New Testament would agree (2 Timothy 3:16-17). So we, too, will learn from the military leaders that Scripture has given us how to practice our precision in the Lord’s Army.
Let’s make sure we can finish well. As Paul said to Timothy, “Fight the good fight of the faith. … I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith” (1 Timothy 6:12; 2 Timothy 4:7).
You can start today by applying Be, Know, and Do with the Training Manual for the Lord’s Army every single day:
Be in the training Manual every day
Know the Manual
Do what the Manual says
Follow along with all of the messages in our series on The Lord’s Army.
Craig T. Owens 