God’s Schedule or Ours?

Friday, August 26, 2016

by Dr. Paul Chappell

“And as they heard these things, he added and spake a parable, because he was nigh to Jerusalem, and because they thought that the kingdom of God should immediately appear.”

Luke 19:11

George Matheson experienced great hardship in his life. He showed enormous academic promise as a young man and was preparing for the ministry when he lost his eyesight. His fiancée was unwilling to marry a man who was blind and broke their engagement. Matheson never married, but he faithfully pastored for many years in Scotland and preached for Queen Victoria when she visited her castle at Balmoral. Today he is best remembered for a poem he wrote on the day of his sister’s wedding which we know as the hymn “O Love that Will Not Let Me Go.”

Matheson wrote, “We commonly associate patience with lying down. We think of it as the angel that guards the couch of the invalid. Yet there is a patience that I believe to be harder—the patience that can run. To lie down in the time of grief, to be quiet under the stroke of adverse fortune, implies a great strength; but I know of something that implies a strength greater still: it is the power to work under stress; to have a great weight at your heart and still run; to have a deep anguish in your spirit and still perform the daily tasks. It is a Christ-like thing! The hardest thing is that most of us are called to exercise our patience, not in the sickbed but in the street.”

One of the main reasons that many people rejected Jesus as the Messiah was that He had not come to establish an immediate earthly kingdom. They had no interest in waiting for the timing that God had ordained—they wanted deliverance immediately. Too often we fail to submit our will to God’s timing for our lives.

Today's Growth Principle
When we are impatient, we are declaring that we think we know how our lives should go better than God does.

Old Testament Reading

Psalm 120-122

PSALM 120

A Song of degrees.

¹ In my distress I cried unto the LORD, and he heard me. ² Deliver my soul, O LORD, from lying lips, and from a deceitful tongue. ³ What shall be given unto thee? or what shall be done unto thee, thou false tongue? ⁴ Sharp arrows of the mighty, with coals of juniper.

⁵ Woe is me, that I sojourn in Mesech, that I dwell in the tents of Kedar! ⁶ My soul hath long dwelt with him that hateth peace. ⁷ I am for peace: but when I speak, they are for war.

PSALM 121

A Song of degrees.

¹ I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. ² My help cometh from the LORD, which made heaven and earth. ³ He will not suffer thy foot to be moved: he that keepeth thee will not slumber. ⁴ Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep. ⁵ The LORD is thy keeper: the LORD is thy shade upon thy right hand. ⁶ The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night. ⁷ The LORD shall preserve thee from all evil: he shall preserve thy soul. ⁸ The LORD shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth, and even for evermore.

PSALM 122

A Song of degrees of David.

¹ I was glad when they said unto me, Let us go into the house of the LORD. ² Our feet shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem. ³ Jerusalem is builded as a city that is compact together: ⁴ Whither the tribes go up, the tribes of the LORD, unto the testimony of Israel, to give thanks unto the name of the LORD. ⁵ For there are set thrones of judgment, the thrones of the house of David.

⁶ Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: they shall prosper that love thee. ⁷ Peace be within thy walls, and prosperity within thy palaces. ⁸ For my brethren and companions' sakes, I will now say, Peace be within thee. ⁹ Because of the house of the LORD our God I will seek thy good.

New Testament Reading

1 Corinthians 9

CHAPTER 9

¹ Am I not an apostle? am I not free? have I not seen Jesus Christ our Lord? are not ye my work in the Lord? ² If I be not an apostle unto others, yet doubtless I am to you: for the seal of mine apostleship are ye in the Lord.

³ Mine answer to them that do examine me is this, ⁴ Have we not power to eat and to drink? ⁵ Have we not power to lead about a sister, a wife, as well as other apostles, and as the brethren of the Lord, and Cephas? ⁶ Or I only and Barnabas, have not we power to forbear working? ⁷ Who goeth a warfare any time at his own charges? who planteth a vineyard, and eateth not of the fruit thereof? or who feedeth a flock, and eateth not of the milk of the flock? ⁸ Say I these things as a man? or saith not the law the same also? ⁹ For it is written in the law of Moses, Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn. Doth God take care for oxen? ¹⁰ Or saith he it altogether for our sakes? For our sakes, no doubt, this is written: that he that ploweth should plow in hope; and that he that thresheth in hope should be partaker of his hope. ¹¹ If we have sown unto you spiritual things, is it a great thing if we shall reap your carnal things? ¹² If others be partakers of this power over you, are not we rather? Nevertheless we have not used this power; but suffer all things, lest we should hinder the gospel of Christ. ¹³ Do ye not know that they which minister about holy things live of the things of the temple? and they which wait at the altar are partakers with the altar? ¹⁴ Even so hath the Lord ordained that they which preach the gospel should live of the gospel.

¹⁵ But I have used none of these things: neither have I written these things, that it should be so done unto me: for it were better for me to die, than that any man should make my glorying void. ¹⁶ For though I preach the gospel, I have nothing to glory of: for necessity is laid upon me; yea, woe is unto me, if I preach not the gospel! ¹⁷ For if I do this thing willingly, I have a reward: but if against my will, a dispensation of the gospel is committed unto me. ¹⁸ What is my reward then? Verily that, when I preach the gospel, I may make the gospel of Christ without charge, that I abuse not my power in the gospel.

¹⁹ For though I be free from all men, yet have I made myself servant unto all, that I might gain the more. ²⁰ And unto the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews; to them that are under the law, as under the law, that I might gain them that are under the law; ²¹ To them that are without law, as without law, (being not without law to God, but under the law to Christ,) that I might gain them that are without law. ²² To the weak became I as weak, that I might gain the weak: I am made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some. ²³ And this I do for the gospel's sake, that I might be partaker thereof with you.

²⁴ Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain. ²⁵ And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible. ²⁶ I therefore so run, not as uncertainly; so fight I, not as one that beateth the air: ²⁷ But I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection: lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway.

Proverbs Reading

Proverbs 27

¹ Boast not thyself of to morrow; for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth. ² Let another man praise thee, and not thine own mouth; a stranger, and not thine own lips. ³ A stone is heavy, and the sand weighty; but a fool's wrath is heavier than them both. ⁴ Wrath is cruel, and anger is outrageous; but who is able to stand before envy? ⁵ Open rebuke is better than secret love. ⁶ Faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful. ⁷ The full soul loatheth an honeycomb; but to the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet. ⁸ As a bird that wandereth from her nest, so is a man that wandereth from his place. ⁹ Ointment and perfume rejoice the heart: so doth the sweetness of a man's friend by hearty counsel. ¹⁰ Thine own friend, and thy father's friend, forsake not; neither go into thy brother's house in the day of thy calamity: for better is a neighbour that is near than a brother far off. ¹¹ My son, be wise, and make my heart glad, that I may answer him that reproacheth me. ¹² A prudent man foreseeth the evil, and hideth himself; but the simple pass on, and are punished. ¹³ Take his garment that is surety for a stranger, and take a pledge of him for a strange woman. ¹⁴ He that blesseth his friend with a loud voice, rising early in the morning, it shall be counted a curse to him. ¹⁵ A continual dropping in a very rainy day and a contentious woman are alike. ¹⁶ Whosoever hideth her hideth the wind, and the ointment of his right hand, which bewrayeth itself. ¹⁷ Iron sharpeneth iron; so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend. ¹⁸ Whoso keepeth the fig tree shall eat the fruit thereof: so he that waiteth on his master shall be honoured. ¹⁹ As in water face answereth to face, so the heart of man to man. ²⁰ Hell and destruction are never full; so the eyes of man are never satisfied. ²¹ As the fining pot for silver, and the furnace for gold; so is a man to his praise. ²² Though thou shouldest bray a fool in a mortar among wheat with a pestle, yet will not his foolishness depart from him. ²³ Be thou diligent to know the state of thy flocks, and look well to thy herds. ²⁴ For riches are not for ever: and doth the crown endure to every generation? ²⁵ The hay appeareth, and the tender grass sheweth itself, and herbs of the mountains are gathered. ²⁶ The lambs are for thy clothing, and the goats are the price of the field. ²⁷ And thou shalt have goats' milk enough for thy food, for the food of thy household, and for the maintenance for thy maidens.