Quote from Forum Archives on October 26, 1998, 1:46 am

Posted by: lifeunlimited <lifeunlimited@...>

Standing Shoulder to Shoulder With You In The Trenches
As We Fight The Good Fight

TITLE: "

Dear Fellow Servant:

I am writing today from the little town of Waynesville, MO, just a short
distance from Fort Leonard Wood military base in the Ozarks of Missouri.
Jo Ann and I are doing a conference on revival and spiritual awakening in
a local church here. The next five weeks are hectic with back to back
conferences.

The big question on my mind today is, "How are you doing?" The past
several weeks I have focused on some of the observations and experiences
of our recent trip to Croatia and Bosnia. Today I want to simply be an
encouragement to you.

Since returning home one week ago, I've had the privilege of talking with
several pastors. It has grieved me to see that most of them seem to be
carrying heavy burdens and feelings of discouragement. That makes me sad
---- I wouldn't wish such a burden on anybody.

Often our struggles with discouragement come not so much with the
circumstances around us as with our apparent inability to deal with the
circumstances by influencing change.

One of the healthiest things that can ever happen to a minister of the
Gospel is to recognize that he is not infallible, and that he has limits.
That's what I want to address today.

LIVING WITHIN OUR LIMITS:

In considering this idea, I would as you to first read Psalm 139, I
Corinthians 12:12 and 18-27, and finally
II Corinthians 4:7-5:10. Those passages will give you the scriptural
basis for seven basic statements I want to make about how we react to the
limitations we have.

To be quite honest, most of us in ministry are tempted to assume that,
because we are called into ministry, God has endowed us with the same
reserve with which Jesus was blessed ---- namely, . . .

1. To know everything about everything,

2. To be everywhere at the same time, and

3. To have unlimited energy and power.

The longer we are in the ministry and the older we get, the greater the
drive is to be so omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent.

But ---- the longer we are in the ministry and the older we get, also the
greater the reality of our own humanity and its accompanying limitations.

The longer we live with the reality of our humanity, the more prone we
are to either increase our battle against it, be content to live below
our capabilities, or find some diversion away from the essential
responsibilities of life and ministry.

Therefore, we need to understand some fundamental truths about our
limits. I believe there are seven such truths.

I. EVERYTHING AND EVERYONE HAS LIMITS:

Just because we are in the ministry does not exempt us from having limits
and limitations. Therefore, since we are not exempt, we must learn to
respond appropriately to them.

1. With some limitations we become frustrated. Our shortcomings in
interpersonal relationships, our status in life, our lack of education,
etc. These things often create great consternation.

2. With others we become content. Sometimes limitations become things
we can accept, make appropriate adjustments, and learn to compensate for
them, resulting in a sense of wholesome contentment.

3. With others, however, we can become lazy and complacent. Not all
limitations are permanent or unchangeable. When we slack off and become
lazy over those that we can do something about, we are hindering the work
of God and short changing our own growth and integrity.

Nonetheless, we must be willing to honestly acknowledge that we have
limitations. It is not a sin to have limitations. Our sin, if there is
any, is when we fail to admit it, fail to take responsibility for them,
or try to overstep them.

II. GOD KNOWS OUR LIMITATIONS BETTER THAN WE DO:

In Psalm 139:1-6, the Psalmist shows us five things God knows about us,
including our limitations.

1. In verse one, He knows our Character ---- "Thou hast searched me and
known me (who I really am).

2. In verse two, He knows our Contemplations ---- "Thou dost understand
my thought from afar."

3. In verse three, He knows our Conduct ---- "Thou dost scrutinize my
path and my lying down, and art intimately acquainted with all my ways."

4. In verse four, He knows our Conversation ---- "Even before there is a
word on my tongue, behold, Lord, Thou doest know it all."

5. Finally, in verses five and six, He knows our Confinements ---- "Thou
has enclosed me behind and before, and laid Thy hand upon me."

Rather than being humiliated, embarrassed, or ashamed of our limitations,
it is encouraging to recognize that God knows our limitations better than
we do, He has not rejected us because of them, and He still declares
"there is no condemnation" just because we have limitations.

III. GOD SETS OUR LIMITATIONS:

When you read verses 13-18 in Psalm 139, you make an incredible discovery
---- God Himself has determined our limitations. None of them got past
His knowledge and His Hand.

1. Sometimes our limitations come by His Cause ---- He designed them and
caused them to be. Therefore, we have no right to complain about them,
but rather, we should recognize them, accept them, thank God for them,
and rejoice in them.

2. At other times they come as a result of Consequence ---- because of
our own mistakes, we suffer consequences that generate limitations for
which we must take responsibility. However, often our reaction is to
blame ---- others, ourselves, or even God. It is time to grow up, and
recognize that with every action or attitude there is an automatic
consequence. If the action or attitude is good, the consequence will be
good; if it is bad, the consequences will have negative results.

3. Finally, limitations come by Circumstances ---- due to no fault of
our own, circumstances took place that place limitations on us.

By whichever means they come, we need to recognize that God has
mercifully established a principle, just a real as the law of gravity,
that puts into play His divine involvement in our limitations.

For that reason, we are to never complain about our limitations. If we
can change them, then we should do so. If we cannot, then we must be
willing to thank God that He loves us enough to direct us, discipline,
and develop us by putting those limitations in place.

IV. GOD IS THERE IN OUR LIMITATIONS:

Wherever we find ourselves with our limitations, God is there. Verses
7-12 in Psalm 139 show us that.

1. Listen to some of David's questions:

"Where can I go from Thy Spirit?" ---- Nowhere.

"Where can I flee from Thy presence?" ---- Nowhere.

2. Then notice his own answers:

"If I ascend to heaven, Thou art there"

"If I make my bed in Sheol, behold Thou art there."

"If I take the wings of the dawn, ---- [that's the east] (Thou art
there)."

"If I dwell in the remotest part of the sea, ---- [that's the west], Even
there Thy hand will lead me."

My dear friend! ---- Whatever your limitations, and wherever your
limitations ---- God Is There!

V. RELEASING GOD'S LIMITLESSNESS:

Our limitations are actually blessings in disguise. You see, our own
limitations are actually triggers that release God's unlimited resources.

Therefore, rather than see our limitations as liabilities or curses,
let's recognize them for what they are ---- opportunities for God's
limitless wisdom, power, and resources to be released into human
circumstances.

Remember Paul's declaration? "Our weakness is made strong" as God
responds in His total sufficiency to our complete inadequacy.

VI. OUR LIMITATIONS FORCE US TO SEE OURSELVES IN TRUTH:

1. We see ourselves in light of God's boundaries that He has placed in
our lives.

2. We see ourselves in light of Satan's strategy to kill, destroy, and
steal. Recognizing those limitations as being points of vulnerability to
Satan's tactics, we are consequently able to "be on the alert" against
the tactics of the Devil. We recognize we are no match against His
subversive undermining, and that our only hope is to rest our limitations
wholly on the total sufficiency of the Lord Jesus Christ.

3. We see ourselves in light of our true values, motives, and
priorities. Whatever else they do, our limitations certainly expose what
we hold of value, what our true motives and reasons are, and what our
actual priorities are, no matter what we profess with our words.

4. We see ourselves in light of "connectedness" with the Body of Christ.
I Corinthians 12 shows us the principle: there is no such thing as a
"Lone Ranger" Christian. We need each other. What you lack because of
your limitations, somebody else in the Body can make up for. It is the
height of arrogance to think that you can "do it all". You cannot ----
and it is essential that we be able to openly admit that.

We definitely need each other. One of the ways God verifies that fact is
by making certain that each of us has limitations which we can never
correct or get around.

5. We see ourselves in light of the needs of people. Having limitations
tends to make us more sensitive to the limitations and needs in others.
When we recognize our own limitations, it is impossible to become
arrogant or develop a sense of superiority toward others who likewise
have limitations. God has His ways of humbling us and then keeping us
humble ---- of serving us and then making us servants.

VII. OUR ATTITUDES AFFECT OUR REACTIONS:

The attitudes we have toward our limitations have a definite affect on
the way we react to them.

1. We can react in frustration, anger, jealousy, resistance, or
rebellion. If we do, we run the danger of facing God's corrective
chastisement, the rejection of other people, and harm to those around us
whom we serve and love.

2. We can also react in disappointment, loss of confidence, low
self-esteem, callousness, a sense of fatalism, or laziness. These
reactions usually stem from an attitude of pathetic self pity that wants
to take on the role of victim and looks for some "hero" to come to our
rescue and take up our cause.

3. Or ---- we can react in humility, gratitude, good self esteem, a
servant spirit, and a sense of joy. This, of course, is the way God
desires us to react. While we can never be like Christ in ability, we
are to be Christ like in disposition.

HOW IS IT WITH YOU?

My friend, have you been plagued, haunted, and defeated by what you
perceived to be limitations? Have you felt guilty or felt like a failure
because of your limitations? Have you been angry at God because of those
limitations? Have you neglected faithfulness in ministry because of
them?

If so ---- it's time for a change!

In our unconscious but nonetheless very real urges to be all knowing,
every present, and all powerful, we must acknowledge that . . .

1. God is, in fact, the one ---- the Only one ---- Who is all knowing,
ever present, and all powerful.

2. God is the key to being content with our limitations.

3. We must faithfully refuse to use our limitations as excuses for
worldly, materialistic, self-centered focus for our lives.

4. We, like David, must honestly allow God to examine us to see if there
"be any wicked way" both in our hearts and in how we deal with
limitations and boundaries, and the resulting consequences to people and
the cause of Christ through His Church.

NO MATTER WHAT YOUR LIMITATIONS,

You need to remember . . .

1. Phil 1:6 ---- "He who began a good work in you will perfect it until
the day of Christ Jesus."

2. Phil 2:13-14 ---- "It is God who is at work in you, both to will and
to work for His good pleasure, Do all things without grumbling or
disputing"

3. Phil 4:13 ---- "I can do all things through Christ Who strengthens
me."

May it be so for you, my friend. Don't be hampered by your limitations
---- or your perception of what you would see as limitations. They are
simply opportunities for God to prove Himself both mighty and faithful.

FINALLY, TIME FOR SOME HUMOR:

I love a good joke, and nothing picks me up at times like a good laugh.

Check this one out passed on by a friend, Reynold Middleton.

1. Checking Meters

Two gas company servicemen, a senior training supervisor and a young
trainee, were out checking meters in a suburban neighborhood. They
parked their truck at the end of the alley and worked their way to the
other end.

At the last house a woman looking out her kitchen window watched the two
men as they checked her gas meter.

Finishing the meter check, the senior supervisor challenged his younger
coworker to a foot race down the alley
back to the truck to prove that an older guy could outrun a younger one.

As they came running up to the truck, they realized the lady from that
last house was huffing and puffing right behind them.

They stopped and asked her what was wrong.

Gasping for breath, she replied, "When I see two gas men running as
hard as you two were, I figured I'd better run too!"

Which reminds me of another one I heard several years ago:

2. A man with more money than smarts had a thing for fast expensive
cars, so he went to the most exclusive dealership in town and asked to
see the fastest and most expensive car on the lot. After sorting through
several models, he settled for one ---- you guessed it, the fastest and
most expensive.

Paying cash, he drove the car off the lot and began playing with all the
gadgets on the console while he waited for the traffic light to change.

Up drives a little guy dressed in a pin striped business suit, riding on
a moped.

Peering over the top of his glasses, he says, "That's a really nice car
you have there. Just buy it?"

The new owner responded courteously in the affirmative and continued
fiddling with all the buttons and knobs.

The light changed, and the driver of the car roared off down the street.

Caught by a second light, he was again approached by the same little man
on his moped.

This time he was a little more intrusive. Leaning up against the new car
and occasionally pointing through the window at different features, , he
commented about what a beautiful car it was, and how much it must have
cost.

The new owner became a little irritated, but tried to remain courteous.
When the light changed, he said, "Excuse me," and sped off down the
street, assuming he was finally rid of the little pest.

To his surprise ---- and disgust ---- when he was stopped by the last
traffic light on the edge of the town, the same guy on his moped coasted
up beside him and immediately began talking and pointing.

This time he was so brazen that he actually leaned through the window and
began to ask more absurd and intrusive questions.

This angered the car owner so much that when the light turned green, he
stepped on the accelerator, blew smoke everywhere and streaked out into
the countryside.

Still muttering to himself about the actions of the little guy on the
moped, he decided to vent his frustration and divert his attention by
testing the road worthiness and speed of his new purchase.

Just as he was beginning to calm down, he was suddenly startled as the
little guy went screaming by the car on his moped, tie and coat tails
streaming out behind him, and vanished into the distance.

Shaking his head and regaining his composure, he was again startled as
the same guy came racing back the other way, whishing past him like a jet
plane.

A few seconds later, here came the little guy again, white knuckles
gleaming as he shot past the car the second time, only to return at
lightning speed going the other way.

By this time the new owner is a bundle of nerves and confusion as he
tries to sort out the pictures in his mind of this little pin striped
business man and the feats he has just accomplished. He welcomed the
stop sign. Since no traffic was coming, it gave him an opportunity to
sit and calm down before continuing on his drive.

Just as he was about to leave the repose of the stop sign, the little man
again pulled up beside him ---- tie barely around his neck, shirt tails
shredded, glasses hanging tentatively from one ear, shoes missing, and
lapel hanging lifelessly from his coat, hair piece gone.

As he huffed and puffed and gasped for air, the rider on the moped raised
a quivering hand and, in a half whisper, spoke to the astonished driver:

"I think you have a really nice car, sir; but, before you drive off
again, would you mind unhooking my suspenders from your door handle?"

Groan! Groan!

Oh, well . . . .

Have a great week! And ---- REJOICE!

In Christ's Bond,

Bob Tolliver -- (Rom 1:11-12)
Copyright October, 1998. All Rights Reserved.

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Hang in there! I'm with you!

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Life Unlimited Ministries
E-Mail: [email protected]
Ph: 417-275-4854
Fax: 417-275-4855

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