A pastor told me his heart ached when he attended his church\u2019s annual ministers conference. When the ministers discussed their churches, one of the first questions they asked of one another was, \u201cIs your attendance growing?\u201d It seemed to my friend that many pastors had \u201cbig, bigger, biggest\u201d attendance as their primary goal.<\/p>\n
But it\u2019s easy to want bigger and more impressive things. It is easy to fall into the \u201cbigger is better\u201d syndrome. I have launched projects that I thought would be a great blessing to God\u2019s Kingdom. Then watched as my efforts fell flat. But then God would show me something else to do that would be more pleasing to Him. He hates pride and loves us too much to let us stumble into success.<\/p>\n
Are you suffering from some defeat? Have you ever wondered why God hasn\u2019t come to your rescue? Usually, it\u2019s because He has something better for you.\u00a0 <\/span>God has plans for you. He doesn\u2019t want your success or failures to hold you back. He will put up the necessary roadblocks to get you to turn around and go in another direction.<\/p>\n When we fail to achieve our goals, in our life\u2019s work, or marriage, or parenting, God doesn\u2019t want us to be overwhelmed with discouragement. Rather, He wants us to believe that He is helping us.<\/p>\n God loves us too much to respond to our grumbling, complaining or self-pity. Get a pen and underline that last sentence \u2013 it\u2019s important. Believe it, and you can be spared hours, days and years of suffering! Much of my own suffering has come from my failure to believe that God was always working for my good. On each occasion I thought He must be ignoring my pain. But now I see that He was permitting me to fail so He could prepare me for something else that He wanted me to enjoy.<\/p>\n Psalm 127:1 says, Except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it <\/i>(KJV). We all want to build good things, and to do good things, but sometimes we labor to accomplish something God hasn\u2019t called us to do.<\/p>\n Sometimes He wants our hearts to be in \u201clittle things.\u201d He is more interested in our desire to please Him than He is any of the things we want to accomplish. Think of all the good things Stephen may have wanted to accomplish with his life. Yet, in God\u2019s plan he was permitted to be a martyr for Christ.<\/p>\n God\u2019s plan is simple: \u201cDo what you can. Leave all the rest to Me.\u201d (Reprint from October 1995)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A pastor told me his heart ached when he attended his church\u2019s annual ministers conference. When the ministers discussed their churches, one of the first questions they asked of one another was, \u201cIs your attendance growing?\u201d It seemed to my friend that many pastors had \u201cbig, bigger, biggest\u201d attendance as their primary goal. But it\u2019s easy to want bigger and … <\/p>\n