Things change. They just do. And sometimes that change can be hard to understand, and even harder to view with the proper perspective, a Kingdom perspective. But that’s something that we have to strive for continuously.
In early October, I spent a week outside of Colorado Springs at Bear Trap Ranch. This is an annual event that I utilize for my spiritual life as sort of a “spiritually fiscal review” of my life for the past year, and for the year to come. This is a cornerstone event for me, impacting my spiritual growth in ways that I cannot even fathom sometimes.
God uses that literal mountaintop experience to help form a spiritual mountaintop experience that helps me navigate through my life and ministry in the months to come.
It’s not the only thing that I intentionally plan through out the year. I also incorporate single day retreats, called Personal Retreat Days, to review my life and ministry, spend time in prayer, and seek God’s continued direction. I strive to do this at least every six to eight weeks through the year. And it helps, being built upon the foundation of the week in Colorado, to maintain a Kingdom perspective.
That was the theme for Wilderness this year. We looked deeply into the Sermon on the Mount, seeing how God is calling us to be Kingdom oriented people. He didn’t call me to “do” ministry. He called me to “be” a Kingdom person, in my life, in my family, in my ministry, and in every other aspect of my life.
Conceptually, that’s pretty easy. I can conceive what that looks like in an academic fashion pretty easily. But when the rubber meets the road, when life throws some things my way that don’t fit into my routines, that don’t align with my regular, day to day, life flow… Then what? How do I keep a Kingdom perspective in the middle of things like that?
Let me give an example of what I mean. My church is in the beginning stages of a staff change. After returning from Wilderness, our youth minister announced his resignation. He has accepted a new position, in more of a leadership capacity, in his home church.
I have been in my position as the lead minister here for a year. I still feel like I don’t have my feet under me completely yet in a lot of ways. A change like this at this point could be a major source of stress for me. But it really isn’t.
Don’t get me wrong. I would rather not have to work through all the details of a ministry change, saying goodbye to a coworker and a family that I love dearly, and then working through the specifics of maintaining his areas of ministry, while seeking for the person that is being led by God to fit into the ministry here at Parkview. Those things have the potential to be overwhelmingly difficult, on all fronts.
But a Kingdom perspective helps me to hold on to the bigger picture through all of this. Our youth minister has clearly and relentlessly sought the Lord’s leading in this, and both he and his wife have come to the conclusion that this is God’s direction for them, and for their new church.
For that to be the case, a Kingdom perspective requires me to have faith in the fact that God is working on all fronts of this situation, and not just theirs. A Kingdom perspective means that, since God is leading that family to a new location for ministry, then he is also already working things out to bring a new person and family to Parkview.
There are a lot of elements here that we simply can’t see yet, but are critical to the overall picture. There’s the spiritual health of our youth minister and his family, the health of the church he’s going to, the health of our church, the health of the church a new guy may be leaving to come here, God’s work in that person’s life and family, and on and on and on.
How often do we just look at the details that are specific to my own life, in this moment? A Kingdom perspective helps me to see more of the bigger picture, and it helps me to trust in the fact that God is already in the midst of this situation.
That’s just one example. Since I returned from Colorado, I have seen this perspective shift in my own mind, in a situation I am dealing with in my family, in other aspects of the ministry at Parkview, in the life of a family facing some significant challenges, in the life of an older couple in our church as they head south for the winter, and so many more.
A Kingdom perspective helps me see all of this in a new and clearer light. And a Kingdom perspective helps me to hold on to the fact that God is right in the middle of all of these situations, so why should I worry?
In Matthew 6:33, right in the middle of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus states, “Seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.”
In the context of Matthew 6, Jesus is speaking about our basic needs, such as clothing and food. He encourages us to rely upon God for even these things, and not to worry about them. A Kingdom perspective realizes that God is concerned for even the small things such as these. And if he will take care of these, he is definitely in the middle of those bigger issues that we face that seem to weigh us down.
A Kingdom perspective helps us to see that God is right in the middle of it; already there working things out for our good, and for the good of his Kingdom and his own glory.
Lord, help me to keep a Kingdom perspective in all these things!
Question: What areas of your life weigh you down? How are you missing a Kingdom perspective in these areas? How would a Kingdom perspective help shift your understanding? You can leave a comment by clicking here.