Efficiency has always been one of my top priorities in life. As much as I value efficiency, however, ministry is costly, difficult and inefficient; adjectives that don’t mix well with logical managing of our resources. Yet, in our efforts to be good stewards, we become deceived into believing that we can’t do until we have enough. Yet, in God’s economy, He takes the little we can offer and turns it into abundant riches.
Kingdom Economics turn everything on its head—culturally, effort-ly, and financially (among others). In fact, an effective mission-focused life goes against the culture, our finances, and even our own logic. Yet that is the calling from God. If we are to be willing to follow God, we must follow Him in ways that may make our lives very uncomfortable; but that’s where the real miracles happen.
The Book of John is written so that people may truly know Jesus and His mission – have life in Him (as the end of the book says). The miracles are shown in John to let us see Jesus’ claim on Himself, how that surprises people and then the choice that it forces them (or us) to make. Here, Jesus miraculously feeds the 5000, powerfully communicating to all who see that He is Lord over all – He is more than just a prophet. Yet this story gives us a look into how Kingdom economics work and why we should be a little more willing to stretch out our trust and pull up our sleeves. Read John 6:1-15 for the full story.
Trust in God’s Plan (v6) VS. Efficient Resource Management (v7)
Stewardship is an important and taught component of discipleship, but we can’t let it control everything we do. Jesus was planning the miracle all along, but wanted to make sure that the disciples saw the importance of service/giving over managing the checkbook. We must respond to what God is doing, not shoehorn Him into our plans – Purpose is more important than cost. This requires us to trust Jesus and have faith – stretch ourselves to trust Him past what makes sense to us.
Consider Ephesians 3:20-21 – He who can do more than we can possibly ask or imagine…maybe we should give Him some room to create! But this miracle isn’t just about resource management.
God’s Disciple-making Pipeline (v12) VS. Letting the Pastor Do It (v13)
Jesus started the work, handed out the food and let everyone eat – He did it first, then invited the disciples to join in and do likewise. Come and see must lead to come and do – otherwise we aren’t seeing Him at all. (Faith without action is dead, James 2:17)
Jesus demonstrated, then recruited the disciples to join in the work. Gospel work (discipleship) Is a shared community project. It was never meant for one person to be an expert, otherwise Jesus would have just stayed. It’s meant to be trained, shared and passed to others. Disciples making disciples is a process of training and passing on – and it takes time.
Waiting on God (v14) VS. Tyranny of the Urgent (v15)
Making Jesus king by force was what was important to them at the time once they saw His power, but not to Jesus. It only works when we follow Him on His movements, He won’t follow us on our plans. He MUST go first. He MUST lead. People may want to push things along, but God controls the timing. Just because we did the “right” thing, doesn’t mean it happened on God’s clock.
So What?
God’s economy has a lot in store for you, if only you are willing to take some steps. Consider these…
- Push yourself to add an extra 10% after that to allow room for God stretch your faith. Tithing 5000, then offer 5500! and trust God to cover the rest. Or a goal to share your faith with 20 people, change that goal to 22 and give God room to work.
- Invest in your own PBT people (Paul, Barnabas and Timothy): someone who can teach and train us, someone who loves us dearly but isn’t impressed by us at all (will tell us like it is) and someone we can teach and train. Keep the discipleship pipeline moving.
- Practice patience; wait on God. For the younger ones, don’t be afraid to take time to learn and grow. Stop putting things on our timetable and start trusting His.
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