Tag Archives: change

Looking Past What is to What Could Be

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One of my most favorite things is to watch those before and after pictures of homes on HGTV. There’s something so satisfactory about watching an old house transform into something beautiful, trendy, and fresh. It always makes me look around my house and imagine what could be.

Before and After

We love to see the after; but for most of us, it’s hard to see the after when you’re looking at the before…unless you have a gift like Joanna Gaines. I do not have that gift, and I am perfectly okay with that.

God is in the business of creating before and after pictures, but he does it through our lives. He has the amazing ability not to see us as we are now, but for what we can become.

Jesus’ Conversation with Peter

At the last supper, Jesus tells Peter that he’s going to betray him. Peter can’t even begin to imagine any circumstance in which he would deny Jesus. In the midst of this conversation, Jesus tells him something that is so key to understanding how Jesus works.

Jesus says to Peter, “After you have repented and turned again to me, strengthen your brothers.” Jesus could see past Peter’s failure to the man Peter would become, in spite of his failure.

God has always had the ability to look past what is, to see what could be. He started the world that way. He took what was and turned it into what could be, an amazing creation. All throughout the Bible, God sees people for what they could become.

How God Sees People

  1. Zacchaeus. Jesus tells him, “I’m coming to your house today.” He said that before Zacchaeus even changed his heart.
  2. Gideon. The angel calls him “mighty man of valor” even while Gideon is hiding.
  3. Mary. Gabriel calls her “favored” before she chose to go through with the pregnancy.
  4. David. God saw him as the great king of Israel while he was still a lowly shepherd boy.
  5. Esther. God saw a queen in a young Jewish girl.
  6. Samuel. God saw a mighty prophet in a small boy left at the temple.
  7. A little boy. Jesus saw a little boy who would feed over 5,000 with a simple lunch.
  8. Jesus saw some lowly fishermen as the men who would turn the world upside down for Christ.

Seeing Us for What Could Be

God has never been content to leave us where we are. No, he sees what could be, who we could become. So he pushes in on us and chisels and works on us, chiseling off the rough edges. He sends trials into our lives that change us and mold us and grow us into who he knows we can become.

He does all this so that one day, we can become the “after” picture. In heaven one day, we will look back at the “before” picture and not even recognize ourselves, and we’ll see that he was busy crafting and changing us and molding us into who he wanted us to become.

More Encouragement

For more encouragement on this topic, check out my post, There’s Beauty in the Unmaking. A great book to read is Love Does by Bob Goff.

3 Ways to Stay Flexible and Be Ready for Change

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Traveling in College

When I was in college, I traveled around the country on a musical team representing my school. I played the piano for our group, and we performed at a different church every Sunday. One of the leaders who traveled with us had a saying, “Flexibility is the key to ministry.” If she said it once, she said it a thousand times. She desperately wanted us to understand that leaders must stay flexible with changing times, people, and situations. With decades of ministry behind her, she knew all too well that life has a way of changing when you least expect it.

I understood this concept in a small way in college, but over a decade in ministry has helped me to clearly understand what she was trying to teach us. The best leaders are the ones who can adapt and change to the people, times, culture, and ideas around them. They don’t hang on to the past, unable to change and adapt and move into the future.

Allowing God to Redirect Us

Sometimes God completely redirects us. Maybe it’s a career change, a move, a new relationship, a loss, a painful experience, or something else completely. God has a habit of shaking things up in our lives when we least expect it. If you would have asked me a year ago to foresee some of the changes God took our family through last year, I would have been shocked. I had no idea that the bottom would fall out for us both in our ministry and in our personal lives. I had no idea we would go for months on end without getting paid, endure depression and discouragement like we never had before, face the pain of potentially walking away from the church we started seven years ago, and having to sell our home and move.

Holding Loosely to My Plans

I have learned over the past several years that the best way for me to succeed in life is to find what it is that God wants me to do and follow it wholeheartedly. View the talents and abilities, dreams and desires He has given me as a compass to point me towards what He wants me to accomplish. The struggles of this past year taught me that I also have to hold on to those plans and dreams with a loose hand and allow God to change my direction and plans at any time because He will do that when we least expect it!

King Solomon teaches us this principle in Proverbs. Proverbs 16:9 says, “A man’s heart deviseth his way: but the LORD directeth his steps.” (KJV) The Message paraphrases it this way, “We plan the way we want to live, but only God makes us able to live it.” (MSG)

Proverbs 16:9 says, “A man’s heart deviseth his way: but the LORD directeth his steps.” (KJV) The Message paraphrases it this way, “We plan the way we want to live, but only God makes us able to live it.” (MSG)

3 Ways to Stay Flexible and Allow for Change

How can we accomplish our goals and dreams and yet be flexible enough for God to be able to move or redirect us?

  1. Keep a tender heart. Keep a clean heart and conscience before God. Forgive people who do you wrong. Don’t get a hard heart with people or situations that disappoint you. God may be allowing those painful situations in your life to move you in a different direction. If Matt and I hadn’t battled every day to keep a tender heart, we would have walked away from ministry this past year.
  2. Develop a consistent morning time routine. Spend time every morning praying, reading the Bible, and journaling. We can’t expect God to direct us if we aren’t spending time with Him. He will use His Word and time in prayer to show us and direct us into what He has for us. My morning time was a lifeline for me this past year. If I hadn’t spent years developing the habit of reading my Bible every morning, journaling, and praying, I would have given up. If you would like some ideas for developing a consistent morning time, read my best tips for an effective morning time.
  3. Continue growing and learning. Spend time reading good books, listening to podcasts, and growing. So many times a podcast I listened to or a book I read helped me to stay faithful, keep moving forward, and make the changes I needed to. It is so much easier for God to redirect us and change us when we are in the habit of growing and learning. If you need book or podcast suggestions, here are a few of my favorites.

Staying Flexible and Be Ready for Change

If we keep a tender heart, spend each morning connecting with God, and allow God to change our thinking by reading good books and listening to good podcasts, we are as ready as we can be for God to interrupt our life and send us in a new direction. Don’t hold so tightly to your ideas, your plans, or your dreams that you can’t let God redirect you and point you in the new direction He wants you to go.

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