Know Your Why

by Ken Costa

  you have put all my sins

  behind your back. (Isaiah 38:15–17)

  In the darkness of his uncertainty, Hezekiah found himself drawn close to God—able to appreciate afresh the grace and love of his Savior.

  10. FIND WORTH IN THE WAITING

  The process of being reoriented is as important as the planned outcome. We are strengthened by the knowledge that what we do today is valuable for tomorrow. Our cry is, “How long?” but God’s cry is, “You can trust me.” Our dreams are often given and then delayed in order to be sure that we rest in him and see the fulfillment of these dreams as having come from him.

  Success very often comes from this season of preparation. But it needs to be followed by a strategy to get the job done. When the preparation phase is over, it is time to get up and go!

  DETERMINED DREAMING

  Waiting can be so hard. Many of us know all too well the sinking feeling in the pit of our stomachs when forces outside our control conspire to put our dreams on hold. In the words of the writer of the Proverbs, “Hope deferred makes the heart sick.” Yet the next line is the hope that we cling to: “but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life” (Proverbs 13:12). Dreams are not just fantastical diversions in our lives, but the very stuff of living. And they matter to God.

  The essence of a dream is prospective, an aspiration to transcend what is not yet attained. John Stott, one of the leading biblical writers of the twentieth century, is said to have described visionary dreaming as “a deep dissatisfaction of what is and a clear grasp of what could be.”3 Visionary dreaming has to go beyond discontent to see how things could actually be different. How, in practice, can the deep malaise that we perceive be made whole again through the light of Christ?

  For many years my greatest dissatisfaction has been that the younger generation seems to have lost its spiritual center. So many people are listless, uncertain, and wavering in their spiritual lives, overwhelmed by a plethora of options. Choice, which once was a blessing to be fought for, has become a curse. I long to see these young people filled with energy and passion and a purpose that comes from God, all of which will change their lives and the lives of those around them. My dissatisfaction has been easy to spot. It has colored my life. But it has been much harder to achieve a vision or dream for how things could be transformed. For many years I prayed to God to give me such a vision, that I might begin to see how I could play a role in building up this generation.

  Over the years that I have prayed this prayer, God has led me in many different ventures. One of the first started with me drawing together a group of young leaders to a gathering called READY, aimed at seeing a new generation released and raised up. I started the event in order to help equip young men and women who were struggling with the concept that God might be interested in their lives outside of church. Martin Smith and Matt Redman led our worship—what exciting times! One evening Matt asked whether he could sing a new song about King David dancing before the ark of the covenant until his clothes fell off, leading David to tell his embarrassed wife, Michal, “I will become even more undignified than this” (2 Samuel 6:22). So enthusiastic was his worship that I became seriously concerned that an overzealous Matt might begin to strip off his clothes in a fit of realistic biblical simulation!

  The needs of the younger generation have, if anything, grown since that first venture. Many other great gatherings have sprung up—New Wine and Momentum in the United Kingdom, and Passion in the United States. Yet still I sensed an unmet need when it came to equipping and empowering those in their twenties and thirties with the biblical leadership skills to be effective at work and to dream with determination. And so out of my dissatisfaction God grew a new dream—to create a place where young Christians could receive leadership training to help them lead others in all areas of their lives. Nicky Gumbel, the leader of my church in London, saw this need and made the necessary resources available for the program to grow. It has taken a long time for the Leadership College to take form and offer specific training in leadership for those in the workplace, but it has been well worth the wait!

  Dissatisfaction, dreams, destiny. Each one leads to the next.

  When we have dreams that we long to achieve, frequently they are given in one season but fulfilled in another. We have to have determined dreams, not daydreams, if we are to fulfill all that God calls us to.

  It is important that dreams and determination run together, in order to separate our frivolous fantasies from our God-given ambitions. I have noticed over the years that people fail not because of a lack of dreams but because of a lack of determination. It can be difficult to endure the tediousness of the waiting room, and those who lack the determination to see it through can often walk out in frustration. Determined dreaming is not the listless daydreaming where we gaze into the middle distance, imagining a better world. That’s all very well, but nothing will happen, and the daydream will evaporate as soon as the real world strikes and the going gets tough. We need to engage our wills and commitment. To fulfill our destiny, we require determination and discernment.

  There is an inspiring group of young men in our church who are passionate about sharpening their skills for God. A few years ago they listened to Gary Haugen, CEO of the International Justice Mission, speak on human trafficking and the scourge of this worldwide evil. They were struck by what they heard and motivated to do something about it. They began to ask, “How can we allow trafficking of human beings in our age and in our city?”

  They started praying together during Tuesday lunchtimes every week for six months, gathering a few people around them.

  Theirs was a bold dream. But ours is a big God. And so they pressed on, waiting, dreaming, and praying about all the practical issues that they would have to address if they were to take real action against modern-day slavery. They were sure there was something God was calling them into, but the way ahead wasn’t clear. So they pressed into their dream, bringing it before God again and again.

  After six months of determined dreaming, God was showing them a way forward. They decided they needed to get the best research available to show what was actually happening on our streets, in the very heart of London. They pooled their money to start a campaign. The first step was to commission expert analysts to gather the facts. They then took the report to the government and lobbied for a change in the law to prevent this evil practice from continuing in our country. The report was well received, and the government considered their arguments. As a result of their prayers, financial commitment, and research, the Modern Slavery Act came to life as a law in the United Kingdom.

  They dreamed. They dared. They were determined, and they delivered. But they had to go through the waiting room—the game before the game. They needed to remain determined through that period of waiting, listening, and discerning the heart and will of God. And in that waiting, they were strengthened and prepared for the challenges ahead.

  As followers of Christ, we must not be disheartened by the constant stream of bad news that flows out of news broadcasts. Just as Paul said in his letter to the Philippians, so must we “press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me” (Philippians 3:12 NKJV). Let us not stand idle but be gripped by the future and by what—in God’s power—could be.

  In his memorable “I Have a Dream” speech, Martin Luther King Jr. spoke of his dream of racial justice in the United States and worldwide. He was absolutely determined to see it come alive. But there must have been plenty of times in his life when King felt stuck in the waiting room—in the game before the game. With much of the US political establishment arrayed against the civil rights movement, and with FBI director J. Edgar Hoover harboring a personal hatred for him, there were countless moments when the path to that dream seemed hopelessly blocked. How easy it would have been to resign himself to the status quo and to leave the fight for equality to someone else.

  But King was determined in his dreaming. He knew he had a calling
from God, and he refused to let that dream fizzle and die, even when it seemed impossible.

  In the Bible, we read of another king who found his calling apparently blocked by the might of the political establishment. In 1 Samuel 16, we see the teenaged boy David, youngest of eight brothers, anointed by the prophet Samuel as the next king of Israel. But it was perhaps fifteen long years before David was able to ascend the throne and fulfill the destiny God had laid out for him. There were times in the wilderness when David—oppressed, exiled, and ruthlessly hunted by King Saul—questioned whether this had all been a huge mistake. There were times when he wondered if he had been forgotten, if God would ever fulfill the promises that he had made.

  Psalm 13, it seems, was written at just such a time.

  How long, LORD? Will you forget me forever?

  How long will you hide your face from me?

  How long must I wrestle with my thoughts

  and day after day have sorrow in my heart?

  How long will my enemy triumph over me?

  Look on me and answer, LORD my God.

  Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death,

  and my enemy will say, “I have overcome him,”

  and my foes will rejoice when I fall. (vv. 1–4)

  But David didn’t stop there. Despite his questions, his repeated cry of “how long?” he clung to the calling that he had been given, and to the faithfulness of God.

  But I trust in your unfailing love;

  my heart rejoices in your salvation.

  I will sing the LORD’s praise,

  for he has been good to me.” (vv. 5–6)

  DON’T CUT CORNERS

  The story of David is a great lesson for us today. His trust in God kept him steadfast in his calling throughout those periods of waiting in the wilderness. Whenever doubts came upon him or he questioned the calling that God had placed on his life, he chose to reaffirm the faithfulness of the Lord. This was his game before the game, a time of deep learning and maturing as he grew to trust in the promises of God.

  But for David, trusting in God also meant trusting in the ways of God. We can learn a great lesson about what it means to wait well when we read 1 Samuel 24.

  Saul, at the height of his reign and with three thousand men at his side, had hunted David and his band of followers into the desert. Things were looking pretty desperate for the son of Jesse when, in a sudden twist of fate, the king of Israel stopped to relieve himself in the very cave where David and his men were hiding!

  David’s men were overjoyed. “This is the day the LORD spoke of when he said to you, ‘I will give your enemy into your hands for you to deal with as you wish’” (v. 4).

  The temptation must have been acute. By then David was well known across Israel as Samuel’s anointed. Killing the king would have made David the obvious successor. All David had to do was creep up behind Saul, kill the man who was so desperately trying to kill him, and receive the crown of Israel promised to him by God several years prior.

  But David didn’t do it. He wouldn’t commit murder. He knew that wasn’t the way of God. He knew that it wasn’t the timing of God. He trusted that God would unblock the path to his calling in the right time and in the right way. To kill Saul in such cold-blooded fashion would be to take the crown in David’s time and in David’s way. It would not be a shortcut but a wrong turn.

  How different the attitude of David is from the attitude of another Old Testament hero: Jacob, the son of Isaac and twin brother of Esau. Jacob’s story is well known. While the twins were still in her womb, their mother, Rebekah, had been promised by the Lord that the older brother (Esau) would serve the younger (Jacob). Jacob was destined to inherit God’s promise to Abraham.

  But neither Jacob nor Rebekah trusted God to fulfill his promises in God’s way and in God’s time. They took it upon themselves, cruelly tricking the elderly Isaac into passing his blessing on to Jacob instead of the firstborn and heir, Esau. And then, because of his actions, Jacob had to flee. He spent decades away from his family home, farming for his uncle in the east, afraid to return to his mother and father and brother. It was only by God’s grace that he eventually returned to claim the calling that God had laid on his life from birth.

  It’s similar to the story of Abraham, who slept with the slave girl Hagar rather than trust that God would provide him descendants through his wife (Genesis 16).

  How tempting it can be for us to cut corners as Jacob and Abraham did, to rationalize that compromising our integrity is the only way to secure our God-given dreams. But God does not want us to compromise. God does not want liars, cheaters, or thieves. Trusting that God has called us into something means trusting that he will bring it to fruition in his way and in his time. When we try to force his hand—when we try to fulfill those dreams in our own way and our own strength—we will create further obstacles to following in the callings that God has given us.

  Paul wrote at various points in his letters about running a good race. It’s not simply about getting to the end, but about getting there with integrity. How we approach the game before the game—how we prepare—is integral to running such a race.

  On September 24, 1988, the finalists of the men’s 100-meter sprint lined up on the start-line at the Seoul Summer Olympics. The race that followed was one of the greatest Olympic moments of all time. Out of the starting blocks like a bullet, Canadian Ben Johnson posted a time of 9.79 seconds, which bested his own world record and smashed the Olympic record by more than 0.04 seconds. He was hailed as a hero for a full three days before everything came crashing down around him. After testing positive for anabolic steroids, Johnson was stripped of his gold medal and his world record and was banned for two years, with his reputation in tatters.4

  Ben Johnson chose to spend the game before the game loading up on banned substances. He chose to prepare for the race in a way that undermined his on-track success. But we, like Paul, should desire to run a good race. When we get to the end of all things, will we be able to say with Paul, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith” (2 Timothy 4:7)? Will we be able to look back on those seasons of waiting, confident that we remained faithful to the calling of God?

  Let us be like King David and like Paul, who spent the game before the game faithfully waiting on the Lord’s timing, refusing to take the shortcuts the world offers. They believed that God would “be [their] guide even to the end” (Psalm 48:14). His calling on our lives remains strong, even as we wait.

  FIVE

  CALLED TO CHOOSE

  MAKING LIFE CHOICES IS NEVER EASY. YOU LEAVE COLLEGE OR university, and you have to make some kind of choice about what happens next. Or you are midway through your career, facing a crossroads, and you think, you sense, God might be calling you to something new. Maybe you have been made redundant in a job you were wedded to for years, and you are confronted by a whole new series of questions about where to go next. And the rent bills keep on coming, so there is a degree of urgency to your situation. Or perhaps you have already found your calling, but you need to find a way to keep the flame alive and not to stagnate or run dry.

  Of course, such choice is the privilege of the few, and we should always see it as such. But the speed of change in technology and the rapidly changing face of the workplace make choice at times frightening and overwhelming. It is almost as if we can’t cope with the number of alternatives: stay where we are, take some time out and return to work, work from home or remotely, study further, change our jobs or the way of doing them, join with others in doing something new, move to something more “spiritual” or “meaningful,” take a break from full-time volunteer work. The choices are dizzying.

  But, in my experience, they are made significantly easier by the knowledge that God calls us and is there to guide us. God first. That is the place to start.

  People sometimes say, “God gave us a brain, so shouldn’t we just use it?” The answer is quite obviously yes. But a problem arises
in the use of the word just. Human judgment alone is not, in my view, sufficient. It must run parallel to and entwined with a purposeful seeking after God.

  Other people say, “God’s in charge, so surely we’ll end up where he wants us.” Again, there’s truth in this, but to argue that our concerns are irrelevant would suggest that we don’t have any say in matters. Sometimes it is true that we receive callings from God that are given as commands. Jonah was going to Nineveh—by boat or by fish. God’s intention was clear: it was up to Jonah to decide the mode of transport. But this is an exceptional calling. The Bible makes it clear that God gives us a choice—that he works with us, not just through us.

  For the most part, we are given the freedom to seek God’s ways and then to make choices. We do not operate independently from him, but neither are we puppets dancing on a string. Our personal callings are not commands but beckonings and promptings. We enter into them in partnership with God, making use of the opportunities that God presents to us and the passions that he has given us.

  Pastor and author Steve Furtick delivered a message entitled “God’s Will Is Whatever.” He based his title on the liberating words in Paul’s letter to the Colossians, “And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him” (Colossians 3:17, emphasis added). Furtick explained that whatever we do can actually become God’s will when we do it God’s way. In other words, wherever you are right now (assuming that you are walking closely with the Lord and what you are doing is neither immoral nor illegal) is where you are meant to be. Your calling is not in some elusive, otherworldly, unreachable place. Your calling is right here, right now. You are called to get on and live in the light of that calling.

  It is easy to think, If I don’t make the right decision about which of the two job offers to accept, I may miss God’s call. Many behave as if the Christian life is merely a determinist track for us to follow or miss. But God’s sovereignty never extinguishes the freedom he gives us to choose. Within the context of God’s great love for us, and our obeying of his commands, he allows us to roam freely and to make the decisions that are ours to make. This is true liberty born out of a continuing relationship with him.