God at Work in Our Work

I have been reading through the books of 1 and 2 Thessalonians in my devotions recently, and what rich books these are! A few interesting themes have stood out to me as I’ve been studying them, and God has been encouraging my heart with these truths as I seek a balance in my life between working and trusting in God, between acting and waiting on God. How can we know whether what we're working for or pursuing in prayer is truly God’s will and whether our desires are His desires for us?

In the books of 1 and 2 Thessalonians, there is a close connection between our work and God’s work. In 1 Thessalonians 1:2-3, Paul expresses his thankfulness to God for the believers’ work of faith, labor of love, and steadfastness of hope in the Lord Jesus Christ. Then in chapter 2 verse 13, he thanks God for their acceptance of the Word of God, which is at work in them.

In 3:8, he talks about the believers “standing fast,” and in verses 12-13 He asks God to make them increase and abound, and to establish their hearts in blamelessness and holiness. To establish something can mean either to make it firm and stable or to show the proof or genuineness of it, to confirm or verify it. While the believers are actively standing fast and working out their faith, God is the one making them firm, confirming the genuineness of their faith, and causing them to grow in holiness.

God’s work in us involves moving our hearts towards that which He desires for us and confirming the desires that He gives to us. In 2 Thessalonians 1:3 we again see Paul giving thanks to God for the growing faith and love of these believers and their steadfastness. And then a few verses later he prays that God might fulfill their every resolve for good and every work of faith by His power, for His glory and through His grace (1:11-12). As God does His work in our hearts, He gives us desires that align with His will for us, and then he gives us the grace to work towards those things and fulfills those desires. When Paul commands the believers in Philippi to work out their own salvation with fear and trembling, he reminds them that the only reason they can do so is because God is the One at work in them to give them both the desire and the ability to do His will (Phil. 2:12-13).

In 2 Thessalonians 2:13-17, Paul thanks God for His sanctifying work in the believers by His Spirit and then goes on to admonish them to stand firm and be obedient to what they were taught. He later encourages them that God is the one who will comfort their hearts and establish them in every good work and word, because of His love and through His grace.

In both 2 Thessalonians 1:12 and 2:14, we see that the purpose of both God’s work and our work is that God might be glorified in us and that we might obtain the glory of God. We can compare this to passages like Rom. 8:29, which tells us that God’s ultimate purpose for us is to be conformed to the image of His Son; or 2 Cor. 3:18, which shows us God’s work of transforming us from glory to glory by His Spirit; or Eph. 1:6, 12, and 14, where we see that God’s primary purpose for our salvation is the praise of His glory.

In 2 Thessalonians 3:3-5 we again see the interconnectedness of God’s work and our work as His children. Paul encourages the believers that “God is faithful” and “will strengthen and guard [them] from the evil one,” and he prays that God will direct their hearts to His love and the endurance of Christ. Right in the middle of these verses, he says that he is confident in them, that they are doing what he commanded them to do. We can be obedient and confident as we seek to do God’s will, because God is faithful and will direct our hearts towards His purposes for us and strengthen us with His grace to accomplish those purposes!

I'm reminded of Psalm 90:16-17, where again we see God's work and our work side by side. Here Moses prays that God's work would be made evident to His servants and that they might see His glory, and then ends with asking God to show His beauty in us and establish the work of our hands.

We can be encouraged in our daily lives with the knowledge that our efforts are not in vain as we let God direct us, because He is the one Who establishes and confirms our work and causes it to be fruitful for His glory! It is His grace that enables us to do what pleases Him and accomplishes His will in and through us.

“Therefore my dear brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always excelling in the Lord’s work, knowing that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.” – 1 Cor. 15:58

Refocus and Renewal

For those of us who are teachers or students, a new school year signifies a fresh start after a time of renewal and refreshment over the summer. Sometimes over the summer, I pull out old ideas that have been forgotten or disused and remind myself of things that I would like to be doing but that have been neglected amidst the daily distractions of life and work. The need for renewal and refocus is not so much a need to learn something new, but to regain perspective and be reminded of what is truly important. 

I recently had the opportunity to go to a ladies retreat with some women from my church, appropriately called a “Renew Conference.” This year the sessions centered around the character of God, and we focused on His ability, knowledge, and goodness through the lives of Sarah, Job, and Joseph.

In the life of Job, we get an inside look at why Job was suffering as he was, and we are told that God was sovereignly using it for His own purposes. We are shown the dialogue in heaven between Satan and God and learn that Job was entrusted with this suffering by God Himself in order to prove the genuineness of Job’s faith and ultimately to bring great glory to Himself.

Job, however, was not made aware of this, and nowhere in the book do we see that God ever revealed to Him why he was suffering. In fact all throughout the book we see evidence that Job is asking the question “Why?” and never does receive an answer to this question. In fact, for 37 chapters God is silent while Job’s friends accuse him without cause and while he pours out his anguish and questions to God.

At the end of the book, when God finally speaks, it is not to answer Job’s questions or to vindicate him, but to redirect his focus away from his situation and his own righteousness to God’s presence, power, and infinite knowledge. He had heard about God and had knowledge about God, even fear of God, but now his understanding of and faith in God was being tested. Through his suffering, he was not learning any knew theology about God, but God was bringing him back to the fundamental truths of who He is and the fact that He cannot be neatly fit inside the box that we try to put Him in according to our finite understanding. He is so much bigger than that and is beyond any comprehension that we think we have of Him.

There are times in life when our circumstances do not seem to match with our view of God, and that can lead to confusion, discouragement, and even anger. Sometimes we don’t ever get an answer to why God is allowing something hard in our lives, but when we are consumed with WHO, rather than WHY, we have truth we can cling to in order to take our focus away from ourselves and the situation and towards the One who has perfect knowledge and sovereign control over it all. Even more than that, He is the One who has promised to work all things for good for those who love Him and are called according to His purposes (Rom. 8:28-29), and this should be enough for us to trust Him even when we don’t understand.

A very interesting passage that has many similarities to the book of Job is Psalm 44. This psalm starts off with the psalmist declaring that he has heard about God (similar to what Job said in Job 42:5), about all that God had done for His people in the past, and His mighty works on their behalf. But then we see the psalmist struggling to reconcile what he knows about God with what he sees currently in his own life and the lives of his people, much like Job struggled to make sense of what was happening in his life in light of what he knew about God. God appeared not to be keeping His promises, to be silent, even to be asleep (Ps. 44:23)!

Through the confusion and the questions, Job was able to persevere as he waited for God’s answer, because he was clinging to the hope of seeing God (Job 19:25) and of knowing that God was at work in his life to bring about a beautiful end result (Job 23:10). As I wait, I should be consumed with knowing Him better and finding out what He wants to do in my life through the circumstances He has wisely and lovingly brought into my life. As I spend time in His presence, I can claim His promises and expectantly wait for Him to work!