This morning I’m slowing down to organize my calendar and to-do list. I know it needs done, but I feel a little guilty about taking the time to do it. There’s so much to do that I feel like I should be sprinting not slowly pacing myself. After all, if God wants me to do these things, they should just happen, right? It feels like that was a message I picked up in my youth somewhere.

BUT God, God has made it clear through my recent Bible studies that many times, maybe even most of the time, there is something I’m supposed to do before He’ll do what He’s going to do. Notice how Ephesians 3:20 includes “His mighty power at work WITHIN us” before “to accomplish”.

Remember when God asked Moses to free His people and Moses was like, “Gee, God, I feel like there’s a better person to do this…” and God said, “Pick up your staff.” and Boom! it turned into a serpent? Naturally Moses dropped it and then God said, “Pick it back up” and I imagine Moses’ primary thought was “Seriously? Umm…that’s a snake…”. BUT Moses trusted God and he picked it up and it became a staff again (Exodus 4:3) .

Later, God would tell Moses to hold out his staff at the Red Sea and when he did – WHOOSH! – it parted (Exodus 14:21).

When they were at Marah and the water was not fit to drink, God told them to throw a piece of wood in it and WAH-LA! the water was sweet and good (Exodus 15:23-25).

When Haman set his heart to kill the Hebrew people, Mordecai delivered God’s message to Esther that she was to go before King Xerxes, uninvited, and plead the case for her people. Uninvited meant she could, if Xerxes was in a bad mood or just felt like it, be executed. Esther took that step of faith and her people were saved (Book of Esther).

When Saul, who became Paul, was stricken with blindness on the way to Damascus, God told him to go to the home of Ananias. He did so and was healed (Acts 9:7).

The Bible contains 100s of examples just like these in which God works wonderous miracles when we ACT on what He has told us to do. Even salvation from our sins requires some action on our part: that we confess to God that we are sinners and ask Him to forgive us.

As the writer James recorded in Chapter 1 v. 22, we must be “doers of the Word and not hearers only”. What is God calling you to do? Is it time to put some other things on hold and prioritize the calling? It is for me today. I imagine it will be again many times in my life.

Beloved, this day and every day, let us listen for the call and respond as He desires so that God may gain glory from our obedience, so that we may be a living testimony to the world of His power at work within us.