For a day in your courts is better than a thousand elsewhere. I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of wickedness. -Psalm 84:10

“I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than . . .” I believe this is a heart that God wants us to have when it comes to serving Him.

So many times when it comes to serving God, especially as we grow and mature, we can get to the point where we think we’re above certain tasks. What used to satisfy us, doesn’t any more, our attitudes shift, we think we should be doing “more important” tasks. We become frustrated that we’re not advancing as we think we should.

Anyone else guilty of this other than me?

God’s really been showing me that He wants me to have the attitude of the psalmist. Recognizing that if I’m doing anything for God, it’s better than anything else I could be doing with my life.

I’m recognizing that it doesn’t matter if the only thing I’m asked to do is to hold a door for the rest of my life, if it’s for God, I’ll do it, I’ll be faithful, I’ll have a great attitude and I’ll do it with all of my heart.

Faithfulness is a much bigger issue than we’ve made it out to be. Faithfulness is a heart issue. Promotion is a God issue. If we take care of the faithfulness issue, God will take care of the promotion issue. In His timing.

Are you willing to be a door holder for God? What areas of your life have you let a bad attitude sneak in because you forgot who you’re really working for and why you’re really doing it? Repent, and with humility, become a door holder!

Thoughts?

Ever feel like this? I know I have. When I was 18 I started interning at my church. It was an unpaid internship and I had no  idea what to expect out of the behind the scenes work at a church. For almost a year the biggest responsibility I had was washing pitchers of water and organizing bins for youth group. That’s what everyone dreams of when they think of working at a church, right?

“God is more concerned about developing your potential than you are!”

I would sit in meetings and hear my mentor delegate “significant” tasks to the rest of the team only to end with looking at me and saying, “Bubs, organize the bins and wash the pitchers.” After two months of that, I had enough. So when my mentor left for his 8 week sabbatical, I e-mailed him telling him I quit. I didn’t sign up to work for free and wash pitchers.

He got me in contact with another mentor and had him talk to me. He said, “Bubs, have you prayed about this?” Of course I hadn’t. He said, “Give God a chance to speak to your heart, if you come back and still don’t want to, then quit.” God had one chance – if he didn’t speak to me in my devotions, it was over. I opened to Isaiah 49:3.4:

³ He said to me, “You are my servant, Israel, and you will bring me glory.” ⁴ I replied, “But my work seems so useless! I have spent my strength for nothing and to no purpose.Yet I leave it all in the Lord’s hand;I will trust God for my reward.”

This verse changed my life forever. I felt like my work was useless, done for nothing, and for no purpose. YET…I leave it in God’s hands – I trust Him for my reward.  I developed this mentality and decided to stick with the internship.

One Thing Leads to Another

For an entire year, I set up bins faithfully every week. At the end of the year, I got asked to give my first offering. I started getting more responsibility. I interned a second year and at the end of my second year, I got asked to speak for the first time ever. Which led to more speaking engagements, more responsibility, and eventually 4 years after I interned, I got hired on staff at my church.

What Would Have Happened if I Would Have Quit Because I thought Everything I did was Pointless?

I wouldn’t be writing this, I wouldn’t be on staff, I probably wouldn’t be living for God. My Conclusion? God has you where you are for a reason, for your development, and if you’ll learn to trust Him for your reward instead of people, in His timing, He will promote you and allow you to do great things for Him, but first, you have to be faithful in the things that seem absolutely worthless.

⁸Another of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, spoke up, ⁹“Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, but how far will they go among so many?”                           John 6:8-9

Do you ever look at where other people are at life, and feel like where you are is insignificant? Or to get where they have gotten in life would be impossible? I promise you they didn’t just arrive at that place. Everybody who is doing something great had to start with something small, with what they had.

God will take what little we do have and make it much

The reality is, we more to offer than we may think. When we offer what we have (our gifts, our talents, our money, our service) with everything we got, God will take what little we do have and make it much.

Jesus took the boys 5 loaves and two fish and used it to feed 5,000 men plus thousands of women and children.

What we may consider insignificant, is significant to God. He said if you’ll be faithful in little, He’ll make you faithful over much.

So wherever you are in life, no matter how little you may think you have to offer, give everything you do have. Give God your best and watch what He does with it.

In time – being faithful with what seems little now, in retrospect, will just be a small step into the bigger things God has planned for you.But God can’t bring you into more, until you’ve valued and proved yourself with the little you have now.

Zachariah 4:10 says, “Don’t despise the day of small beginnings.”

What is before you that you could give to God that you deem insignificant, but could be used to bring glory to God? That could reach people? Don’t miss out on opportunities to minister to people just because you don’t think you have anything to offer – because God will take your little, and make it do much.