Share the Work (Exodus 18:17–18)
Many women struggle with the “need” to please everyone. But we simply can’t be everywhere at once. We can’t even do everything we would like to do. Trying to be all things to all people puts us on the fast track to burnout. But when we delegate, we are freed up to focus on the things God has given us to do.
Delegating also creates the opportunity for another capable person to grow into a new role. The people around Moses might never have become leaders if he hadn’t given them the opportunity. It’s the same for us today. Sometimes the best thing we can do for others and ourselves is to step aside so someone else can step up.
Reflect & Pray:
- What are your highest priorities?
- Can you release a current responsibility to someone else and encourage that person to grow?
- What chores can you delegate to your children so they can grow and learn to serve others?
Taken from NIV Busy Mom’s Bible
God Works for You
I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. He will not let your foot be moved, he who keeps you will not slumber. (Psalm 121:1–3)
Do you need help? I do. Where do you look for help?
When the Psalmist lifted up his eyes to the hills and asked, “From where does my help come?” he answered, “My help comes from the Lord” — not from the hills, but from the God who made the hills.
So he reminded himself of two great truths: one is that God is a mighty Creator over all the problems of life; the other is that God never sleeps.
God is a tireless worker. Think of God as a worker in your life. Yes, it is amazing. We are prone to think of ourselves as workers in God’s life. But the Bible wants us first to be amazed that God is a worker in our lives: “From of old no one has heard or perceived by the ear, no eye has seen a God besides thee, who works for those who wait for him” (Isaiah 64:4).
God is working for us around the clock. He does not take days off and he does not sleep. In fact he is so eager to work for us that he goes around looking for more work to do for people who will trust him: “The eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show his might in behalf of those whose heart is whole toward him” (2 Chronicles 16:9).
God loves to show his tireless power and wisdom and goodness by working for people who trust him. Jesus was the main way the Father showed this: “The Son of man came not to be served but to serve” (Mark 10:45). Jesus works for his followers. He serves them.
This is what we must believe — really believe — in order to “rejoice always” (Philippians 4:4) and “give thanks in everything” (Ephesians 5:20) and have the “peace that passes understanding” (Philippians 4:7), and “be anxious for nothing” (Philippians 4:6) and “hate our lives in this world” (John 12:25) and “love our neighbor as we love ourselves” (Matthew 22:39).
What a truth! What a reality! God is up all night and all day to work for those who wait for him.
After seven years, the famine starts. Jacob’s sons go down to Egypt and bring back grain to sustain their families.
Surviving the Famine
Read
But the famine continued to ravage the land of Canaan.
(Genesis 43:1)
Reflect
Jacob and his sons had no relief from the famine. God’s overall plan included sending them to Egypt, reuniting them with Joseph, and feeding them from Egypt’s storehouses. But this bigger picture wasn’t apparent to them.
Suffering and hardship never end quickly enough. Waiting for God to intervene can test us to the breaking point. But remaining faithful to God is an opportunity to learn greater trust and dependence. In other words, we build a deeper, closer relationship with God. Suffering may cause us to question God’s goodness; faithfulness is the path we must travel to uncover that goodness.
This was what Jacob and his sons discovered. God had been working for good throughout the famine.
Respond
If you are facing suffering or hardship and God is not bringing relief as quickly as you would like, remember that he is working for good in the meantime. Echo the words of Psalm 119:81, and ask God for the strength to remain faithful.
Streams in the Desert – May 22
He worketh (Ps. 37:5).
The translation that we find in Young of “Commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in him; and he shall bring it to pass,” reads: “Roll upon Jehovah thy way; trust upon him: and he worketh.” It calls our attention to the immediate action of God when we truly commit, or roll out of our hands into His, the burden of whatever kind it may be; a way of sorrow, of difficulty, of physical need, or of anxiety for the conversion of some dear one.
“He worketh.” When? Now. We are so in danger of postponing our expectation of His acceptance of the trust, and His undertaking to accomplish what we ask Him to do, instead of saying as we commit, “He worketh.” “He worketh” even now; and praise Him that it is so.
The very expectancy enables the Holy Spirit to do the very thing we have rolled upon Him. It is out of our reach. We are not trying to do it any more. “He worketh!” Let us take the comfort out of it and not put our hands on it again. Oh, what a relief it brings! He is really working on the difficulty.
But someone may say, “I see no results.” Never mind.
“He worketh,” if you have rolled it over and are looking to Jesus to do it. Faith may be tested, but “He worketh”; the Word is sure!
–V. H. F.
I will cry unto God most high; unto God that performeth all things for me (Ps. 57:2)
The beautiful old translation says, “He shall perform the cause which I have in hand.” Does not that make it very real to us today? Just the very thing that “I have in hand”–my own particular bit of work today, this cause that I cannot manage, this thing that I undertook in miscalculation of my own powers–this is what I may ask Him to do “for me,” and rest assured that He will perform it. “The wise and their works are in the hands of God.”
–Havergal
The Lord will go through with His covenant engagements. Whatever He takes in hand He will accomplish; hence past mercies are guarantees for the future and admirable reasons for continuing to cry unto Him.
–C. H. Spurgeon