Making Plans

Posted on by korgrocker

“I am coming to visit you after I have been to Macedonia, for I am planning to travel through Macedonia. Perhaps I will stay awhile with you, possibly all winter, and then you can send me on my way to my next destination. This time I don’t want to make just a short visit and then go right on. I want to come and stay awhile, if the Lord will let me. In the meantime, I will be staying here at Ephesus until the Festival of Pentecost. There is a wide-open door for a great work here, although many oppose me.”
1 Corinthians 16:5-9 NLT

I’m writing this on the last day of 2025, although it will be a few days yet before my readers read it. Paul wrote about the plans he was making. He was totally committed to his work for the Lord, undertaking one missionary journey after another, making converts and establishing churches. He reminded the Corinthians, “For I decided that while I was with you I would forget everything except Jesus Christ, the one who was crucified” (1 Corinthians 2-2:). A great place to start if evangelism is attempted. But as we know, we have a sceptical world around us who are like the people in 1 Corinthians 1:23, “So when we preach that Christ was crucified, the Jews are offended and the Gentiles say it’s all nonsense”. But that didn’t stop Paul from making plans because he saw the world around him as fields ripe for harvest. Then, as now, many people need to hear the Good News about Jesus, because they are depressed and weary from the constant bad news peddled by the media. Many people struggle to live the life they have found themselves in, facing issues such as illness, cost-of-living pressures, and poor-quality housing, among others. But the biggest issue people face is a lack of hope. Hope for the future. Hope for their family. In fact, I recently spoke with a lady whose children had decided not to have children themselves because they didn’t want to burden them with a life in the bad and sad world in which we live. So there is an increasing sense that living is pointless and to be endured, not enjoyed. But this is not what God intended when He created mankind.

What plans can we make to share the Good News with those around us in our neighbourhoods, communities and families? What about our workplaces or social clubs? Schools or colleges? Paul didn’t care about what people thought of him because he had his mind fixed on the goal of the Heavenly prize. Philippians 3:12b-14, “ … But I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me. No, dear brothers and sisters, I have not achieved it, but I focus on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead, I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us”. Such motivation could only empower the plans Paul was making. But reading these verses begs the question: what plans are we making? What is the goal we are striving to reach? Are we actively trying to achieve it, or are we just warming a pew, waiting for the day when we die?

We pilgrims also have the opportunity to make plans for our families. We may be parents or grandparents, but we must make plans to nurture the younger members of our families so they grow up knowing God. We may not always express words, but they will look closely at how we live our lives. Referring to what the Lord had done for them, Moses instructed the Israelites, “But watch out! Be careful never to forget what you yourself have seen. Do not let these memories escape from your mind as long as you live! And be sure to pass them on to your children and grandchildren” (Deuteronomy 4:9). We have a testimony about which we must never be shy of sharing with others in our families. 

We pilgrims also have the opportunity to make plans for our churches and fellowships. There is always the tendency to allow others to do the work necessary in a church, practical things like cleaning and serving. We must ask God to show us the plans He wants us to make so that we can live a church life, “loving our neighbours as ourselves”. And then those of us still in employment can make plans to help and encourage our fellow workers, showing them the practical side of Christianity so that perhaps one day they will ask us how they too can be saved. 

“Speak Lord, Your servant is listening”

In the year before us, what plans can we make for Jesus? Worth a prayer of two? But more than that, in response to our prayers, God might ask us to do something outrageous as He did to Ananias, when He told him to go and pray for Saul after his Damascus Road encounter with Jesus. We also need to have the same attitude as Samuel. Remember the story, “And the Lord came and called as before, “Samuel! Samuel!” And Samuel replied, “Speak, your servant is listening”” (1 Samuel 3:10). When we pray for God to help us in our plans, we need to listen. And God, seeing a heart willing to serve, will bless us richly with an answer. 

Dear Father God, we pray today for Your input into our plans. Please lead us in this next season in our lives, because, regardless of our ages, You have work for us to do. May the year before us be filled with Your blessings in all that we do. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Phoebe

Posted on by korgrocker

“I commend to you our sister Phoebe, who is a deacon in the church in Cenchrea. Welcome her in the Lord as one who is worthy of honour among God’s people. Help her in whatever she needs, for she has been helpful to many, and especially to me.”
Romans 16:1-2 NLT

The last chapter in Romans starts with the names of Paul’s friends, with each of them accompanied by some words extolling their virtues. First on the list is a lady called Phoebe. Paul records her role in the Cenchrean church, located in a town a few miles from Corinth on the coast. She was obviously a benefactor of Paul along with others and was doing an important job in her local church. The fact that Paul was asking that she should be welcomed by the Roman believers indicated that she was to travel there at some time. Perhaps she was the bearer of his letter, accompanying others from the Corinthian church, where Paul was assumed to have written the letter to the Romans. We wonder if Phoebe was perhaps a business woman, so she might have been using a trip to Rome to further her business interests. 

Paul introduced Phoebe as being a deacon, a Greek word meaning no more than servant. But her ministry of helping others was worthy of a title. And as we should with all of our visiting Christian brothers and sisters, Paul asked that she would be given a special welcome, and given any assistance she required, as she has helped others. 

Not much here for us pilgrims today, we might think, but it’s the principle of being a servant in our churches, helping those around us that comes across. Phoebe was an example to her church, and, because Paul recorded her name in his letter, she has been providing the same example down through the ages. If our ministers and pastors were writing a letter like Paul, would we get a mention like Phoebe? Of course that would not be something that we would expect, but in our churches and fellowships we should all be “deacons” or servants. Sadly, too many people who go to a church service are irregular in their attendance, and do little or nothing to help others when they are there. It is often said that 80% of the necessary work is done by 10% of the people.

So we pilgrims should aspire to be male or female Phoebe’s, using our resources, our time, skills and money, to help those around us. It may be inconvenient at times but it is our calling. Jesus set the scene for us in His act of washing His disciples feet. Jesus said, as recorded in John 13:14-15, “And since I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash each other’s feet. I have given you an example to follow. Do as I have done to you”. Was Phoebe a foot-washer? Probably. But we pilgrims today should certainly have the same attitude that Jesus had, in His service to His disciples.

So we pilgrims must look out for one another, and try and outdo each other when it comes to acts of service in our local church or fellowship. Contrary to common custom, the church minister is not responsible for doing all the tasks in the church. If the building belongs to the church that meets there, then there will be plenty of opportunities to do a Phoebe. And what we do is done as to the Lord. Recently I attended a service in Charlotte Chapel in Edinburgh, and after the service I was down in the gents bathroom where I found a young man mopping the floor and singing his heart out. I said to him that he sounded happy. He said of course, I’m doing this for Jesus. What a lovely attitude. Surely a young man “worthy of honour among God’s people”.

Dear Father God. We too sing for Jesus, because of what He did for us. Thank You. Amen.

Payback

Posted on by korgrocker

“What can I offer the Lord for all he has done for me? 
I will lift up the cup of salvation and praise the Lord’s name for saving me. 
I will keep my promises to the Lord in the presence of all his people. 
O Lord, I am your servant; yes, I am your servant, born into your household; 
you have freed me from my chains.”
‭‭Psalms‬ ‭116:12-14, 16‬ ‭NLT‬‬

In our culture we hate being anyone’s debtor. “Neither a borrower or a lender be” is a saying from one of Shakespeare’s plays, and it underpins the proudful independence so respected in British society. But when it comes to God, we’re in a different league. There we were, bumbling along in our sinful worlds, heading like lemmings over the cliff of self-destruction into a lost eternity, “where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth”. And all of a sudden, by a series of circumstances, Jesus found us, and we read in Romans, “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” All of a sudden, as we embrace our salvation through the love and blood of Jesus, we find that we owe a debt to God that is unpayable. We can never earn enough to repay God for all he has done for us. In fact, even the whole world would be insufficient to pay the debt. Through God’s grace, our salvation cost Jesus everything but cost us nothing. But none of this stopped the Psalmist from saying, “What shall I return to the Lord for all his goodness to me?” It’s a trap we can fall into if we try and answer that question by our own efforts. The reality is that there is nothing I can do to earn God’s gift. I can only approach Him with a humble heart, overwhelmed in gratitude for “all His goodness to me“. 

I have heard people plead with God saying things like, “God, if you only heal my mother, then I promise I will go to church every Sunday for the whole of this year.” or, “God, if you help me give up smoking I’ll put the money saved in the offering every week.” I’m sure we have all walked that road at some time in our lives. But nothing we do to tug a concession from God’s heart will ever work. It’s because He knows what we need. He knows what our problems are. And through His grace and mercy, through His goodness and love, he will answer our prayers of faith, simply and effectively.

But that is not to say we should sit back waiting for our new life, basking in God’s grace. He has work for us to do. And we will be obedient, not to earn His salvation of course, but because we love Him. What does He want us to do? The Psalmist writes, “I will lift up the cup of salvation and praise the Lord’s name for saving me. I will keep my promises to the Lord in the presence of all his people.” And then in verse 16 he writes, “O Lord, I am your servant”. God has things for us to do. We are His servants and we delight in doing His will. We might ask, “What is God’s will for me?”. If we don’t know we only have to ask Him – He will soon answer.