Taking It to Work:
Many of us have a love/hate relationship with polices and procedures. Depending on how you’re wired, getting forced to follow all the company rules can really leave you feeling a little empty or frustrated, knowing that you could have gotten the job done much quicker or cheaper if you would have had a little leeway with all of the rules. I’ve been there.
What I have found over the years as I have worked with different companies, most of those regulations stem out of avoiding costly mistakes or maybe even physical injury. I’m not saying that we should all agree to where bubble wrap to work to avoid papercuts, as I do agree some rules are overkill where someone went overboard on their corrective action, but I have found that most procedures make pretty good sense, if you know the reasons they were put in place.
Problem is, we don’t always know that, and without that information we can tend to bend the rules where it makes sense to us. Unfortunately, we do that with God’s policies and procedures as well.
It’s a problem. Many times, because we really can’t see the big picture of why God instituted all His rules, we can find ourselves cutting corners, and morphing God’s guidelines for living into something that makes sense for us, to our own injury down the line.
It’s a faith problem actually. We may not have faith in the procedures of the imperfect company we work for, but look at the God we work for – perfect in every way; and His precepts are too.
If you ever doubt this, just take a look at an ant’s nest, or better yet a beehive that you can see down inside. Unbelievable order. Unbelievable consistency. Unbelievable efficiency. We would all love our companies to run that well. Each bee doing exactly the beehive procedures, unquestioning, tirelessly. All following God’s perfect programming.
We can look around and see the world God has created. It is truly amazing that in each natural habitat, very, very complex systems with multitudes of vastly diverse creatures living in perfect balance, without written procedures, middle management or org charts, because they follow their creator’s rules perfectly. It all works so well when they do. Amazing!
So, why do we doubt His ways when it comes to living out our own lives? Why do we question and doubt, bend the rules, and create our own policies, when all around us, we see clearly that He knows exactly what He’s doing – even when we don’t.
Where are you struggling? Where is it just not coming together? Step back and look at His Word. As an employee, contractor or corporate leader, or a father, mother, brother or sister, if you really want it all to work out for the best, like every other living creature on the face of the earth, we really need to do it His way, as His Word works flawlessly through you today.
Is 55:9 (ESV) – For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.
Ps 18:30 (ESV) – This God—his way is perfect; the word of the LORD proves true; he is a shield for all those who take refuge in him.
Job 12:7-8 (ESV) – “But ask the beasts, and they will teach you; the birds of the heavens, and they will tell you; or the bushes of the earth, and they will teach you; and the fish of the sea will declare to you. “
Luke 6:46 (ESV) – “Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do what I tell you?
Listening to the Holy Spirit (Rhema):
In groves of trees there is abundant life. Each shares the sun, and in a common ground they stand. Birds of the air nest in the boughs, and My creation completes in even the smallest of life, together balanced that all would live fully. The animals have no choice, for they follow the way of their God without doubt, without knowledge, each giving and taking as music of a great choir falls and rises on a grand melody, written by My hand. The ways of the Father are perfect, for if even the beasts of the field flourish without thought, then how much greater those who call Him Father. My voice brings life, in law and precept. Perfection can be heard among the Church, but it is heard little. My Word speaks life, but it is he who follows his own way, who loses his way, and each of the others suffer for the loss. Seek first My way. Call forth that I might guide, for My way is the way of the Father, fully in truth, and perfect in ways above the sight of man. The hive of the bee is in perfect harmony; in this see and have faith. Doubt not My direction; it errs not.
