It wasn’t what Jesus planned

Have you ever made plans, only to have them ruined by something unexpected?  Maybe one of these sound familiar:

It's been a tough week at work.  Good-busy, but definitely busy.  You’ve settled into bed, only to be woken up a couple hours later by your anxious-sounding child who says, “I don’t feel good.  I just threw up in my bed.”  As you drag yourself out of your warm bed, you realize that there won’t be much sleep tonight.
OR
You’ve looked forward to a quiet Saturday afternoon/evening all week.  Nothing is planned.  Nothing will be planned.  The only items on the agenda are peace, quiet, and (finally!) some relaxation.  Just as you’re settling in, you get “one of those calls” from a not-super-close-friend-whose-more-of-an-acquaintance.  Their life has suddenly fallen apart, and you know helping them will consume the rest of your day. 
OR
You’re getting the family packed for a long-awaited vacation, and just as you’re getting ready to leave…your neighbor’s pet suddenly has an emergency and has to go to the vet.  Your neighbor asks if you can stay with her kids while she takes care of the animal.

I’m sure you can think of other scenarios that you have experienced.  What is your default response to having your plans upended?  How quickly do you get upset?  How many curse words and complaints are muttered under your breath or shouted in your head?

These situations are especially challenging when your interrupted plans are ones you had with other people.  When we’re the ones setting the agenda, we don’t want our plans to be knocked off course.  How we handle these moments can be quite revealing for what our hearts and minds are preoccupied with. 

On more than one occasion, Jesus had the same issue – someone came to Him and drastically changed His plans for the day.  The example we’re going to look at comes at one of the busiest times in His ministry.  He had previously sent out His 12 disciples in pairs to preach about the coming Kingdom of God and heal sick people as proof of their message (Mark 6:7-13).  After completing their mission, they’ve come back to Jesus, and He decides they needed some rest:

Mark 6:30-32
The apostles gathered around Jesus and reported to Him all that they had done and taught.  He said to them, “Come away by yourselves to a remote place and rest for a while.”  For many people were coming and going, and they did not even have time to eat.  So they went away in the boat by themselves to a remote place

That’s great leadership.  The 12 apostles were successful in their mission, but they were tired out from all the work.  Jesus wanted to celebrate them, but also give them the opportunity to rest – away from all the crowds.

Have you ever been so busy that you did not even have time to eat?  Even if all your work is a success, without fuel and rest, we all crash eventually.  Jesus knew His people needed some R&R, and it must have sounded wonderful to the disciples when they heard Jesus say, Get in the boat, we’re going to go somewhere and rest for a bit.

However, getting away wasn’t that simple.  Jesus and His disciples were meeting needs for many people, and they had a reputation for doing so.  Crowds formed wherever they went, and some people were willing to go to great lengths to be near Jesus:

Mark 6:32-34
So they went away in the boat by themselves to a remote place, but many saw them leaving and recognized them, and they ran on foot from all the towns and arrived ahead of them.  When He went ashore, He saw a large crowd

A large crowd was the total opposite of what Jesus had planned for His disciples.  His planned “staff retreat” had unexpectedly turned into a large-scale ministry event.  What would have been your response?  I think I would have wanted to get back in the boat and sail to another side of the lake…probably would have also had a few choice complaints bounce around my brain and possibly escape my lips.  But look at how Jesus responded:

Mark 6:34
When He went ashore, He saw a large crowd and had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd.  Then He began to teach them many things.

Although He had planned a longer time of rest for His disciples, the time during the boat ride would have to be sufficient.  Jesus’ plans were upended with an unexpected need…and He responded with compassion.  Instead of seeing the crowd as a barrier to His own agenda, Jesus saw the crowd as they really were – they were like sheep without a shepherd.  They didn’t know what to do, where to go, or when they had crossed boundaries…they simply wanted to be with someone who they could trust, someone who would see them compassionately.

After teaching the crowd all day, as it was getting late, the disciples realized there was no food to feed anyone.  It was this moment when Jesus performed one of His largest miracles – feeding thousands of people with only five loaves of bread and two fish. 

My take-away from looking at this story unfold:
Serving others in unexpected, unplanned moments will require me to see others with compassion instead of looking at them as roadblocks that keep me from my own agenda.  And while I serve, I will have a front row seat to however God is going to feed them.

Keep Pressing,
Ken

Unexpectedly interrupted, and it was good

I have plans.  You have plans.  We all have plans – for how we start our mornings, how we expect the day to generally progress, how we will spend time this coming weekend, how we will spend our money, and on and on and on.  We’re more protective of some of our plans than others…and we certainly don’t like it when our plans are interrupted.  But how many times have our plans been derailed, and we look back and say “Wow, I didn’t expect that good thing to happen.”

That is exactly what is about to happen to Jesus’ disciples. 

After the Samaritan woman accepted Jesus’ free-gift offer of living water and eternal life, she ran back into town to tell others that the Messiah had finally arrived.  Here’s what happened next:

John 4:39-42
Now many Samaritans from that town believed in Him because of what the woman said when she testified, “He told me everything I ever did.”  So when the Samaritans came to Him, they asked Him to stay with them, and He stayed there two days.  Many more believed because of what He said.  And they told the woman. “We no longer believe because of what you said, since we have heard for ourselves and know that this really is the Savior of the world.”

A two day stay was not part of the original travel itinerary.  They were traveling from Judea in the south to Galilee in the north, for most of the disciples, Galilee was home.  I’m sure they were looking forward to seeing family and friends.  When Jesus saw the Samaritans’ need for Him and their desire to hear more, He opted to change the disciples’ travel plans.  And look at what took place as a result: many more believed in Him because of what He said.

Those that heard Him speak over those two days either hadn’t heard the woman’s invitation to meet Jesus at the well, or they were too skeptical to join her and the others when they went back to meet Jesus at the well.  Jesus staying longer gave extra time for even more people to encounter Him.

Think of it, though, from the disciples’ perspective.  They stayed two more (totally unplanned and unscheduled) days with the Samaritans.  The disciples likely didn’t want to be there at all.  Samaritans were outsiders and sometimes enemies to Jewish society.  On their current journey, they were about halfway home.  How did their interactions go when they bought food in the town?  Were they rude?  Stuck up?  Condescending?  If so, what was it like when the shopkeepers arrived later with the woman to hear from Jesus?

There are lots of ways that we could apply our observations from this small section, but let me share a personal one:

A few months back, I was working on the outline for this study of John 4.  It was during my initial flight home from a 10 day work trip.  I was ready to get back to the USA, and I had planned to use at least the first leg of my journey to hammer out as much as I could for this study’s blog posts.  I did not know anyone around me and most were not Americans.  I thought it was the perfect time to shut out the world and do some focused work.  However, soon after takeoff, my plans were interrupted.  The woman next to me must have read some of what I was transferring from my notes to the Bible verses in my laptop’s outline text – she apologized for disturbing me and asked if I was a pastor.  I told her that I am a teacher and gave her a card for this blog.  She was very thankful and told me that growing closer to God was one of her goals for the year and that she’s always amazed at people that can teach from the Bible.  She quickly apologized again and said that she didn’t want to interrupt my work. 

Did I have some work to do?  Absolutely…a lot of work, in fact.  It was Wednesday, I did not have Thursday’s post complete.  I was up against a deadline to have the next day’s post ready for you, my regular readers.  However, taking care of her was more important in that moment.  She went on to tell me that she was flying home to brother’s funeral.  We talked about God and how He can handle our outbursts and frustrations when we don’t understand what’s happening in life.  We talked about our families and parenting boys into young men.  I encouraged her to reach out to me via the blog/website if she has any questions – I hope that she does.  But if I don’t hear from her again in this life (and as of this posting, I haven’t), we’ll have some catching up to do in eternity. 

Her needs at that moment were spiritual food for me, our conversation encouraged me to keep going…but talking with her certainly wasn’t on my To-Do list for the day.  However, Jesus’ encounter with the woman at the well and His unexpected two day stay in Samaria shows us how important it is for us to flexible with our schedules – so we can do God’s work in the harvest fields when the opportunity arises.

Keep Pressing,
Ken