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I’ve found, during my short tenure on Planet Earth, that a great many problems arise from our inability to properly reconcile the present with the future.
Here’s what I mean. In his book “The Associate Pastor,” Martin Hawkins outlines a potential pitfall faced by people who desire to be senior pastors but are currently serving as assistant pastors. Their desire to move up, to be that senior pastor, often causes them to do their work halfheartedly or to not get fully involved. “Those people…[can be] shortsighted. They don’t learn what God has for them in that place. They may go out and fail because they didn’t develop the skills they needed when they had the opportunity.” In other words, a preoccupation with the future can cripple their effectiveness in the here and now.
I, on the other hand, frequent the opposite end of the spectrum. In my current capacity as youth Bible teacher in my church, I’m so concerned with doing my job well that I rarely bother to ask what skills I could be cultivating for the future.
Do we need to be at all attentive to the future? David seemed to answer that question when he observed that God “knit me together in my mother’s womb” (Ps. 139:13). We have to ask, did He assemble David and then drop him into the world like a confused robot, absent any plan or direction? Not likely. Unless David is a special case, it is logical to assume that God also gave similar care both to knitting us together and to placing a plan and a direction upon our lives. Wouldn’t it be foolish to stumble through life never considering what God might have in mind for our future?
The Bible also says that Christ went to the cross “for the joy set before Him” (Hebrews 12:2) – in other words, for future joy and future glory. There’s even an entire book, Revelation, dedicated to a tantalizing vision of the future where sin is vanquished and the believers live triumphantly in a new earth.
At the same time, we can’t overlook the present. Jesus demonstrated an excellent example of this during His earthly ministry. He divided His time skillfully between training his disciples to carry on in His absence – one eye on the future – and caring for those around Him through teaching, healing, feeding, and counseling – one eye on the present. Any ministry, or indeed any life, absent either of those aspects will lack power and focus.
Ask yourself for a moment whether you tend to favor the present or the future. (If you find yourself favoring the past, that’s an entirely different problem, for which you should seek a good Biblical counselor.) Favoring the future can be a powerful gift in that it allows those people to see God’s plan and direction very clearly. Such people can plan, guide, and direct ministries as well as their lives with great skill, at the cost of possibly being less effective in the present moment. Favoring the present is a powerful gift as well, in that those people get the most out of every moment, at the cost of sometimes being surprised or disoriented when change comes.
We shouldn’t necessarily view a preoccupation with the present or the future as a flaw; after all, as David pointed out, God made us how we are. We should, however, consider it an opportunity for God to refine us. If you center on the present, seek out someone who has an eye for the future. Learn their skills; learn how God speaks to them about where He is leading and guiding. You may never have that skill at the same level that they do, but you will at least be cultivating it. If you’re a visionary, find a person who’s solidly grounded in the here and now. Learn how to spot ministry opportunities as they develop, and how to get the most out of every moment. God may have made us how we are, but we can’t use that as an excuse to remain stodgily single-faceted.
Strive for a proper balance between present opportunity and future possibility, and be amazed at what God will do through you.
Copyright Jim Barringer
