There is alot of material in the community of Jesus' followers about grace and forgiveness for screwing up. Though most of us still struggle with forgiving others and receiving forgiveness ourselves. We have high confidence, dare I say "Faith", that God is big on forgiveness and grace as well. And most of us are pretty well acquainted with our own screw ups, whether from our own discovery or with the help of others. A very good friend of mine kindly pointed out my unkindness toward some airline personnel recently. I sure hope that there is grace for me there (and lessons for the future).
I wonder though how God feels about performance of a job or task or responsibility before we have already delivered poorly? Do we have any information about that? We do have this from Col 3:23,"Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men". Does that mean that we need to be doing our best at whatever task we have? Better in our jobs, in our families, in our church and community? Is there any motivation for best over better? Is there any priority for excellence in the community of Jesus' followers? I know a Christian brother who owns a business but does not like to hire other believers because they rely more heavily on grace than performance. Is that where we have come in our faith? Are we truly balanced and working at everything as though we were working for God?
There is alot of material in bookstores on how to do more things and how to do a few things well. The general view is that no one can do many things excellently. And yet the cause for much poor work and poor performance is that we are too busy or 'didn't have time'. This doesn't apply just to work. It also applies at home. How many fathers would score a low performance appraisal for their work at home? How many husbands want to be the very best husband possible?
Do we miss out on empowerment from God in our responsibilities where He provides super-wisdom, or super-endurance or super-? because we didn't bring our best to the situation?
So really, how does God feel about performance? or Excellence in what we do?
Confession: I don't perform excellently in all I do and it's disturbing to me. Due to my background I suffer from hyper-performance-mania. If you find something in my life that I agree with you is performing poorly, I will likely obsess on fixing it. I need to learn to relax "excellently".
1 comment:
Paul, that's a hardy thought process on performance. I tend to not think quite that deep along those lines. You are logic based and therefore will approach these matters more intensely, especially being as task oriented as you are... and that with very black & white stripes!
I tend to think in terms of three houses; (the house, the house, the house... as a good friend once said)
the house personal, the house domestic and the house of God. This covers my role as a man before God, a man before my family and neighbors and a man among Christ's body.
Each situation contains the same principles and outcomes. How you treat your wife is how you treat your subordinates is how you treat your brother. When I am with a human of any kind, I do my best to allow God to reign in the moment whether work related, family related or among the body of Christ. This tends to leave me with a singular focus that can be summed up like this; walk strait no matter what road you're on, and if you end up in the ditch then get up and get going real quick because time is of the essence.
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