Often when I coach people to find their purpose, they will make a statement, "I just can't quit my job to do what I love." It's interesting because most of the time I had never mentioned quitting their job. Knowing that they were doing something they did not like in order to earn a salary, they concluded that their only purpose hope was to immediately stop doing what they didn't like to have a chance to do what they enjoyed.
What's more, their fear of an unknown future drove them to create a scenario that was so extreme that no one, not even the Lord, could or would expect them to go from a regular paycheck to a life of faith—or so they thought. Therefore, they excused themselves from any further consideration of ways to engage their purpose, for in their mind, it is an all or nothing kind of thing: either they worked their job or their purpose. After that, I tried to ease them off the ledge of jumpng to such extreme thinking to consider the matter from a different perspective.
KINGDOM OF PRIESTS
When Joshua was directing the distribution of land to the tribes, we see it mentioned twice that one tribe got no land:
But to the tribe of Levi he gave no inheritance, since the food offerings presented to the Lord, the God of Israel, are their inheritance, as he promised them. . . . But to the tribe of Levi, Moses had given no inheritance; the Lord, the God of Israel, is their inheritance, as he promised them (Joshua 13:14, 33).
The Levites didn't to receive any land because they were to serve the Lord and the people in His holy place and were to live off the offerings of the people. That is because the Lord and His service were their portion, as Jeremiah declared: "I say to myself, 'The LORD is my portion; therefore I will wait for him'” (Lamentations 3:24, emphasis added). Later in the book of Joshua we learn that God also gave them cities in which to live within the borders of every tribe's territory.
Jesus was also a priest and He told His disciples, “'My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work" (John 4:34). Now we are a kingdom of priests and the Lord is also our portion and our "food" is to do His will. And how the Lord chooses to provide for you is His business. You only have to focus on His promise that He will provide so you can, like the Levites, serve Him and the people. And that doesn't just pertain to "ministry," for how often have you heard and perhaps even said that no matter what you are doing, it's ministry—even if you are working for a secular company.
NO WORK, NO FOOD
Of course, we are to work and not live off other people. Paul warned us in 1 Timothy 5:8, "Anyone who does not provide for their relatives, and especially for their own household, has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever." Yet aren't we part of God's family? Then isn't He obligated by His own words to provide for His own household of faith? Your role is to work; God's role is to provide. Pretty simple.
The reality of this promise that God will provide should free you to serve the Lord by doing what you love, knowing you are in God's will and doing what it is that He wants you to do. Since I started my ministry eleven years ago, God has provided for me through my writing, publishing, consulting, teaching, part-time administrative work, travel and speaking, and donations through my ministry.
Have you allowed financial concerns to limit your expression of purpose? Has the Lord chosen to provide for you in ways that are not conventional or similar to how He does it for others? Can you focus on the fact that He is your portion and will not allow you to lack, and that goes for your family and you in your latter years? Yes, I have worked for my pay, but He has provided in numerous ways and I have never known what's coming next. I've only witnessed that it—my provision—will indeed come.
I am nobody special in the Kingdom. If God has done that for me, then He will do it for you if you allow Him to guide your thinking away from "all or nothing" to a mindset that God will provide, but it's His business how and when and through whom He does it. Have a blessed week.
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