Discovering Destiny (Part 22): You Find Your Life When You Give It Away

https://youtu.be/6cclExFFaJc

(Special Edition: What The Mission Field Taught Me)

Today, we continue our focus on THE YEAR OF DISCOVERY, as we learn that some parts of your destiny are only discovered when you pour your life into somebody else.

I am back. Last week I told you that Isabella and I would be hosting a mission team here in the Dominican Republic and that I would be off the keyboard for a few days. We just finished. I did not come home with only pictures. I came home with lessons. Today I am pausing the Jacob story to hand you four of them.

Key scriptures for this year:

2 Peter 3:18 GNT

“But continue to grow in the grace and in the knowledge of our Savior, Jesus Christ. To Him be glory now and forever.”

Luke 10:20 Mirror

“It’s time for you to rediscover who you are from Heaven’s perspective.”

1 John 3:10 Mirror

“There is a very visible and vast difference between living one’s life from your God identity or from a fallen man’s mindset.”

Proverbs 25:2 NKJV

“It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, but the glory of kings is to search out a matter.”

Jeremiah 29:13 NIV

“You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.”

Scripture(s) we will study today:

Mark 8:34-35 ERV

“Then Jesus called the people and his followers to him. He said, ‘Any of you who want to be my follower must stop thinking about yourself and what you want. You must be willing to carry the cross that is given to you for following me. Any of you who try to save the life you have will lose it. But you who give up your life for me and for the Good News will save it.'”

Matthew 16:24 ERV

“If any of you want to be my follower, you must stop thinking about yourself and what you want. You must be willing to carry the cross that is given to you for following me.”

Mark 10:45 NLT

“For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

1 John 4:7-8 ESV

“Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.”

Supporting scriptures:

Ephesians 2:10 NLT

“For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.”

Matthew 9:36 NKJV

“But when He saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion for them, because they were weary and scattered, like sheep having no shepherd.”

2 Samuel 24:24 NKJV

“No, but I will surely buy it from you for a price; nor will I offer burnt offerings to the LORD my God with that which costs me nothing.”

Isaiah 58:10-11 NLT

“Feed the hungry, and help those in trouble. Then your light will shine out from the darkness, and the darkness around you will be as bright as noon. The LORD will guide you continually, giving you water when you are dry and restoring your strength. You will be like a well-watered garden, like an ever-flowing spring.”

Matthew 19:14 NLT

“But Jesus said, ‘Let the children come to me. Don’t stop them! For the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to those who are like these children.'”

Zechariah 4:6 NKJV

“‘Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,’ says the LORD of hosts.”

1 Timothy 4:12 NKJV

“Let no one despise your youth, but be an example to the believers in word, in conduct, in love, in spirit, in faith, in purity.”

1 Thessalonians 2:8 NKJV

“So, affectionately longing for you, we were well pleased to impart to you not only the gospel of God, but also our own lives, because you had become dear to us.”

1 John 3:18 NKJV

“My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth.”

Matthew 25:40 NLT

“And the King will say, ‘I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me!'”

Setting the Stage:

Let me tell you what last week actually looked like, because the numbers will not tell you about the sweat.

23 missionaries paid their own way and flew into the Dominican Republic. Add my family and our team on the ground here, and the house (where we were meeting) was full every single night. We ate breakfast together, prayed, and then left early in the morning for a full day of camp (Vacation Bible School, with an English as a Second Language Program). The VBS supported just under 100 children. We taught them, fed them, played with them, sang with them, taught them the Bible, taught them English, taught them skills, and shared the love of God. One morning I walked past a classroom and saw a boy standing at a whiteboard writing out 1 John 4:7 in his own handwriting: “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God.” Next to it, somebody had already written “GOD LOVES YOU” with a heart.

Then there were the backpacks. One thousand of them, packed with school supplies, carried into some of the poorest communities on this island and handed to children one at a time, by hand, by people who flew a long way to do it. I watched grown adults kneel in the dirt to get eye level with a child. I watched a boy hold his new backpack up to a camera like it was a trophy. One moment, I stood in a yard, surrounded by banana trees, with children everywhere, and all I could do was lift my hands and give God praise.

But here is what the pictures will never show you. We prayed every night. After the bus came back, after dinner, after the dishes, when everybody was exhausted and had every reason to go to bed, that team gathered and prayed. We prayed with the children at the school too, in the middle of the day, in the middle of the program. And in those moments, children gave their lives to Christ. Children who would not lift their heads on Monday were leading on Friday. Young people who came down here as helpers went home as leaders.

By the end of the week all of us were wrecked. Every one of us said the same thing: “I would do it again tomorrow.”

Now let me show you why. Jesus laid this principle out a long time ago, and last week I watched twenty-three people live it out in front of me.

Mark 8:34-35 ERV

“Then Jesus called the people and his followers to him. He said, ‘Any of you who want to be my follower must stop thinking about yourself and what you want. You must be willing to carry the cross that is given to you for following me. Any of you who try to save the life you have will lose it. But you who give up your life for me and for the Good News will save it.'”

Read that again slowly, because Jesus said two things there, and most people only hear the first one.

First, He told us the cost. “Stop thinking about yourself and what you want.” That is the part that scares people off. It sounds like loss. It sounds like you are being asked to hand over the life you built.

Second, He told us the return. “Any of you who try to save the life you have will lose it. But you who give up your life for me and for the Good News will save it.” Catch what Jesus is actually saying. He is not asking you to throw your life away. He is telling you where to find it. The person clutching his life is the one who ends up losing it. The person who lets go is the one who finds it.

Jesus was not describing a sacrifice. He was describing an exchange. You hand Him the life you made. He hands you the life He planned. And nobody in history has ever come out on the losing end of that trade.

That is exactly what I watched happen last week. 23 people stopped thinking about themselves and what they wanted for seven straight days. Not one of them lost anything. Every one of them found something.

You do not lose your life when you give it away. You find it.

So, what does this mean for you today? A few things.

1. When You Serve, You Discover Two Things At The Same Time: God’s Heart And Your Own Purpose.

I want to give you the biggest lesson first. We have spent 21 messages in this series saying that you do not create your destiny; you discover it. Here is what last week added to that: a lot of the discovering does not happen in your prayer closet. It happens with your hands full. And you do not only discover YOU. You discover HIM. I watched people come down here unsure of what they had to offer, and by Wednesday they had found their lane. One found out he could command the attention of a room full of children. One found out he could organize chaos. Several found out they could love a stranger’s child like her own. Nobody journaled their way into that. They served their way into it. And in the same week, those same people told me they had never felt closer to God in their lives. I call that the double discovery.

How this applies to you:

— 1 John 4:7-8 ESV says, “whoever loves has been born of God and KNOWS GOD… Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.” Do not rush past that. John is not saying loving people is a chore you do after you know God. He is saying loving people is one of the ways you come to know Him.

— You learn things about God in the act of loving people that you will never learn in a book about Him.

— Look at Matthew 9:36 NKJV: “when He saw the multitudes, He was MOVED WITH COMPASSION for them, because they were weary and scattered, like sheep having no shepherd.” That verse tells you what moves the heart of God. Now understand this: you cannot feel what moves God’s heart from a distance. You have to get close enough to see the multitude. Last week I watched people’s hearts break over children they had never met. That was not emotion. That was the heart of God transferring into human beings who got close enough to feel it.

— Many told me that they had seen the pictures for years, but being here, up close, was completely different. Proximity produces compassion. Distance produces opinions.

— Ephesians 2:10 NLT says God created us anew in Christ Jesus “so we can do the good things he PLANNED for us long ago.” The works were prepared before you got here. You are not a builder of good works; you are a walker in good works. And you cannot discover a path by studying a map over and over. At some point you have to put your feet to work.

— Purpose is revealed in motion, not just in meditation.

— Watch how Jesus trained the 12. He did not run them through three years of classroom and then release them. In Luke 10, He sent 70 of them out two by two, into towns He was about to visit, and told them to heal the sick and announce the Kingdom. They came back in verse 17 “with joy,” saying, “Lord, even the demons obey us when we use your name!” They did not discover their authority in a lecture hall or a church sanctuary. They discovered it on assignment, in the real world.

— Philemon 6 NKJV says it plainly: “that the SHARING of your faith may become effective by the acknowledgment of every good thing which is in you in Christ Jesus.” Catch the order. Sharing comes first. The acknowledgment of what is in you follows. You find out what God put in you by giving it away. It stays hidden while you hold it.

— What is in you gets revealed when it comes out of you.

— So let me ask you the honest question. Are you waiting on clarity before you serve? Most people are. They say, “When God shows me my purpose, I will get involved.” God’s economy runs the other direction. Get involved, and He will show you your purpose. Serve where you are with what you have, and watch how fast the clarity will come.

— You will not think your way into your assignment. You will serve your way into it, and you will meet God as you do it.

2. Love That Costs You Nothing Changes Nothing.

I want to be honest with you about the price of last week, because the church has gotten far too comfortable with cheap love. 23 people spent their own money on flights. They spent their own vacation days. They worked in heat that does not let up, from early morning until night, for seven straight days. Nobody got paid. Nobody got a plaque. But their reward is far greater than anything this world has to offer.

How this applies to you:

— 2 Samuel 24:24 NKJV records David refusing a free threshing floor: “nor will I offer burnt offerings to the LORD my God with that which COSTS ME NOTHING.” Araunah offered David the land, the oxen, and the wood for free. David said no. He understood something we have forgotten: an offering that costs you nothing is not an offering. It is a gesture.

— If it does not cost you, it is not a sacrifice.

— Look at the pattern in John 3:16. “For God so loved the world that He GAVE.” God did not so love the world that He felt something. He did not so love the world that He made an announcement about it. In God’s vocabulary, love is a verb with a price tag attached. The measure of the love was connected to the size of what He gave up.

— God defined love by what it cost Him.

— 1 John 3:18 NKJV says, “let us not love in WORD or in TONGUE, but in DEED and in TRUTH.” John is drawing a line between two kinds of love: the kind you say and the kind you spend.

— Talk is the cheapest currency in the Kingdom. Deeds cost you something.

— Now hear the other side, because this is not a guilt trip. Every person on that team came home tired, and every one of them came home FULL. There is a kind of tired that empties you and a kind of tired that fills you.

— You spend yourself, and you end up with more than you started with. This is the good kind of tired.

— So what has your love cost you lately? Not your opinion. Not your prayer list. Your actual love. Have you sacrificed your calendar, your comfort, your bank account, your energy? If your honest answer is “nothing,” then the fruit your life is producing will be nothing too.

3. Prayer Fueled The Program.

We planned that week down to the minute. Breakfast at 7:30, bus at 8:30, camp, lunch, program, dinner at 7. We were organized. And I am telling you today that the schedule was never the thing. The thing happened in the prayer moments. It happened at night, when the team gathered after a full day and prayed together instead of scattering to their rooms. It happened in the middle of the day at the school, when we stopped the program and prayed with the children. That is where children gave their lives to Christ. Not during a polished presentation. But during prayer.

How this applies to you:

— Zechariah 4:6 NKJV settles it: “Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,’ says the LORD of hosts.” We brought might. We brought people, money, supplies, and a plan. None of that saves a child. The plan gets you in the room. The Spirit does the work in the room.

— Here is a good lesson: Organize like it depends on you, but then pray like it depends on Him!

— Matthew 18:20 NKJV says, “where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there in the midst of them.” Two or three. That’s all you need and Jesus will show up!

— Do not miss what happened with the children. Matthew 19:14 NLT records Jesus saying, “Let the children come to me. Don’t stop them! For the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to those who are like these children.” The disciples were trying to manage the crowd and move the kids out of the way. Jesus stopped everything for them. Children are not the future of the church. A child who gives his life to Christ is the church, today.

— Psalm 8:2 NKJV says, “Out of the mouth of babes and nursing infants You have ordained strength.” At the dinner table, when we asked people to share what they learned that day or how God moved them in their heart, I can tell you that some of the greatest wisdom came from the youngest people on the trip.

— Romans 10:9 NKJV tells us what actually happened in those moments: “if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.” Nothing on this earth compares to watching a child do that. Backpacks wear out. Notebooks get filled up and thrown away. A name written in the Lamb’s Book of Life does not expire.

— So here is the question for your own life, your own house, your own ministry, your own business: are you running a program, or are you making room for God? You can have every detail organized and still miss Him. Make sure you make time for prayer!

4. People Will Not Remember What You Said. They Will Remember That You Came.

We handed out 1,000 backpacks. Those backpacks will wear out. But something else happened that will not: children found out that somebody got on an airplane for them. Somebody knelt in the dirt in front of them, looked them in the eye, learned their name, and put something in their hands. Watch what that does to a child. Children who came in on Monday with their heads down, who would not speak, who stood at the edge of the room, were laughing and leading by Friday. That did not happen because we said the right words. It happened because we came and we served.

How this applies to you:

— 1 Thessalonians 2:8 NKJV is Paul describing his own ministry: “we were well pleased to impart to you not only the GOSPEL OF GOD, but also OUR OWN LIVES, because you had become dear to us.” Paul lists two things: the message, and then himself. Anybody can hand you information. But when someone loves with God’s love, they can GIVE YOU AN IMPARTATION FROM THEIR LIFE!

— We could have wired the money and had the backpacks delivered. It would have been cheaper, faster, and far more efficient. It would also have missed the entire point. The supplies were the reason we came. The supplies were never the point. The point was PRESENCE.

— Efficiency is a business value. Presence is a Kingdom value.

— This is exactly how God chose to reach us. He did not send a memo from heaven. John 1:14 says “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” God’s strategy for the salvation of the whole world was to show up in person. If a message alone had been enough, Jesus would have stayed home.

— God did not send a message. He sent Himself. The Law was given on tablets of stone. But grace CAME in a person, and His name is Jesus!

— Now let me tell you about our young people, because this is the part that got me. 1 Timothy 4:12 NKJV says, “Let no one despise your youth, but be an example to the believers in word, in conduct, in love, in spirit, in faith, in purity.” We had young people on that team who came down as helpers. Give a young person real responsibility, real children, and real work, and watch what comes out of them. They did not grow because we taught a leadership class. They grew because we handed them something that mattered and got out of the way.

— Leadership is not taught in a seminar. It is discovered under the weight of key moments.

— So here is my charge, and you do not need a passport for it. Somebody in your reach needs a person, not a post. Go be present. Show up at the hospital. Sit at the table. Make the drive. Learn the name. That is Christianity with shoes on.

That’s enough for today.

Declaration of Faith:

Father, I thank You that I do not find my life by holding it. I find it by giving it away!

I am not a builder of good works. I am a walker in the good works You prepared!

When I serve, I discover Your heart. When I serve, I discover my purpose!

Proximity produces compassion, so I will get close enough to feel what moves You!

My love has a price tag on it, because Yours did!

I will not offer You what costs me nothing!

Not by might, nor by power, but by Your Spirit!

I do not just run a program. I make room for You!

I do not just send a message. I show up in person!

When I pour out for others, You pour back into me!

Whoever loves knows God, so I choose to love, and I choose to know Him!

This is THE YEAR OF DISCOVERY, and GREATER IS COMING FOR ME!

I declare this by faith. In Jesus’ name. Amen!

This is Today’s Word. Apply it and prosper!