Last week we had a look at what God is all about. We discovered that God is all about people. I promised to follow up this week with Part 2 to give us some practical ways that we can be all about people.
The verse we were looking at is found in 2 Chronicles 1:10-11, where King Solomon asked for wisdom and knowledge so that he could govern God’s people well. Today I want to focus on God’s reply to him and discover how we can apply it to our lives. We need to be about what God is about.
“Because your greatest desire is to help your people, and you did not ask for wealth, riches, fame, or even the death of your enemies or a long life, but rather you asked for wisdom and knowledge to properly govern my people— I will certainly give you the wisdom and knowledge you requested. But I will also give you wealth, riches, and fame such as no other king has had before you or will ever have in the future!” – 2 Chronicles 1:11
Note the first thing that God says: “Because your greatest desire is to help your people”. Solomon’s greatest desire wasn’t wisdom or knowledge or riches or fame or success in battle. His greatest desire was to help people. Wow, how challenging is that?
I’ve had to ask myself, “Is my greatest desire to help people?” Honestly, no it’s not. But I want to be more like God and I want to be about what He is about, and that is people.
No matter what city you live in, or what country you find yourself in, we can all look around and realise that people need help. They need the help we can give them as individuals and they need the help we can give them corporately, as part of a church or organisation.
So do you want to me more about people? I certainly do.
Below are some practical ways we can all be more about people:
- Look around: In your neighbourhood, is there a single mom who needs her lawn mowed? Is there an elderly couple that is lonely or a stay-at-home mom who could use a helping hand? I think if we are more aware of who is around us, we will begin to see the need that people have and we most certainly can do something to help. We don’t have to do everything, but we can all do something.
- Join forces: Individually we can do much to help people around us but collectively we can do so much more. My church recently had its annual “Be The Change Day,” where we participated in different projects around our city. More than 2 000 people were able to make a serious difference to help people all over our city. We visited retirement centres, cleaned up litter on the beach, painted refuges, and much more. Individually, we could never have the impact that we had collectively. What can your church do to help people in your neighbourhood?
Let’s open our eyes and begin to notice the people around us. Let’s be less about ourselves and more about people.
To find out more about a real relationship with God, click on the link below or on the pop up.