By A couple days ago I was doing my morning reading out of my daily read Bible that my church is going through and there was a story that struck me. I am going to do a brief recap but the story is found in 2 Samuel 7. David says to the prophet Nathan, I have this amazing palace but God lives in a tent, how can this be. I should build Him a temple that is permanent. Nathan in his own mind told David the Lord is with you, do what you is in your heart. Nathan that night hears from God that David is not to build the temple, he has more important things to do first, the temple will be built by his sons after he has died. My mind was blown reading this. Why would God not want His temple to be built by David, isn’t David known to be a man after God’s own heart? Had he not already done so many great things for God? So I thought and prayed and reflected on King David. He was a warrior, he was conquering the lands and bringing peace to Israel. Maybe he would not build the temple because the people were not ready to have the presence of God in their land in that way? Perhaps because God wanted David to focus on his mission of conquering the enemies?
I am also in the middle of a study through a book called 7 Realties For Experiencing God and right after I read this story and had all these thoughts, the reading for that day had a quote that tied it all in for me “Don’t seek more responsibilities than those He’s given you.” I thought to myself, wow its amazing how these 2 different things lined up today to remind me of a great lesson. David was seeking more responsibilities than God had given him. How often do we hear about these good things that need to be done and we jump in to help and it takes away from the primary mission or purpose of our lives? I know I have spent too much time doing things that take away from my primary purpose because I want to help or do something that is a good thing. I think it is important to remember that good things are not always God things and we need to focus on the God things and not the good. I know that I am taking stock of things I am doing and asking myself and asking God is this a God thing or a good thing? Do you think that there are some good things taking away time from the God things you are called to do?
