Our Work for God — Zac Poonen

Our Work for God Must Flow from Worship and Walking with God

In the last two evenings, we were looking at our worship of God and our walk with God. And I mentioned that our service for the Lord or our work for God, we're going to think today about our work for God, that our work for God must flow out of our worship of God and our walk with God.

So you realize from that that you can go to two extremes. One where, like a lot of Christians do, there's very little or no worship in their life, even though there's a lot of singing. And they're not walking with God in their personal life, but they're seeking to serve God.

And that, of course, is one extreme. Then there's another extreme of people who have swung Christianity, has got this disease called pendulomitis, swing to the other extreme and say, these fellows are not walking with God, they're not worshiping.

So we spend our time worshiping God and walking with Him and never do anything for Him, never serve Him, never work for Him. That is just another extreme. And to tell you quite honestly, the devil is quite happy with both these extremes.

Because imagine if all that the apostles did in their entire life was just worship God and walk with Him, there wouldn't be any Christianity today. All of us became Christians because somebody did a work, somebody sacrificed.

He didn't spend all his time worshiping and walking with God, he worked. The apostles worked. So we need to recognize that our worship and our walk must lead to work. And when we think of our work for God, many people think only of full-time Christian work.

Was Jesus working for God only for three and a half years? Whom was He working for the other 30 years? At the end of 33 and a half years, He said in John chapter 17 and verse 4, and that's the verse I want you to look at.

You know, each of these evenings we've been looking at one theme verse. And if you remember the first day, it was Matthew 4 .10, you shall worship and then only you shall serve. And then the second day we were thinking of 1 John 2 .6, if we say we abide in Him, we must walk as He walked.

And today we want to look at John 17 verse 4, I have glorified you on earth by, how do we glorify God on earth? By finishing the work which you gave me to do. Or as the message Bible says, by completing down to the last detail, the work that you assigned me to do.

Completing down to the last detail, the work that you assigned me to do. So if we believe that the Father loves us, like He loved Jesus, then there is a work that God has assigned for you to do. Like an old hymn says, there's a work for Jesus that none but you can do.

Nobody else can do that. Only you can do it. That's why the Bible calls the church, the body of Christ, where each member of the body has got a function. The eyes, the ears, the hands, the legs, even the little toes.

I discovered one day that you can't stand properly if you don't have those little toes. Do you know your stability comes from those 10 little toes. You can't despise them. If you had feet without those 10 toes, you wouldn't be able to stand properly.

Every little thing in the body, every little person in the body has got a function. Some brother may be like a small little toe. He brings stability to the body. What about the internal organs? Many that we don't see.

There are many members of the body of Christ who never come up to the platform, who you never see. Don't they have a work? Like all the internal parts of the body, the heart, the liver, the kidney, many, many things.

Every single thing has a function. You know, I heard that the doctors know there's a thing called the appendix and they say it doesn't have a function. These are arrogant, stupid doctors who say that instead of humbly saying we haven't yet discovered the function.

There is nothing in the human body that God created without a function. We may not have discovered it. That's another thing. Medical science keeps on discovering new, new things. Maybe one day they'll discover it or if they continue in their stupidity, they'll never discover it.

But there's a function in every part of the human body. Every single part. And if that could be true of the physical body and you are part of Christ's body, you must remember there's a part that you have to fulfill.

It may be visible, it may be invisible, it may be something that brings honor before men or may not bring honor before men, well then you'll still get your reward from God. But the point I want to stress is that if you don't fulfill that particular function, then either somebody else's work becomes double or God's work is hindered.

See for example, I'll take an example. If my left hand is paralyzed, the right hand has to do the work of two hands. If my left leg is paralyzed, I got to keep hopping on my right leg and my right leg has to do the work of two legs.

So that often happens in the body of Christ unfortunately, where many, many people, many sitting here, who have not taken seriously their responsibility in the body of Christ, who are not gripped by the fact that you have a function to fulfill in the body of Christ.

How long? I'll tell you, from the day you are born again until the day you die or until the day Christ comes again, then we'll be taken up. But until the last day of your earthly life, there is a function that God wants you to fulfill.

I'll believe that even if I'm 90 years old, I believe that God has got a function for me to fulfill until the very last day of my earthly life. None of us know how long we're going to live, but we must believe this.

I believe this with all my heart and faith makes a difference in my life. That's why my life becomes exciting. You know, if you give up and say, oh well, God's got nothing for me to do. But that's exactly what the devil wants you to say.

He wants you to believe that God's got nothing for you to do because you're not so gifted like somebody else. Why do you think the man with the one talent went and buried it? Because he looked at somebody with five and he said, boy, I don't have what he has.

And he looked at you, I don't even have what this fellow's got, who's got two, and he got discouraged. And that's what happens, you know, very often the devil says, you don't have the gift that brother has, so what?

But you still have a function to fulfill. Think of some of the internal organs in our body said, well, we are not, nobody is noticing us, if we relax, it's okay. Well, if you relax, the body dies. How many times the heart pumps and pumps and pumps thousands of times a day.

That's what keeps our body alive, but nobody ever thinks about it until they get a heart attack or something. There are invisible parts inside our body that they don't relax, they keep on functioning because they are not doing it for honor.

They're doing it for the head. The head tells the kidneys, the liver, the heart and every part of the body to keep functioning. And they're not concerned whether you see it or not. They obey the head.

It's a wonderful picture, the church, the body of Christ, where each person's connected to the head. And the head's given me a burden to do something. And I hope the head has given you a burden to do something.

And you may not have a prominent place like some other parts of the body. But if the head chose to give you that function, are you happy to accept it? That is the problem with Lucifer. Lucifer was not happy with the position God gave him.

He was discontent. He wanted something else. And the moment you desire something other than what God has planned for you, that's the way to destroy your own ministry which God has called you for. In Ephesians, it says about the growth of the body like this.

Ephesians chapter 4, it says here about the growing up. Verse 15 and 16. We speak the truth in love and we grow up in all aspects into him who is the head, even Christ. And from the head, the whole body being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies.

Every joint has to supply something. And the proper working of each individual part causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love. Christendom has generally promoted outstandingly gifted personalities and made God's work depend on a few outstanding personalities.

And such churches are not building the body of Christ. They are building congregations. Nowadays you hear, particularly in the United States and even it's coming to India, to mega churches. Churches with 10 ,000 people, 20 ,000 people, 30 ,000 people coming to listen to one man.

It's like a massive cinema theater where everything is centered around one man. And you remove him from that scene, the whole congregation disappears. They're not interested in anything else. Their head is not Christ.

Their head is this man who they come to listen to every Sunday. And now it is such that where the people can't fit into that particular auditorium or stadium, wherever they meet nowadays, they have video cameras filming him and projecting him by cable or satellite to some other part of the city and other cities so that in some place they gather together 500 people in a hall and they watch a screen.

So it's not just the 30 ,000 here, there are thousands here and there and everywhere. It's all centered around one person. Now that's not the body of Christ because those people sitting there have no connection with each other.

I mean it's like when you go in a cinema theater, you don't know who's the fellow sitting next to you and next Sunday you come there, it may be somebody else sitting next to you. You don't know anything about him.

And this is what's happening in the churches. People have gone astray from the pattern that's been revealed in the New Testament where each individual part has got a function. They may not have the function that the man who is gifted to speak has, but everybody has got some function and some spiritual function I mean.

I don't mean just to arrange the chairs and do the physical part of a conference or in a meeting hall. That anybody can do. I'm talking about a spiritual function that every person who's born again has.

See you must believe that God has given you a spiritual function. I thank God that I believed it when I was 21 years old and I said, Lord I believe I'm a member of the body of Christ. Now 21 years old means it was 46 years ago.

I didn't know much of what I know now. I knew very little, but I didn't have any great gift of teaching or anything then, but I said, okay I'm a member of the body of Christ. I can bless somebody. I can talk to somebody.

I can tell somebody about Jesus who saved my soul. And that's all that I did. Little I knew I shared with other people. I knew ABC. Around me were people who were illiterate who didn't even know ABC. Okay, I can teach them ABC.

Maybe I can't teach them higher stuff. I can teach them ABC. I want to say to you, everyone sitting here, there is somebody in your circle who does not know as much about Jesus as you know. By your circle I mean your relatives, your friends, your neighbors, the people with whom you work in the office every day, maybe a shopkeeper from whom you regularly go and buy something, maybe the milkman who comes to your door every day, maybe the place where you go for a haircut, or you go to get your face beautified, you ladies.

Somebody whom you're meeting regularly. I don't mean the persons you meet occasionally in a bus or in a train. I'm talking about people whom you meet regularly. There's a work for Jesus that only you can do.

That is your little world. And in that little world of yours, you're the only one who knows them. Do you know that each of you sitting here has got a little world, maybe 5 people, 10 people, 20 people, 30 people, whom nobody else in this hall knows about.

They don't know any of them who are in your little circle. And I remember years ago hearing one of our young brothers saying this in one of our other Tamil churches. He spoke on John 3 .16 and said, God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life.

And he said, I've got a little world of people whom nobody else knows. You know, he heard that after I spoke this. But this is the revelation he got. There is a little world of people whom only I know in this church.

And God so loved that little world that he sent me, his son, into that world so that those people may not perish but have eternal life. That's how he understood John 3 .16. There's a work for you to do in that little world.

Witnessing in the Power of the Holy Spirit

And to do that work, you need, just like Jesus, to be filled with the Holy Spirit. And you need, just like those early apostles, to be baptized in the Holy Spirit and fire. When Jesus went up to heaven, the world was in tremendous need.

There were people dying every day. I don't know how many people died per day in those days. Today it's in millions. But in those days also, many thousands of people must have died in one day. And so, there was such an urgency.

Before these people die, we've got to go out and give them the gospel before they die and go to hell. And so Jesus said, you've got to go and be my witnesses in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria and increasing circles, like concentric circles.

You start in Jerusalem, which represents your home and your local church. Then, as you're faithful there, you go to Judea, which is the state, and then to Samaria, the next state, and to the uttermost parts of the world, finally.

Jesus said, you've got to be my witnesses. Go to every nation and make disciples. And as they were all ready to go, because Jesus is going up to heaven, he said, no, don't go yet. You've got to wait. You've got to wait until you're endued with power.

Otherwise, you'll go and you'll accomplish nothing. But Lord, you know how many thousands will die tomorrow? That's okay. You've got to wait. How long you've got to wait? Many days. How many thousands will die in those days?

You'll accomplish nothing, my people. Wait. And they waited to be filled with the Holy Spirit. They prayed, they praised God, and the Spirit of God came upon them, and they were changed. Then nobody had to tell them to go.

You know, I have seen when people are genuinely baptized in the Holy Spirit and fire. What did Jesus say in Acts 1 .8? When the Holy Spirit has come upon you, let me read it to you, Acts 1 .8. You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.

And then what did he say? Read it carefully. You should be my witnesses. No, you shall be my witnesses. Do you know the difference between you should be and you shall be? World of difference. You should be is an exhortation.

Like, you should be generous. You should go and witness to people. This is what we generally hear. You, hey, you should be witnessing to people, man. You should be doing this and you should be doing that.

And we get into all condemnation and bondage because people tell me I should be doing so many things and I'm not doing it. And I'm being told, you should be doing it. But Jesus never said it like that.

He said, you shall do it. It's like telling a cat, you're going to have a kitten. And when you have a kitten, it'll automatically lick itself and keep itself clean. You mean the cat says, I don't have to teach it?

I don't have to instruct it how to lick itself? No, it shall keep itself clean. It's nature. It's something, that's what God does it. You can tell a little piglet, I mean, whether you like it or not, you're a little piglet, it's going to be dirty, just like you.

You mean I don't have to teach it to be dirty? No, you don't have to teach it to be dirty. It'll be dirty, whether you like it or not. It's like I would tell people who have children, this sweet little baby that you have now, he's going to be a liar.

And it's going to cause you a lot of headaches when he grows up. He will be stubborn, he will not obey. You don't have to teach it. It shall be. It's nature. You know the difference? You don't have to tell a child, you should be a liar.

You should fight with your brothers. You should grab the toys. No, it will. That's what Jesus said. When the Holy Spirit's come upon you, you don't have to be told, you should do this, you should do that.

And I've seen this in different cases. When people are genuinely baptized in the Holy Spirit, genuinely, they get power and they become witnesses. It happens automatically. They begin to have a passion to do whatever they can for the Lord.

And if they continue to be filled with the Spirit, that passion will continue to do something for the Lord with their one earthly life. And they become reckless. They say, it doesn't matter if I lose money.

It doesn't matter if I lose my life. It doesn't matter how much inconvenience I have. It doesn't matter if I don't get, if you don't eat my meal or anything. I've got to bless this man. I've got to help this man.

I've got to sit up late at night and write those letters to bless somebody. Nobody has to tell you that. Nobody tells me what I should be doing. Even God doesn't tell me. He doesn't say, you should be doing this now.

Or you should do that. You should do that. It's just a passion. And if you don't have that passion, I have to say to you, wait upon God. Those who wait upon the Lord will exchange their strength. That's the real meaning of Isaiah 40 verse 31.

Those who wait upon the Lord will exchange their strength. They will give up their human strength and get divine strength and they shall rise up with wings like eagles. They shall run and not be weary.

They shall walk and they shall not faint. Even the young people, it says there, will grow weary and faint in Isaiah 40. Those who wait upon the Lord will be strong. See, that's to me a perfect description of what happens when we are filled with the Holy Spirit.

Isaiah chapter 40 and verse 30 and 31. Let's begin with verse 29. Because God is one, in verse 28 it says, God is one who never becomes weary or tired. Let me read to you from the message Bible. God is the creator.

He doesn't get tired. He doesn't pause to catch his breath. He, not only He doesn't get tired, He energizes those who get tired. Verse 29. And He gives fresh strength to the dropouts. Are you one of the dropouts in the Christian life?

He'll give you fresh strength. Even young people will get tired and drop out. Young people in the prime of their strength will stumble and fall. But those who wait upon God and get filled with the Holy Spirit, get fresh strength.

They spread their wings and soar like eagles. They run and they don't get tired. They walk and they don't lag behind. It's really true. When you're filled with the Holy Spirit, it energizes your body.

You become strong to serve the Lord. Young people will get tired, but you will not. I can think of numerous times in the last 32 years here in Bangalore, as far as I can remember, I don't think I have missed a single meeting of the church in Bangalore in the last 32 years.

I'm trying to recollect. I don't think I have. It doesn't matter if it's rain or heat or sickness or anything, except for a few days when I was in a hospital. Other than that, if I was at home, I remember times when I've been at home, I've been lying in bed with a fever and it's Wednesday evening for the meeting.

I get up and in the name of Jesus, I go. And nobody knows that I've got a fever. I don't tell anybody either. And I get up and I speak for 45 minutes, one hour and the fever is gone. And I come back. That's happened to me many times.

I want to say to you, don't listen to the devil's excuses. Ah, you're so tired now, you can't do that. Wait upon the Lord, seek for the power of the Holy Spirit. There's a work for Jesus that nobody but you can do.

And if you don't have the strength for it, if you don't have the wisdom for it, it says here, He's got all the wisdom and He'll give that to you. We don't have the wisdom and we don't have the strength, but He'll give it to us.

But there's a work that we have to do for God. And I'm sure that Jesus was always looking for opportunities wherever He was. You know, He'd be alert, alert to the Spirit. There was a day when He was very hungry, walking through some area.

And as normal, they would all go together as a team to some restaurant to eat food. And Jesus felt, no, the Spirit of God is telling me to wait here. So He told His disciples, you go. And He sat by the well.

And sure enough, there was a needy woman who came there. And He spoke to her. And the whole of Samaria turned to come to Him. Think if He had not stopped there. Think if He had thought of His stomach, I'm hungry, I better go and eat.

Think what would have happened. And think if you were like that. Think of the times in your life when you didn't listen to the Spirit and you just satisfy the needs of your body. Think what you would have missed.

Something God wanted to do through you and you missed it. You know, listening to the Spirit. He'd walk by a road and the Spirit of God would say, stop, look into that tree. And Jesus would look into the tree.

There's a man sitting there. His name is Zacchaeus. Zacchaeus, come down. I've got to come to your house. The Spirit of God has told me to come to your house. The man was all ready. He was like a fruit ready to fall.

And Jesus picked it up. All ready. Imagine being led by the Holy Spirit to go like that from place to place to place. You can be in a secular job and God can take you here and there and build this church through you.

Trust God that in your secular job, He will transfer you to the place where God wants you to be. How is it we have a church in Dunhillam today because this brother Martin was a teacher in a secular job and he got transferred there.

Who sent him there? The government. And when he went there, there was not a single Christian in the whole village. Today we have conferences there. And then when the work is over, you get transferred somewhere else.

This is God's way. You don't have to be a full-time worker. In fact, I've seen that a lot of people, when they become full-time workers, they become very lazy. And it's almost as though the anointing goes away, many of them, because they've got nothing to do.

And they sit around and gossip and backbite, wasting their time. Whereas in the days when they were in a secular job, they were busy and they were anointed and God was mightily using them. I've seen that all over India.

So wherever you are, there's a work for Jesus that only you can do. Nobody else can do it. I can't do it. God so loved that little world of people whom you know that He sent you, His son, His daughter, into that world so the people around you may have eternal life and not perish.

Not everybody will respond. Not everybody responded to Jesus. Not everybody responded to the apostles. There's only a few. You know, when people dig into the gold mines and they bring up a lot of muck, a huge amount of muck, they get a little bit of gold.

And you say, is it worth going down 10 ,000 feet and bringing up all that muck? Sure, because you get a little bit of gold out of it. And that's how God sends us in multitudes of people. In the midst of that, you get a few nuggets of gold.

Those are the ones God's looking for. And that's why we should be praying. Like we have prayed for many years and I've myself prayed and I've taught other people to pray, Lord, if there's anybody seeking a godly life, seeking after God in this area, they must be praying to you.

You know them. Somewhere in this area, there are people crying out to God, Lord, you know who they are. Bring me in touch with them. Or bring them in touch with me. And if you don't do both of them, tell me what's wrong with me.

Why can't you bring him in touch with me? Why can't you bring me in touch with them? I'm not talking about everybody in the world. I'm talking about those who are seeking after God, who are seeking for victory over sin.

And perhaps there's nobody else in a hundred mile radius who's preaching victory over sin, except you, except me. Well, then they have to come to me. Because there's nobody else in that radius near them who's telling them anything about sin shall not rule over you, because you're not under law, but under grace.

And here's somebody seeking God, defeated like those Israelites crying out in Egypt, oh God, oh God, we are enslaved, we are in bondage. Please deliver us, please deliver us. I don't know who they are.

It's like looking for a needle in a haystack. But God, you know, like satellite communication. You know what satellite communication is? You speak in a telephone here, it goes up to the satellite, and from the satellite it goes down there to Canada or America, wherever it is.

And they hear. It's the same way. Here's somebody praying to God, who's much higher than the satellite, and he's communicating with God, and God brings him in touch with me. And we communicate. I didn't even know him.

But God, the great, the one who brings people together, brings him in touch with me. And I could tell you numerous stories of people like that whom I have met in Bangalore, in India, around the world.

Serving Christ in Secular Work and Personal Circles

And I want to say to you, you can do that if you recognize that your primary calling in life is to be a witness for Jesus Christ. Paul was a tent maker. He worked with tents. He worked with his own hands and earned his living like I've done for 30 years, like our elder brothers do.

But if you ask Paul, Paul, what are you doing? He wouldn't say, I'm a tent maker. No. He'd say, I'm an apostle. Apostle? I thought you were a tent maker. Tent maker? That's just to earn my living. I'm an apostle.

What are you? I hope you can say, I'm a servant of God. Oh, I thought you were a nurse. That's just to earn my living. I thought you were a teacher. Teacher? That's just to earn my living. I'm a servant of God.

You mean you're a full-time worker? No, no, no, no, no, no, no full-time worker. I'm a servant of God. But I work to earn my living so that I don't become a burden to the church or to society. That's how Paul was.

Is there anybody greater than Paul in the New Testament? Can't you be like him? That was the challenge that came to me. There's a work for Jesus that none but you can do. And in your little circle, if you're faithful, God will expand that circle and make it more and more and more.

But you have to seek for the power and the supernatural gifts of the Holy Spirit. Don't you think it was supernatural for Jesus to walk through Samaria and hear a prompting saying, don't go for lunch today.

Where did that come from? Don't go for lunch today. Oh, okay, fellas, you go for lunch. I'm sitting here. Don't you think it was supernatural when he walked down the road and said, look up, there's somebody there.

It wasn't only Jesus. Peter, when he prays, he's praying and the Spirit of God says to him, go down, there are a couple of people waiting to see you. There was one man, Cornelius, communicating to God, oh God, I don't know the way to you.

I want to come to you. I want to know the way to live. And God up there communicates with Peter down there and say, hey, you better go here. He brought him in touch with him because Peter was ready for it.

The same God can do it for you. There are many people like Cornelius who don't know God here and there. I mean, Peter didn't go and speak to everybody in Caesarea, just one person. God brought one person in touch with one person and it's one person that he will take you to.

He's taken me to one person here and one person there, one person there. You, my brother, sister, will you see God like that from today? Don't say I'm too young. No, you're not too young. Don't say you're too old.

You're not too old. As long as you're alive, there's somebody, some work that God wants you to do. If you pray and say, Lord, I'm young, but it doesn't make a difference to you. You can make me a blessing.

Do you know that some of you 10-year-old boys and girls, if you speak to some 10-year-old boy and girl, they listen to you better than they listen to me. Because they say, oh, he's a grandfather. He's okay.

He's about to die and maybe he's thinking of God and all that. That's what they'll think. But when you 10-year-old, you're not about to die. They hear you talking about Jesus. Hey, what's wrong with you?

They'll listen to you because you're their age. God wants people like you to witness to people of your age. He needs every single one of us. Do you think India is full of so many zealous Christian workers?

No, not at all. How many people are worshiping Jesus Christ and God, really worshiping in this country? How many people are walking with Jesus, seeking to live an overcoming life? Very, very, very few.

A number of them are sitting right here. What are you going to do? Is there going to be an overflow from your life to meet the need of people around in this country? Are you willing to say, Lord, send me wherever you want?

I'm willing to sacrifice anything. I'm willing to give up anything. I'm willing to be inconvenienced. I'm willing to take leave without pay. If you want me to take leave without pay, if you want me to go and serve you, how many of you would be willing to take one month's leave without pay to go and serve the Lord somewhere?

We have people in Bangalore who won't even take one day's leave for a conference because they say, oh brother, we've got to keep our leave to go and visit our relatives in some other place. We've got some unconverted relatives there, of course, we never witness to them, but we want to have a good time with them.

Go and sit wherever you like and waste your time. I'm not talking to you. I'm talking to the other people who are willing to sacrifice, who understood that when Jesus came from heaven to earth, it was a sacrifice for him.

He didn't sit there and say, I've got all my friends in heaven, why should I leave all this and go to that miserable old earth? No. The spirit of Christ was such that he could not enjoy what he enjoyed and see other people not enjoying it.

That is the spirit of Christ. If you don't have that spirit of Christ, something's wrong with you. Do you know why the rich man went to hell? He could enjoy all that good food and he never thought that Lazarus is not able to enjoy what I'm enjoying.

God said such a fellow deserves to go to hell. I agree 100%. God's given you all that and you don't think of that other person who's needy, with whom you should share what you have. You don't want him to enjoy what you have.

That is what we need to get people stirred in our churches with a passion for. Not just get them to dress properly and wear this type of clothes and that type of shoes and this take off these type of ornaments.

That's not what I'm interested in. I wish we could get people to have a passion, to be a witness for Christ, to share the wonderful news which has changed their life. I remember when God gripped me 31 years ago and made the message of victory and Christ coming in the flesh and the overcoming life a reality to me.

I was just 36 years old, younger than lots of you sitting here. And I said, Lord, if you give me life, I'm just one person and our church is probably 10 people. That's okay. But if you give me life, I will do all that I can, whatever the cost, whatever the price, whatever the sacrifice, whatever price I have to pay in terms of my health or money or anything, to spread this message all across India to every group.

I didn't realize that God had plans to take it beyond India to many countries of the world. And I also said, Lord, I don't want any money for it. I won't take any money for it. I'm not doing it for money.

I'll do it because you died for me on the cross, because you loved me and gave yourself for me. Does that grip you? Does that grip you that Jesus loved you so much that he came from heaven to earth just to bring that message to you?

And you sit back and it doesn't stir you. It stirs me so much that I say, Lord, put that passion in me to reach out to other people. There are people sitting here who have heard this message for 30 years.