Seven Keys to Effective Living                                                                   

Greg V Hurd

God is calling us up to live effective lives; Lives that are guided by purpose and powered by the gifts that He has put within us.

The church at Thessalonica lived in the midst of troublous times; in order to consistently stay strong the Apostle Paul gives them these words of admonition that would serve as the template for empowered and effective living in the middle of a perverse age.

His words still resonate today and are as relevant now as they were when they were put down with inspired pen.

Each of these seven directives is building blocks to achieving the Divine life (Life as God intended for it to be).

Let’s look closely at these divinely inspired words.

Have the right attitude!

This directive deals with our attitude.

"The knowledge of Christ's love for us should cause us to love Him in such a way that it is demonstrated in our attitude, conduct, and commitment to serve God. Spiritual maturity is marked by spiritual knowledge being put into action."
-- Edward Bedore

"There are no menial jobs, only menial attitudes."
-- William John Bennett (b. 1943),

"Those who have easy, cheerful attitudes tend to be happier than those with less pleasant temperaments, regardless of money, making it, or success."
-- Dr. Joyce (Diane Bauer) Brothers (b. 1929),

"A happy person is not a person in a certain set of circumstances, but rather a person with a certain set of attitudes."
-- Hugh Downs

As Christians we need to get the attitude of Christ who came not to be served, but to serve and give His life. This attitude is selfless, that seek not to be the recipient of God’s ministry but the vessel.

If we are to be effective in this life we must wrangle and bring into submission our attitude.

We must create our attitude based on the knowledge of God’s Word and not on temporary circumstances.

Bad Attitudes are not a right of the successful!

We must be proactive concerning our own attitude by taking responsibility for it and judging it daily. We cannot afford for others to have to help us with our ‘tude!

“But David encouraged himself in the Lord.”                                                     

                                                          1 Samuel 30:6 

The word ‘encourage’ in the Hebrew means to fasten upon, to seize. It also carries the connotation that as he did this he became STOUT and began to behave himself valiantly.

 Isaiah 40:29-31 

David began to rehearse the mighty acts of God and this brought his problem into the proper perspective.

Jesus is still asking, “Who do you say that I am?”

What are you saying in the midst of tribulation and distress, who is He to you in those times? David knew "from where comes my help", He knew that God's power was available, as it had been in the past.

He remembered the lion, the bear, the giant and Saul.

 James 1:1-8 

David is putting himself in position to receive from God. He doesn’t stop there.

 “Bring me hither the ephod.”  

                             1 Samuel 30:7  

Now it is time to take our place as a King and Priest unto God!

One man with a covenant with God can stop any onslaught of the enemy.

 Psalms 22:3; 9:1-4  

“And David enquired of the Lord.”                                    

                                    1 Samuel 30:8 

God tells him to pursue and he immediately obeys the voice of God. He leaves behind those that are faint.

 “If thou faint in the day of adversity, thy strength is small.”  

                                                                        Proverbs 24:10 

Encouraging ourselves in the Lord and getting into worship elevate us to hear and receive God’s wisdom. We must follow this with instant obedience.

  “But David pursued.”          

                  1 Samuel 30:10 

Instant obedience puts us into God’s timeline.

1 Samuel 30:11-15

  “And David recovered all.”

                                   1 Samuel 30:18

One of the definitions for groove is a pronounced enjoyable rhythm. There are times in which I have actually experienced this. It actually seemed like everything I was doing was already choreographed, each step predetermined and there seemed to be a flow to my life like I was dancing through my day. I was in a groove, doing the will of God for my life, walking in synch with the Master.

The groove breaker comes, a temptation, test or trial, and we begin to stumble, our steps are less fluid and our moves blockier and forced. It seems as if we are in a strong magnetic pull that keeps us from being light on our feet. The flow stops and we wonder how we are ever going to get our groove back.

David experienced this many times in his life, as have all the patriarchs and heroes of the Bible have. Jesus declared that in the world we are going to have tribulation, but we are to be of good cheer because He has overcome the world. But the rain falls on the just and the unjust and sometimes we can find ourselves walking through life with the coordination of a newborn calf.

The events described in 1 Samuel 30:1-20 surely made David weak at the knees, but we see something else in this instance of David’s life that we can apply when we find ourselves in need of victory.

No matter what comes our way, hardship, trial, relational breakdown, financial pressure, health challenges or just dealing with the stresses of post-modern life we must:

So, let’s look at this incredible tale and find the nuggets of truth that can turn the tides of despair to tears of joy and thanksgiving.

1 Samuel 1:1 – If you read the preceding chapters we find that David is in exile and is living in the land of the enemy. He has become a mercenary of sorts and he and his men have taken up residence in Ziklag. David narrowly escapes having to fight against his own country men and is sent home. David is doing the will of God; he is training his men and waiting for God to exalt him to the throne of Israel. Since he was fifteen David knew that he would someday be king, but he would not force his hand, even though Saul was backslid and was rejected by God. David has a destiny and his men know it, so they wait patiently for God to bring it to pass in the land of the Philistines.

If anyone could gripe when trouble came his way, it could have been David. Displaced from his homeland and family, treated like a wanted man with bounty hunters and his own king trying to hunt him down, he is not in Bethlehem, but in the land of Israel’s enemies. Then after going through all this he comes toward his camp and sees the smoke of destruction rising up from a pillaged and sacked village where his wives and children and those of his men were. All is gone and seemingly lost.

How many times have we seen literal or figurative fires from our homes? I don’t know about you but I do pretty good handling someone else’s problems, but when it comes to my home I react a lot differently. I can talk to other people’s kids about the dangers awaiting them, but when it comes to my own I can come off as sounding as if I have a mouth full of marbles. Where I am clam cool and collected in the midst of challenges faced by others, weeping with those who weep and rejoicing with those that rejoice, I have a hard time doing that with my family. It is more personal.

Your smoking village could be a:

Call informing you of a passing loved one

Letter stating that your spouse wants to end the relationship

Pink slip at your place of employment

Bad report from the doctor

Whatever it is, there is hope.

By looking at how David reacted to his plight and the course of action that he took, we too can overcome life’s messy surprises.

We are redeemed from the curse of the law, but not the curse of the fall. We have an enemy. The Bible states that “Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers them out of them all.”

But we must not live there. It has its place, but there are people that when they talk you swear you hear violins. In times of crisis, many turn to anger, blame-shifting and finger pointing. But this helps nothing and really impairs your ability to hear from the Lord. Instead of feeling the pain we sometimes flash into anger and end up causing more harm than good.

 David wept, he felt the pain, but he moved past crying about his problem and began to do something that would change his misfortune and turn the momentum of the situation over to his favor.

Notice what David did not do.

He did not run for the hills

He did not call 1-800-Intercessor

He didn’t curse God

He did not accept this as the will of God

No! David knew his God.

                                                     1 Samuel 30:6

We will see how David did this next week, so see ya same time same station!

I was looking over my library and found a great book that everyone in the body of Christ should read, "In Search of Timothy" by Tony Cooke.

That seems to be the quest of many Pastors and Leaders today, to find their faithful companion in ministry that is like-minded and committed to the vision set before the Leader. As I have talked with many Leaders, the conversation will always turn towards a "Where's my Timothy?" slant, as they pine away for a helper and travel companion through ministry.

Where's Timothy? Where's Timothy? Where's Timothy?

I believe before we can ask that question, we have to ask another question, "Where's Paul?"

There would be more Timothys if there were more Pauls.

Instead, ministry life seems to be filled with more Sauls (King Saul) than Pauls.

The Apostle Paul was a true mentor, a father in the faith to Timothy and their relationship was inter-dependent, which is the true place of dominion. We can only live in true dominion as God has given it, by first being dependent on God and then others.

 Timothy not only served Paul faithfully, Paul served Timothy faithfully.

I do not want to downplay the fact that Paul, in his office, was serving in a capacity that was on a higher level of responsibility, they were not equals in position, but their relationship was one of mutual benefit. Timothy helped relieve the burden of the Apostle and Paul poured his life into Timothy, enabling him to one day be the Pastor of the largest church in Asia minor during very difficult times.

Today there is competition among ministers.

Some are afraid that up and coming ministers (Timothys) may take a piece of their pie, it seems that some Leaders today are consumed with building their kingdom rather than the Kingdom of God.

I recently read a statistic that staggered me, it stated that in our state of Oklahoma only 16% of our population attend a church! Even in wake of the Mega-Church age, 86% are chosing to stay home and not be involved in a local church. My friend, we have a lot of work to do, and the only way it's going to get done is through empowerment relationships like Paul and Timothys. We need to stop being self-serving, insecure and petty and start pouring our lives into other leaders that can reach the demographics that we cannot reach. As Senior Pastors, why do we think that one Church (our church) or one ministry gift can reach the whole world? We are fools if we think that. We might say that we do not ascribe to that belief, but our actions speak louder than our words.

Our goal is disciples not just converts!

I heard a minister say one day that you should not get close to your people, because then you will not be able to correct them, I wanted him to give me chapter and verse on how he got that revelation, but he couldn't, because it's not in the Bible. Jesus never demonstrated it, Paul did not either. It is a corporate lie that has crept in the Church and has seperated Pauls from Timothys.

I don't see how collision clauses are in agreement with the Great Commission.

Jesus is into Dominion.

Paul did not hold anything back from Timothy, he gave him his wisdom, his experience and eventually his anointing. He was a true spiritual father, unlike the posers who cut the strings on their spiritual children the first sign that they feel threatened. I am sure Paul and Timothy had there "ups and downs" as any relationship, but Paul's ministry philosophy to "seek another man's wealth and to spend all and be spent for others" kept the relationship where God wanted it. We should always have one hand up, holding onto a mentor that can take us to new heights and one hand down, to help those coming up.

INTERDEPENDENCY

It is how we are supposed to function as the Body of Christ, it requires all the virtues: Faith, Hope and Love.

Until we realize we need one another, we will never accomplish the Command of Jesus.

Jesus did not state that we would be known as His disciples by the size of our Churches or Ministries, but in how we LOVE one another.

We had a great night in the Word of God last Wednesday night, God has been speaking to us in a powerful way in our study in the book of Ephesians.

At the beginning of the year, the Lord directed us to teach the Bible verse by verse, starting with the Epistle to the Ephesians. So on February 13 we ventured to obey the Lord and now, close to 25 lessons later, we are coming to the final verses of the epistle. It has been quite a journey and a growing experience for us. It has feed our faith and gave us revelation knowledge in so many areas. Last Wednesday, we began discussing the Authority structure for the home and how God's blessing flows through His prescribed structure to bring us to maturity, but it was when we entered into chapter 6 and verse 10 that we began to see why that structure is important because the Apostle Paul tells us to, "Be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might."

The words "power" and "might" in this verse denote ruling power or endowed power. In other words, Paul is telling us that we have ruling power and endowed authority in Christ that we should be strong in and exercise.

We must learn to exercise our ruling power within ourselves, upon our circumstances and against our enemy! If we will abide in God's structure of authority we can exercise the delegated authority or ruling power that Christ has given us, we have it in Him! It is ours to walk in today!

We can speak to barren places, walled cities, mountains of adversity and the giants of discouragement, and see them fall! Satan has been stripped of his authority on the redeemed new creation and it is time for all the children of God to exercise their ruling power, liberating themselves and others from the traps of the enemy.

We had a time of prayer after the study in which we exercised our ruling power over areas in our lives that the enemy has had his hand in too long, I believe breakthroughs happened as an atmosphere of joy and excitement came over the people. I cannot wait to hear the testimonies of what God has done since that night, He is awesome!

I would encourage anyone who wants a grasp on the Bible, to come to our Wednesday Night Bible Study, we are close to wrapping up the Ephesians study, but will be breaking down another book of the Word of God after we get through. I have grown and the people in attendance have grown as the Word has went forth and I know that you will as well.

Hope to see you soon.

Your Servant,

Greg