Ready-Made Good Deeds for You

Dear Friends and Members of IBC,

In last week’s ‘Word for the Week’, I reshared a conviction that we are to be ‘servants of all’ (Mark 9:35), ready to serve in both extraordinary and unremarkable ways. As we are still in the early days of this New Year, possibly making plans and priorities for 2025, let me drop a pertinent Bible verse that it might be helpful for us to meditate on at this time.

In Ephesians 2:10, the apostle Paul writes “For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” I find it astonishing that God has already allocated for you and me good works to do, that they have even been prepared for us before we were born. God knows us so well, that He understands the good deeds that will be of most use for Him in His kingdom, and that would also bring us the most joy. After all, we are his handiwork, his masterpiece, and so He knows exactly what will be most beneficial.

So, we don’t need to be at a loss, desperately trying to discover how we might be of use, we can simply ask God what these pre-planned good works are. It might be a practical idea for us to start every day, maybe as a part of our devotional time, by praying out this verse, thanking God for the good works He has prepared for us on that day and asking for Him to reveal them to us. And let’s remember that God is a God of the details, of the small stuff. His task for us on any given day might be something mundane but meaningful, something that forces us to put aside the ego, or grow in one of the fruits of the Spirit.

God bless you
James