Pastor Peter Bonanno
September 21, 2014 - W1438

Today, I want to share with you:

• God’s desire to work on the little things in our lives and use them to bring us to new levels in our journey.

• How to ensure that when He opens doors of opportunity for us that we remain faithful to Him.

 Scripture teaches a principle we need to learn. It has to do with the little things in our lives.  I like to say it this way, “Little things are big things to God.” Luke 16:10 says, “One who is faithful in very little and therefore can be relied upon is faithful also in much (and can be relied upon there); and the one who is dishonest in very little is also dishonest in much.”

 Specifically, we will be talking about how God shapes our character through being faithful in “the little.” Since you don’t know me I’ll be transparent with you and share a little about my life--it’s not very glamorous.  My first job, just out of college, was working for a television station of which I was very excited.  After about six months into the job, I became the producer of the news broadcast. I figured that I knew everything at this point.  This was a small station and not a big deal, but it went to my head a little.  The station manager had appointed someone over the news crew, who in my opinion didn’t know anything about television because he was a radio guy. I remember thinking this guy doesn’t know anything about what we are doing here.  I was assigned to produce and lay out the news stories and he came to me and said, “Peter, I think we need to move this story to this slot and this one up here.”  I was only 23 years old, and I said, “No, that’s not the way it should be.”  He said, “No, I’m asking you to move this one here.”  I said, “Well, I’m producing, not you.” And I left it the way it was and didn’t think anything of it until the next day when I came in and Mr. Ed Ross Kelly looked at me in the eyes and said, “Peter, pack up your belongings.  You are being let go for insubordination.”  I thought, “What?”  But looking back I realize that it was in “the little thing” that I failed.  In fact, I’m so glad I got fired when I was 23 because it taught me a lesson about being faithful in “the little.”  It wasn’t a big deal but I had to submit to authority and that was a lesson I had to learn.  It was a character check for me. 

 Character Check

 A character check reveals who we are when we are faced with a challenge, an obstacle, a disagreement, or especially a crisis. In fact, God will often check our character during a time of crisis.  He forms our character in “the little.”  In other words, your integrity or your lack of it shows up when you are under pressure, but that is not when you start developing your character.  You don’t develop character when things are going the way you want it to go.  It starts when no one sees you.  It starts in the secret place.  It starts with you and God and allowing God to speak to you personally.  Wouldn’t you like to have a personal relationship with Jesus?  Isn’t that what it’s all about—a personal relationship with the Lord?  Then He begins to get personal.  He speaks to us through the Word. When we’re reading the Word it begins to read us.  He begins to reveal things to us:  “You know that area of anger in your life?”  You say, “Yeah, I know.  I kinda grew up that way.”  “That area of gossip?  Let me work on that when nobody is around because the time will come when you are faced with a challenge or crisis, and you don’t want it to show up then.”

 Character is not made in crisis. It's only exhibited.

 We need to give attention to our inner man and invest in the health of our soul. We should praise God not only when the band is playing but praise God when there’s no music, just us, if we expect to move up to greater things on our journey.  Little things are big things to God.  Think about your life. Are you compromising in the little things, things that you think nobody will ever know about?  Little compromises, such as, getting angry with the person standing in front of you in the checkout lane with 12 items in the “less than 10 items” lane.  It’s okay.  Learn and grow in those things—the little compromises. 

 Let’s look at a familiar scripture in Daniel 3. The three Hebrew men were put on trial for not bowing down to a golden image that King Nebuchadnezzar had erected.  They were faced with an opportunity to save themselves, to compromise, and even rationalize the importance of “the little” but we will learn that it didn’t just happen then.  Their character was formed long before then and was continuing to be formed in “the little.” 

 King Nebuchadnezzar made a golden image, 90 feet high (the size of a 10-story building) and he decreed that all people were to bow down to it when the music started. The three men didn’t bow because they were convinced in their hearts that they would serve only The One True God.  They were able to do this because they had ordered their steps in the day-to-day of their lives when nobody saw them.  The king basically said, “If you don’t bow down, you will be thrown into a fiery furnace that will be turned up 7 times hotter than normal.”  The men were faced with the opportunity to compromise, but at that moment boldness arose from their hearts and mouths. Daniel 3:16, 17, “Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered the king, ‘O, Nebuchadnezzar, it is not necessary for us to answer you on this point. If our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, He will deliver us out of your hand, O king.  But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship your golden image that you have set up.’”  This was not in a flippant dishonoring way.   

 Integrity, character, and true faithfulness show up in our lives when the door of opportunity opens. Then once we are inside the door and faced with a crisis or temptation, we have a choice to obey God or to compromise our values for the convenience of the moment. 

 These men had been given prestigious leadership positions in Nebuchadnezzar’s kingdom because God gave them wisdom, knowledge, understanding, and skill in all learning. They had 10 times more wisdom than all the magicians in the court.  The gifts that God gave them opened the door for leadership opportunity, and they were faced with a crisis. 

 Years ago I had a pastor who taught me that “Your gifts and talents have the potential to take you further than your character can keep you.”  He said your gifts will open doors, but your character will determine what you do once those doors are open to you.  What will you do once you enter the door to which God has brought you? 

Integrity

 God checks our character in crisis, but he forms it in “the little.” Have you ever thought, “What would I do if I could break the rules and get away with it?”  These men were still accountable to God while everyone else was bowing down to the golden image.  Ethically, it would be “okay” but for the three men to bow, but they had formed something in “the little,” in the private when nobody was looking.  They knew who they were and, therefore, would not break the rule just because they could get away with it.  You say, “It’s just a little thing.  It won’t hurt anyone else.” I believe integrity is pretty optional in our culture today.

 There’s more to learn in this passage. They did not go into the fire until they were first tested in the area of faithfulness in their everyday life.  In the previous two chapters, the men resolved not to defile themselves with the food and the wine from the king’s table.  Just a little thing, but they made a decision to serve God yesterday, and today they would not serve the image.

 “If we do the little things like they are big things, then God will do the big things like they are little things.”

 They said to the king, “Our God will deliver us from you, but if not…” When we say God’s will, whatever God’s will might be, supersedes the result we expect from our obedience, it is truly faith on our part.  They did not have to defend themselves because of their deep trust and faith in God.  In the little things they did, God showed up.  In a book by Mark Batterson called All In, he said, “If we do the little things like they are big things, then God will do the big things like they are little things.”   Don’t you love that?  That’s miraculous!

 Keeping their integrity was the only way for these men. Integrity might be little things for others but to God little things are big things.  People have said, “Don’t sweat the small stuff.” I say, we need to sweat the small stuff.  Are we willing to be faithful in the little?  Tests will come and sound decisions have to be made during a crisis. I don’t think Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego knew that this crisis would happen but they were prepared.  It was like a pop quiz.  There is no preparing or cramming for a pop quiz.   

 We will never be able to say no to the Nebuchadnezzars of our lives if we have not learned to say yes to God in the little things. Walking in “the little” will lead us to maturity because the little things form the big things in us.  If you desire to please the Lord, do the little things. 

 Servant-Leader

 I love the way Jesus worked with His disciples. It wasn’t always glamorous.  There were menial everyday tasks such as passing out bread and fish, getting Jesus in the boat from one place to another, doing crowd control, staying up with Jesus in all-night prayer, or running errands.  Jesus didn’t give them glamour and power.  He showed them how to be faithful in “the little” - doing the insignificant tasks as when He got down on his knees and washed their feet and gave them a towel and basin and told them to do the same--be a servant.  Jesus said, “The one who is least is the greatest in the kingdom.”  Little things make a big difference, positive and negative.

 When we first planted the church, I attended a Church Planters’ Boot Camp. We were in a classroom setting talking about vision, prayer, faith, and what it meant to be a servant-leader.  After a 15-minute break, the speaker asked us if we had noticed anything on our way out and in?  We didn’t notice anything.  We said we were talking about the servant thing, what it means to really lay down our lives for what God has called us.  He said, “That’s great!  But did you notice something on the way out and in?”  He told us to turn around and there at the entryway where we had to actually squeeze to get around was an open trash bag.  None of us noticed the trash bag to take it out!  Little things are big things to God. 

 The lesson of the fiery furnace is that Jesus does show up in our lives every single day, but we must learn to go after Him even when there is no crisis.

 A personal relationship with God is allowing Him to get personal in our life.   I want to encourage all of us to ask the Lord to check those areas in our heart—what comes out during frustration, fear, anger, lack of faith.  Developing these areas in our everyday lives is something called Spiritual Discipline.  This is where God develops character—the little things are big things to God.  God opens us up not to expose us, but because He loves us. 

 It’s so easy to focus on the big, the much. It’s so easy to go after the greatness but the Lord Jesus is speaking to us and saying, “It’s in the little.  When no one else is looking.”  Not when the big things happen to us, but being faithful in the everyday little things of life.    

 Character is formed in the little ways you respond to situations, to small unnoticeable things.

 STUDY QUESTIONS:

1. How does God shape our character?

 2. How is character tested?

 3. When do integrity, character and faithfulness show up in our lives? Why?