Have you heard the famous story of a king  who wanted to build the greatest monument for his deceased queen? He spent years building this monument only to find that when he finished it, he couldn’t find the queen’s body!!!

“The greatest enemy of intimacy with God is service for God,” Dallas Willard once said. I find this to be true especially as someone in the ministry. It is easy to think that my relationship with God is good because I am doing so many things for God. And the more I feel burnt out and spent for God, the better my relationship is with God. After all, aren’t we all supposed to be willing to die for the Lord?

But when I feel this way, I’m walking into a very dangerous territory. For want of building a monument to my beloved, I might miss the beloved altogether…

We see this playing out in human relationships all the time, don’t we? A dad is so busy working to provide for the family, he has no time for them at all. A mom is so stressed cooking and cleaning for the kids, she doesn’t enjoy them at all. A student is so focused on doing well, he cheats on tests not realizing that those tests are there to help him become better.

This is the mistake that the priests and the pharisees made with Jesus. They were so zealous in serving the Lord and preparing for His arrival that when the Lord finally showed up, they missed Him entirely! Boy, did they miss it badly! They crucified the very One they had been waiting for for centuries! What caused it? Their service for God instead of the object of their service became their focus.

Have you found time this week to drop everything to simply rest in God? “But I just don’t have time for that, Pastor! You have no idea how hectic my life is!” It’s true we go through those seasons. But if it’s been like that for a while, you might be missing the point entirely.

Before we are His servants, we are His children. Enjoy Him. Don’t miss the body in light of the monument.

PH