Somewhere deep inside, each one of us longs for more. We want more money, more authority, more followers, more of whatever it is that we find especially desirable or especially validating. “Sheol and Abaddon are never satisfied,” says the Sage, “and never satisfied are the eyes of man” (Proverbs 27:20). We live within a vicious cycle of longing, receiving, and longing all over again.
Yet the longing for more is not always bad and not necessarily wrong. There may be good reasons to long for more—more gifts, more responsibilities, more opportunities to serve the Lord. God is not opposed to giving us more. But he means to give us more according to our faithfulness with what he has already given.
Give me a bigger congregation, wishes the pastor! But what are you doing with the one you have now? Are you being a faithful shepherd over that small flock? And are you really ready to accept the weightier responsibility that will come with more?
Give me more readers, wishes the author! But how are you being faithful with the readers you have at this moment? How are you blessing and serving them with the words you write? Your faithfulness with hundreds predicts your faithfulness with thousands or millions.
Give me more money, wishes almost every one of us! But how are you proving yourself a faithful steward of the money God has already blessed you with? It is folly to think generosity depends upon abundance. If you will not give out of your lack, you will not give out of your plenty.
If you will not be committed to God’s purposes in little things, you provide no evidence that you will be committed to God’s purposes in great things. If you cannot faithfully steward little there is no reason to think you will faithfully steward much. Hence, God may be holding back what you long for to save you from the catastrophe of being unfaithful in much. He may be saving you from yourself. What you count a sorrow could actually be a rich blessing, for if you get what you want, it might destroy you.
God has placed you in the situation in which you can best prove your faithfulness to him. He has placed you right where you can best serve his cause. It is today that he means for you to prove your sincerity, here that he means for you to prove your love, and now that he means to for you to prove your devotion—in this circumstance, in this sphere, with this quantity.
It is folly to think generosity depends upon abundance. If you will not give out of your lack, you will not give out of your plenty.
And it is when you have proven yourself in this—when you have accepted it with joy and stewarded it with faithfulness—that God may see fit to give you that. Thus, if there is any longing for more in your heart, let it first be a longing for more of God’s glory, more of God’s fame, more wonder that he has seen fit to give you any of his blessings when you are so undeserving. And when you have proven yourself in what God has already given, when you have dedicated it to his cause and enlarged it for his purposes, perhaps he will deem you suitable to be stewards of more. Or maybe he will keep you just where you are and just as you are. Either way, you can trust him fully.
So don’t resent that you serve God in a small arena. Don’t feel sorry for yourself that you write for a small audience or preach before a small congregation. Be honored that God lets you serve him at all and deploy what he’s given you for the good of others and the glory of God. Be faithful in little and fully discharge your duty before God. Leave it to the riches of his wisdom to determine whether he will call you to prove your faithfulness over more.
