GREAT TALK from a fantastic Network Day! All our team who attended were blown away.
Well worth looking over and praying through in your teams etc.
Psalm 133:
1 How good and pleasant it is when brothers live together in unity! 2 It is like precious oil poured on the head, running down on the beard,
running down on Aaron’s beard,
down on the collar of his robe.
3 It is as if the dew of Hermon
were falling on Mount Zion.
For there the LORD bestows his blessing, even life forevermore.
Have we accessed this blessing to its full extent?1
We can INSTIGATE this, bring it in ourselves. If… we can figure out how to be united.
And that’s not about standing up and all hold hands. That can be purely external. We need this REAL unity. In our teams, churches, cities. In our marriage and with our kids is where it starts.
Where has this gone wrong?
Go and look for brothers in the Bible that got along – there weren’t many!
Cain and Abel
Jacob and his brothers
David and his
Joseph and his
The enemy’s having a laugh at our expense! We are praying for a blessing and it starts here. Or not.
There are two brothers (this goes beyond male/female). Two big categories. The enemy finds it easy to separate these two and bring tensions.
Brother Reliable.
Brother Restless.
Reliable – you never have to remind them twice, they’ll take notes, and pass them on. Think it through, plan it through. We celebrate him (behind the scenes).
Restless – fidgeting, twittering, never quite there with you. A million ideas all at the same time.
We have both of these people and we have to understand how it works.
The parable of the prodigal son was not about the failure of ONE brother, but of two. And the Restless one comes back – which doesn’t often happen in the house of God cos we push them out.
And Reliable brother doesn’t like it.
If you let Reliable run the show, on his own he’ll become Resentful (why are we throwing a party for you, not me?).
If you let Restless go for it completely he’ll become Reckless.
i.e.., They will go to their EXTREMES.
The father’s saying ‘I’m Dad of BOTH! If you’d keep these two skill sets together, a blessing would fall.
Who do you preach to? Do you make one feel good at the expense of the other feeling bad?
He’s the father of both. He’s not excluding either.
Joseph and his brothers came from two very different vantage points.
Gen 37: 1 Jacob lived in the land where his father had stayed, the land of Canaan. 2 This is the account of Jacob’s family line. Joseph, a young man of seventeen, was tending the flocks with his brothers, the sons of Bilhah and the sons of Zilpah, his father’s wives, and he brought their father a bad report about them.
REPORTS can replace RELATIONSHIP
The first indication of the difference. Reliable (Joseph) – sees something that the others don’t see. They’re having a laugh, not taking the work seriously, a way they could improve etc. Something that could be given a better system.
When Reliable people enter in and see that, but there’s no RELATIONSHIP, then he’s just filing a report. What we’ll have in teams is SNITCHES.
And notice that what Reliable sees is RIGHT, it’s something we DO need to change/tweak. But without relationship it’s putting brother against brother. And division creeps in – and it will go to whatever team/ network they’re in. And then we pray, ‘God bless us’ but he can’t. The way you say it matters.
Not everyone is like you – and God designed it that way.
We can build a staff top heavy with one type of people or another, and try keeping the same people all together. Like separating kids off into their bedrooms. False peace. We need to mix them up.
ROBES can divide RELATIONSHIP.
3 Now Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other sons, because he had been born to him in his old age; and he made an ornate robe for him. 4 When his brothers saw that their father loved him more than any of them, they hated him and could not speak a kind word to him.
We mistake God’s favour for his favourites. God gives us his favour to commission you for what you’re going to do next. Titles, bonuses etc can become a dividing issue. If we put a robe on someone, do we think about it beforehand? How it will effect them and the team?
That robe or this one may fall on one, and all the others should celebrate that. For Joseph, it may have felt very awkward to wear that robe. The others may have felt overlooked – but God says, ‘figure it out’ – celebrate this, because it’s a robe of responsibility = more work.
Be careful how you speak over other’s lives. Put words in that defuse the other brother spirit in those around.
5 Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him all the more. 6 He said to them, “Listen to this dream I had: 7 We were binding sheaves of grain out in the field when suddenly my sheaf rose and stood upright, while your sheaves gathered around mine and bowed down to it.”
8 His brothers said to him, “Do you intend to reign over us? Will you actually rule us?” And they hated him all the more because of his dream and what he had said.
9 Then he had another dream, and he told it to his brothers. “Listen,” he said, “I had another dream, and this time the sun and moon and eleven stars were bowing down to me.”
RELIABLE bluntly says it as they see it. Reliably. ‘Deal with it.’
A Restless person would bring it very differently. Talk all about how they feel etc. Creative, passionate, persuasive.
Reliable people need help with discernment.
Restless is sensing something else.
You need BOTH to give you a report. Listen to both reports:
Reliable, ‘It was great, started on time, finished on time…’
Restless – It was boring, nobody engaged.
The dream that caused division – was a dream of future restoration, in a moment when robes would not be an issue.
How is this FIXED?
In our teams.
(Especially in worship teams where the divas are!).
Don’t kick one out – say, ‘You’re brothers – figure it out. Seek to work together for the long term – the blessing comes there.’
How to bring reconciliation?
The Reliable ones have to be willing to drop their guard – even lose control.
Gen 45: 1 Then Joseph could no longer control himself before all his attendants, and he cried out, “Have everyone leave my presence!” So there was no one with Joseph when he made himself known to his brothers. 2 And he wept so loudly that the Egyptians heard him, and Pharaoh’s household heard about it. 3 Joseph said to his brothers, “I am Joseph! Is my father still living?” But his brothers were not able to answer him, because they were terrified at his presence.
Be willing to show your vulnerability. That you’re not perfect. That we need to talk about this. To say, ‘Hey – we’re brothers! let’s see the big picture.’ He’s showing his human side.
Close the Gap
vs. 4 Then Joseph said to his brothers, “Come close to me.”
Explain the dream – a different way.
When they had done so, he said, “I am your brother Joseph, the one you sold into Egypt! 5 And now, do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here, because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you. 6 For two years now there has been famine in the land, and for the next five years there will be no plowing and reaping. 7 But God sent me ahead of you to preserve for you a remnant on earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance.
8 “So then, it was not you who sent me here, but God..
If there was ever a day when robes could divide – it was that day, but he now had a come close attitude.
Talk about it together
Not shout. Not compete. Talk. About how we can be more united.
14 Then he threw his arms around his brother Benjamin and wept, and Benjamin embraced him, weeping. 15 And he kissed all his brothers and wept over them. Afterward his brothers talked with him.
We want Psalm 133 in our team!
How about you?
