Yeah, I know, it’s a new year and I’m supposed to offer words that inspire you to get off your derrière, to hustle, to develop healthy habits and, (what seems to be everyone’s current favorite judging by Instagram hashtags) to love yourself more.

But here’s the thing: I’m not about to share any life-transforming 30-day challenges. I’m not going to proclaim your breakthrough is around the corner. I’m not going to tell you what new “rhythms” (which I suspect is a fancy word for “routines”) to adopt in 2021.

So, what AM I saying?

This new year, I’d like to encourage you to simply stop – and maybe walk away from some opportunities (Gasp!). Hold on. Let me explain my rather dismal-sounding message.

This world can sometimes serve up opportunities that look brilliantly dazzling. When those too-good-to-be-true moments present themselves, perhaps the wisest option is to stop and consider whether they will lead us toward God – or away from Him. Could we see some prospects as “stopportunities” – a moment look to God before plunging headlong through a doorway just because it’s ajar? Is it possible that sometimes it’s not our actions that speak the loudest but our walking away from the action?

In the Bible, we see a young guy who didn’t seize every opportunity because he was convinced that God’s ways were one hundred percent, without a smidgeon of doubt, better than his.

I’m speaking of David, known as “a man after God’s heart.” He wasn’t perfect  – not by a long stretch. But there are also moments in David’s life that make you sit up and say: Whoa, did he really pass that up?

In 1 Samuel 26, David visits a camp where his arch-rival Saul and his men lay sleeping. Saul, a man hot on the heels of David with the single-minded agenda of killing him, lay conveniently snoring in a camp with his spear accessibly placed next to him. David could have picked up the spear and pulled a Braveheart on his snoozing enemy. Within seconds, he could have been freed of this mad man and taken over as king of Israel.

Yet,  instead of plunging the weapon into Saul’s heaving chest, David takes Saul’s spear and water jug – and simply walks away. What a defining moment in the life of that 20-something-year-old guy who would one day be king. That spear and jug, to me, symbolize not the spoils of war but the sign of wisdom. They were displays that God works in ways that defy human understanding and subvert human calculation.

David seized the stopportunity. He trusted God’s timing, God’s ways, God’s POA, God’s rewards, and God’s character. David trusted that God had something better planned for him.

What are some of the stopportunities that will likely line themselves up for you in 2021?

Maybe it’ll be the chance to write a nasty text back to someone who has wronged you. Maybe it’ll be the chance to climb the corporate ladder on the back of someone else who deserved credit too. Maybe it’ll be the chance to make it “big” on social media provided you compromise on your values and ignore your family. Maybe it’ll be the chance to buy that property or business except that you’ll have to invest in some slabs of butter to grease some already-oily hands.

When those moments come our way, do we have the strength of character to stop – and to walk away?

The other day I had a chance to publish a video/ Instagram reel that would garner a few hundred, maybe even thousand views, and win me a handful of followers (and which writer doesn’t want more followers? Not this one – still working on the whole ‘seeking validation’ thing. That’s a whole other blog post or possibly a book!).

But when I stopped to consider whether that video would really bring God honor, whether it would be helpful to anyone, whether it would just be all about I, me and myself – and wham – I had the answer staring me in the face. Yup, it was a stopportunity – not an opportunity.

The world is insistent that we seize the day, strike when the iron’s hot, grab every lucrative opening that presents itself. But God’s ways are not ours. They are infinitely better.

Sometimes we just have to walk away from the falsely promising so that we can walk into the fulness of life that God has promised.

Friends, may we act upon the opportunities that He orchestrates for us. May we walk into this new year confident that, even if we walk away from seemingly shiny, the Lord will still shine His face upon us.

 

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Photo by Obi Onyeador on Unsplash