Such things were written in the Scriptures long ago to teach us. And the Scriptures give us hope and encouragement as we wait patiently for God’s promises to be fulfilled.May God, who gives this patience and encouragement, help you live in complete harmony with each other, as is fitting for followers of Christ Jesus. Then all of you can join together with one voice, giving praise and glory to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.Therefore, accept each other just as Christ has accepted you so that God will be given glory. Remember that Christ came as a servant to the Jews to show that God is true to the promises he made to their ancestors. He also came so that the Gentiles might give glory to God for his mercies to them. That is what the psalmist meant when he wrote:“For this, I will praise you among the Gentiles;I will sing praises to your name.”And in another place it is written,“Rejoice with his people,you Gentiles.”And yet again,“Praise the Lord, all you Gentiles.Praise him, all you people of the earth.”And in another place Isaiah said,“The heir to David’s throne will come,and he will rule over the Gentiles.They will place their hope on him.”I pray that God, the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. Then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit. (Romans 15:4–13 NLT)
I recently heard about a professor at a seminary who starts off his class at the beginning of the semester by asking the students to look around the room to find all the yellow objects. After they spend a few minutes scanning the room, the professor tells them to close their eyes. He then asks them to name all the blue objects in the room.
The goal of this exercise isn’t to trip up the students; the professor is trying to illustrate a point about God that so many of us spend our lives learning and relearning.
Our brains are built for pattern recognition. This means every story about God at work in the world we’ve read in a book, listened to in a sermon, experienced, and heard from others builds a framework around which we expect God to work in the future. This means when we come upon similar experiences or certain kinds of people, we pay special attention to them, expecting to see God at work yet again.
But all that time spent looking at one thing causes us to miss out on a whole host of other areas where God is actively at work. We’re too busy looking for the yellow that we never notice the blue right in front of us.
Before Jesus arrived on the scene as a newborn in a manger, the people of Israel expected God would work in them, through them, and for them, just as he had in generations past. They were expecting a Messiah who would build a Jewish empire. Yet God was not concerned with only saving the Jews; God was working in and through them in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, but it was no longer for them alone.
During Jesus’s years of ministry, as well as in the years short after his ascension, most of his disciples and followers saw Jesus as the savior of the Jews. But as the apostles and others began retelling the story of Jesus, and began receiving visions from God about what is clean and unclean, like Simon Peter in Acts 10–11, they also began to realize the death and resurrection of Jesus was not just for Jews; this was salvation for the entire world. “There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male and female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus. And now that you belong to Christ, you are the true children of Abraham. You are his heirs, and God’s promise to Abraham belongs to you” (Galatians 3:28–29).
The disciples were so busy during the years of Jesus’s ministry paying attention to yellow – God at work in, through, and for the Jews, just like he had throughout history – they didn’t notice the blue right in front of them – God at work for the whole world. The plan from the beginning was always for the benefit of the whole of creation, not just a single people group.
Think back on your own experiences seeing God work in your life. What are the people, situations, and ways he has worked through in your life, either for you or for the benefit of others? Take a moment to celebrate all God has done, but then spend a few minutes inviting the Holy Spirit to open your eyes to the other ways God might want to work through your life today. Pray for eyes that are open to the possibilities that you might otherwise overlook.