As a pastor, I recently asked someone to do something simple, something that he has done about four times. This brother suffers from an ailment, but I know that God's Word tells us that we can do all things through Christ Who strengthens us.

He asked for a guideline to follow. I provided them. But then, he called a few times with concerns over this simple task. He also lost the guidelines.

For a few seconds, the thought occurred to me that I may have just done it by myself and save myself the inconvenience of the phone calls and having to reprint the guidelines he lost. But the Lord reminded me that would be stupid on my part. As a pastor, I am to patiently train others to serve. For me to jump in would dwarf the spiritual and social development of this brother.

So it is with God. Although we might want Him to "jump in" or "snap His fingers" for a quick and correct result, He wisely chooses to work with us and through us. If we are truly in Christ, if we err, we should be able to sense His correction so we can do the task better next time.

Even today God performs miracles. However, most of the time He develops the qualities He has placed in each of us. Because we are often slow learners, that process is slow.

Consider Moses. Read the whole account from his birth to his death and you will see in his earlier years Moses gave God a good bit of trouble in regard to serving Him. At one point, he complained to God about having to lead the over one million Jews whom God delivered from Egypt. But after viewing just a mere fraction of the awesome magnitude of the moral qualities of God, Moses began to change to where he pleaded with God to spare the Israelites after they sorely angered Him to where He was going to destroy them.

While God performed numerous miracles before the Jews entered the Promised Land, His greater miracles occurred within people like Moses, Joshua and Caleb.

We are reminded from the Word of God in 2 Corinthians 6:1, "We then, as workers together with him, beseech you also that ye receive not the grace of God in vain." If someone has committed to Christ, they are to serve Him and are coworkers with Him. Declaring frail, fallible humans as coworkers is a patient, loving choice on the part of God.

By the way, the brother did very well.