The Slow Work of God

Welcome to the Here Below Podcast, a ministry of Christ the Redeemer in Greenville, South Carolina. The great doxology exclaims praise God from whom all blessings flow. Praise him all creatures here below. Praise him above ye heavenly host. Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. This is our attempt to do just that to join our voices with that great heavenly chorus, providing reflections that are grounded in Scripture, formed by the great tradition and oriented towards spiritual formation in the everyday stuff of life here below. Enjoy the episode. Welcome to another episode of Here Below. My name is Matt Wyerman. I'm one of the pastors at Christ the Redeemer Church in Greenville, South Carolina and has been usual. I've got my friend and co-labor in the gospel, Dr. Luke Stamps, who is a community group, director, a faithful member, has been at Redeemer for several years. Took a hit the pause button for some travel and then came back, and so we are grateful. We have been doing these episodes of Here Below in an effort to, as we say in the introduction, to basically join our voices with the "throng of witnesses" that we hear about in Hebrews 12 that are cheering us along and that here below we want to re-down to God's glory and we want to reflect on what it means to not just have a relationship with Christ with God himself, but what does that relationship with God look like here below? It's not just a faith that that saves us for heaven as it were. Heaven is the new heaven, the new earth. It's where God Himself will dwell in our presence. But as we don't get to see that in its consummate glory yet, how do we live our lives here below in the everyday stuff of life and just the mundane? And one of the things, we're releasing this in January of 2026, one of the things I felt, I was telling Luke before we hit record, felt inclined to have us talk about is, you know, during the month of January, folks are talking about new habits, new goals, which I personally love and I do that myself. But a lot of times within our goal setting, our new habit formation, we forget that the whole purpose of those is to become a different kind of person. And now Luke and I had a separate conversation before we started this podcast and he shared with me a prayer by Pierre Telehard Dishardim. And forgive me, my French ain't that good. And but I thought it would be great Luke for us just to for you to read that prayer. And for us just to encourage folks, this is going to be a shorter episode today. We're going to just have variations on different things so that every episode isn't an hour long, but maybe just something to give you a little shot in the arm, a little encouragement, a little reminder, and to point your eyes towards Jesus. So Luke, could you do us the favor of just reading that? And then we'll just, you know, as the spirit leads, reflect on some of the things, even we can incorporate some of the things that we were talking about prior to, it's a recording, but at the very least if you could go and get us started off, that would be wonderful. Yeah, sure. So I don't know a ton about a Deshardan. I know he's a Jesuit priest and and I think he was like a scientist, you know, as well and, you know, a spiritual writer. But you know, one of the one of the great things about the truth is that it's not really dependent upon the source. You know, so in there may be things about Deshardan that that would be problematic and we're not endorsing him, but the truth of what he has to say can be discerned by careful Bible readers. But anyway, the, the, the, the prayer as it's written, or as I found it, is called patient trust. And it goes like this, above all, trust in the slow work of God. We are quite naturally impatient and everything to reach the end without delay. We should like to skip the intermediate stages. We are impatient of being on the way to something unknown, something new. And yet it is the law of all progress that it is made by passing through some stages of instability and that it may take a very long time. And so I think it is with you. Your ideas mature gradually, let them grow, let them shape themselves without undue haste. Don't try to force them on as though you could be today what time that is to say grace and circumstances acting on your own good will will make of you tomorrow. Only God could say what this new spirit gradually forming within you will be. Give our Lord the benefit of believing that His hand is leading you and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself in suspense and incomplete. So what do you think about that? That's a prayer that I need to remind myself of daily. There are two things I'm looking at it here as well. This the beginning and the end are just like hit, hit me right in the gut, above all. So if you were to take the measure of all the different things that are happening in your life, this is what he's saying. You have to trust in the slow work of God. And then he says give our Lord the benefit of believing that His hand is leading you and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself in suspense and incomplete. That we are always going to be incomplete until the great day when our Lord Jesus returns that as Paul says on that day, right, when we will see Him face to face. And I think if we can get comfortable with being uncomfortable, we would do really well for ourselves. And I think inherent within that prayer and giving our Lord the benefit of believing that His hand is leading you, that in essence, we're trusting that the Lord is omnipresent and He's active in His creation and no less the case He's active in our own individual lives. I think it's such a wonderful, beautiful prayer to start out 2026 that we consider trust the slow work of God. I have a couple more thoughts, but I'd love to hear just even as you were reading it in this moment, but then also even as you were reading it earlier this morning, anything that the Lord particularly calls to jump out at you. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think it's something that I've been learning slowly, right? As most things are, as this prayer expresses, is the importance of the present, right? It's interesting to see that even, you know, even sort of unbelieving psychologists and philosophers recognized by nature, by reason, what we also know from Scripture, the importance of being mindfully present, right? Again, we might think about that as kind of like a pop psychology, trendy thing to say, but the Bible actually has a lot to say about this as well, right? And all the world religions do as well. But the importance of being in the moment, right? Jesus says, take no thought for tomorrow, right? Because the trouble of today is sufficient for itself, right? The Bible says, you know, today is the day of salvation. Now is the accepted time, right? I mean, there's this emphasis in the Scriptures. And again, in all of the world religions and even in philosophy and psychology, these are things that are sort of universally recognized by human beings that the present is all you have. It's all that you will ever have. In a way, the present is all that exists, right? And if you follow, I mean, the past is gone. You can't undo the past. The future is not yet here. The present is all that you have. So anyway, that one thing that stood out to me was just a lesson that I've been learning slowly of just being mindfully present, right? And that's one of the lines that stood out to me most from this prayer was don't try to force your ideas on as though you could be today what time will make of you tomorrow. I'm, you know, kind of eliding a line or two there. But don't try to be today. What only time can make you be tomorrow, right? Because we kind of want to force everything. A different personality types might even be more prone to this than others. But we want to force everything now, right? And just letting go and being in the moment and trusting that slow work, you know, like the farmer who waits, you know, for the seeds to germinate and the crops to grow is really hard, but it's also really freeing, you know, like it's freeing to know. Yeah, you don't have to worry about that. You don't have to worry about that particular issue that that's may or may not crop up, right? Yeah, and that's exactly what Jesus says in that text from from Matthew 6. How many of you by worrying can add an hour to your life or a cubist to your stature or whatever? Worrying actually doesn't do anything. It sort of gives us the illusion that they were doing something. It actually inhibits us from not just from doing, but from becoming the kind of people that we need to be. Yeah, exactly right. It's yeah, it's not just unproductive, it's counterproductive to worrying, but we think we're doing something when we worry. Like as long as I'm worrying about it, you know, at least, you know, at least I'm doing something. No, you're actually not, you're not doing anything and what you're doing isn't helping. So I would just to sort of be, again, sort of, again, this is kind of a buzz word, but again, there's some truth of being mindfully present in the moment and trusting God that like as David says, my times are in your hands. You know, the Lord is appointed every day. They've, they're all written in a book. You know, they're all, he's the one who who's in charge of all that. You know, my task is to practice his presence daily, moment by moment, to just be with the Lord. You know, not to leave him in my quiet time in the morning, but to take him with me, right? Every moment of the day and just entrusting myself to his good providence, even when it's difficult. Yeah. Yeah, I think one of the other things that, even as you're talking and what I was reflecting on is, is what this shardine is encouraging. I said, like, only God could say what this new spirit gradually forming within you will be. I think about my own life, you know, when I was in first and second grade, I had a certain plan for my life. And it could have happened or it could have not happened, right? I wanted to be a heart surgeon. I wanted to be a doctor, a medical doctor. And that would have been a wonderful thing because the Lord can, because what the Lord is after in our own lives as his children is the shaping of our soul. And, and all the other things are just tools in which he wants to shape our soul. So, you know, the, the, the moments of learning humility, the moments of learning, trusting in God's love, that could be had if I was performing surgery. It could be had while I'm having a hard conversation with someone or writing that difficult email, right? So, so the Lord uses all these tools because at the, at the end goal, as, as Paul says, this is God's will for your life, your sanctification. What is that? A sanctification is simply Christ being formed in us. And, and so, so all of these, you know, accidents to use it in a technical way, all of these things that we experience in life are God's ways of getting at our essence of who we are. And, and so, as you look at this new year of 2026, I want to encourage you, I'm talking to a listener and in myself and you, but I want to encourage all of us to, to slow down long enough ourselves to, to be in step with the Spirit of God, that he's doing a slow work in our lives and to be in step with the Spirit oftentimes is to slow down, to be aware, to be present with the person that you're talking to, to be present with the, the moment that God gives you that he, in fact, is shaping you into the image of his son, Jesus. That's really what he's after. Like, sure, dropping 30 pounds this year, great goal I have, right? But what kind of person does that require me to be? It requires me to be a more self-control person. Helps me to be a more aware person as I'm eating. Helps, helps me to also be present and say, whatever I do, whether I eat or drink, do it all for the glory of God. And that, that also relates to, you know, not giving to gluttony, not giving to sloth, not giving to, you know, any number of the vices and to cultivate in my own heart the virtues of charity, of, of trust in what the Lord's doing in my life. So, so I think that that would be my prayer for all of us this 20, 26 year is that we would as my favorite book is called Practice the Presence of God. That's, that's on my top. That'd be my top 10 list. I probably need to write down a top 10 list because I say that about a lot of different books. That's my top 10. Well, it depends on the genre, but that definitely out of all the books I've ever read in all of my life. Top 10 would be Practice the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence because it would, I read that when I was in college and recommended on the regular and in fact give it out at our membership class because it is, if you let it do its work, it will reshape you into a different kind of person. Not just how I need to read more, I need to pray more, I need to serve more, like those will all be fruits, even as we looked at on Sunday from Isaiah 27. These fruits will happen in your life, but actually the the gravitational pull is in is communion with God and in that moment communion with him. Yeah, the thing I love about that book is its simplicity. If you get into reading spiritual theology, it can get complicated, you know, like a lot of a lot of people, a lot of the mystical writers, like we talked about in previous episodes and even the Puritans and spiritual writers, like it gets very some of the processes can kind of get very complicated and that some of that's very helpful because like life is complicated and we kind of need that granular, you know, detail in order to make sense out of what does it actually look like to grow in a fallen world given in dwelling sin and given the challenges of life. And so I'm not trying to dismiss more complicated pictures, but the thing I love about Brother Lawrence's book is like the method is so simple and like we kind of need that simplicity sometimes the focus of just saying like here here's what it is. It's very simple. Recollect God's presence every moment and all of your tasks. Just take him with you, right? He's already with you anyway. He's already there and to you. The goal is just to turn your gaze back to him and attend to him as he's with you whenever you wash the dishes as he's with you whenever you travel, you know, to the next town to buy wine. These are the kinds of things that he talks about doing, right? In terms of practicing God's presence. I'm remembering the book, right? Isn't it? Isn't that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. The particular one for me that was that was just profound was the washing of dishes. I was like, there ain't no way you're practicing God's presence and you're like, yeah, when you are there and realizing that I am I can be with God right now. Because we oftentimes look our lives at just sheer tasks as opposed to the shaping of our soul. Yeah. And most people have a kind of internal dialogue anyway. They're kind of talking to themselves and, you know, there's layers of thought going on. So for a Christian like the goal is to just take that internal dialogue that we all have as we're planning our day thinking about our anxieties, you know, is just to sort of remember God is in there, right? God is present in that internal dialogue and just to make it not a monologue, but a dialogue to just, you know, just talk to God throughout the day. Thank him, you know, for things as they appear in your life. I mean, I feel like that's one of the best ways to practice God's presence. Honestly, it's just being grateful. It's kind of things that you don't even think about. Like, you know, my car cranked this morning. Crunk. Where were you? Make that. I think crunk is a kind of dance. Yeah. My car cranked this morning. Yeah. Cranked. Yeah. You know, then it was very cold and there was heat that kept me warm in the very short commute. I have twerk. So just remember to give thanks. Like, give thanks to God for things that happen in your life, even for the difficulties that happen in your life. Gratitude, I think, is just one of the ways we can practice God's presence the best. But just to invite God into that, you know, that internal conversation that we're already having and that's how you pray without ceasing. I mean, I think I remember being young and I thought, well, that's obviously an exaggeration, you know, like, you know, like this is the hyperbolic, you know, he's really mean pray without ceasing. He just means having a posture of prayer or whatever, you know, like I, but like, Amy red brother Lawrence, I realized, no, like, you can't actually pray without ceasing. You know, I mean, obviously, I have to stop and talk to you in this podcast. I'm going to give teacher class in a minute. So I'm going to have to talk to other people and you have tasks you have to do. So yes, there's some truth in that posture of prayer approach. But like, you can pray on your way, on your way to work. You can pray even in the middle of a conversation. Yeah, Lord, give me the words to say, give me, give me, yeah, you know, I mean, like, I remember noticing this in Nehemiah years ago, reading, doing a Bible study through Nehemiah. And whenever he's interacting with the king, he's praying like that he would have the, the right words to say, you know, back to the, to the king. And so you can pray even in the conversation, you can pray in between tasks, you can pray, we're going to the bathroom. You know, what I mean? Like, like, you, you can pray all time, you know? And I think that's just having, you know, learning the discipline of that, I feel like is one of the, the great benefits of that book that is actually what helps you to do the thing that we began with, right? Which is in the slow progress of our sanctification, in the difficulties and uncertainties of life, what are we going to do? Well, we, the only thing we really can do is trust God's providence. And the only way that that cash is out is in this moment by moment, dependence upon him. Yeah. I've got a two analogies, two images. I wanted to briefly share maybe one humorous one, hopefully helpful. But first one of the, like, Luke, you, for those that know you, know that you love barbecue, you love making barbecue. And so would it be preferable if I had a, you know, lampshank or, you know, I get what do you do? What do you, what do you, what do you, what's your favorite thing to the barbecue? You know, I do pork shoulder roasts and brutes. Okay. Those are the things I do most. So if I were to want to get involved in that, would it be beneficial for me to turn the grill up to 450 and just kind of throw it on? If I've, if I've got, you know, the game, I forgot about it. The game is starting in an hour. I need this thing done. What would happen if I were to do that? Yeah. You drive that thing out. Yeah. It's not going to be good unless it goes low and slow all the way. It's a great, great illustration. Yes. Maybe we'll have an episode where we just only talk about barbecue and just pull all of the, the spiritual ramifications, the inspection of you, the patience and four, four sites and all the things that are involved, but we could maybe do that. I could really play around with that because, you know, all the details about, you know, there actually are some ways to speed up the cook time even when you're going low and slow by wrapping, you know, eventually whenever it hits a stall, you wrap it out a world or butcher paper to help that'll preach. So I'm thinking, you know, there's got to be some surmulations in there. Wrap your life in foil. Yeah. Wait, no. The other image I got was, so yeah, so I actually, we'll put a pin on that. Maybe we'll have a little fun episode where we talk about barbecue. If you want that to happen, just send us an email here below at redeemergreenville.com, say yes to the barbecue. So I'm, maybe we'll have, you know, some debates going on, some mustard based and ketchup based and vinegar, all the, all the different things that I'm not aware of. But I do love barbecue as well and, but I'm not the connoisseur as you are. But the other image I got was a lot of times in parenting of the encouragement that we got from older folk and that I would give to a younger folk is my oldest is now a freshman in college. And, you know, I a little bit further down the road. This was the encouragement, especially as they're toddlers, as they're, you know, bumbling around, figuring out things. And then as they start to form logic and reason, you know, that they're six and seven year old self or they, or, or even at the, at the, at the teenage level in some ways, right? I'm saying, why did you think that that was going to work that way? And the, the encouragement was this, don't expect a 13 year old or a five year old or a 10 year old to have a 30 year old's mind. Don't expect that to, for them to be able to reason like that. Not only reason like that, but then to be able to have the, have the experience of, oh, if I say this to this person, then this will probably result. But let people be formed and shaped through time and trust the process and continually show up for your kids to be able to guide them in that process. But I think for us, the by way of analogy, is don't expect the 65 year old mat wireman to show up as the 47 year old mat wireman and, and so forth, because I can, I can be prone towards guilt and frustration by the way I did, did my parenting, for example, or like, man, I wish I would have been more patient. Well, I'm more patient now because of the hard work of learning and of, and of repenting and of asking for forgiveness. And I think also for us, like, hopefully by God's grace, right, changing from one degree of glory to another, by God's grace, January 2026, mat wireman and Luke stamps will be different than December 2026, Luke stamps a mat wireman. And that's all of God's grace and to realize that as we are immune with God and cooperating with his spirit who dwells within us, indeed, is nearer than our own soul that he wants to shape our soul. And we have no clue. That's the, that's, that can be, be anxiety-producing or it can be really awesome if you trust the one who's guiding you, right? Like, man, what kind of person will I be if I am communing with God and in prioritizing my relationship with him? What kind of person would I be after 12 months of doing that day after day, whole and moldy? That could be a really amazing person. And I want to be that person and trusting the Lord in that process of creating that person. So that's my encouragement to all y'all who are faithfully listening and it's an encouragement to our church as well as to those who are listening on the periphery we want to encourage you that that God is working in you to create a certain kind of person. And we have no idea what that is. But if we can trust that as we are with him in that process, that is going to be really beautiful. Yeah. There's, there's, there's, there's joy in letting go and, and freedom in that and recognizing like, it's not just, it's not to excuse sloth or hate or inaction, but, but in our striving after God to know that everything is ultimately in his hands, you know, that we can't manufacture transformation in our lives. We can't manufacture transformation in someone else's life. We're dependent on God and God is going to do it his way and in his timing and just kind of being okay with that. Not never being okay with sin, you know, like, but being okay with God's providence and resting in that gives you freedom and joy. Yeah. Yeah, well, let me close this in a word of prayer and then we will put a cap on this episode. Heavenly Father, we thank you for the great privilege it is to be your children. We thank you for the great privilege it is to have friends and we thank you for the great privilege it is to be a part of your family. God, we ask that during this year that you would help us, that you would reorient our hearts, that you would focus our attention at tending to you, that we would put our attention to you as we go about our days, as we fill spreadsheets, as we respond to emails, as we have wonderful and difficult conversations, we ask God that you would make us aware of your presence, that we would trust the slow work that you are doing in our hearts because you are trying to change us on the inside. You are reconstituting our loves, you're reorienting our hearts, you re, you're transforming our minds, Lord. And that takes time and we pray that we would trust you in that process, no matter where we are in our pilgrimage with you that we would trust you as we follow you as our guide and as the shepherd of our souls. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. Thanks for listening to this episode of the Hear Below Podcast. You can visit us online at redeemergreenville.com and you can drop us a note, a question or comment there and who knows we might use it on one of our next episodes. We do hope that this has helped you in some way in your offering in the great doxology here below. Until next time, may the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you. May the Lord lift up his glorious countenance upon you and give you his peace. Amen.