Devotional thoughts - Lent 2013 - Day 14

Early this morning, I kept thinking of the refrain from the song Your Love Never Fails by Jesus Culture – a restatement of part of Romans 8:28 sung as:  “You make, all things, work together for my good.”  Then there was this quote by Oswald Chambers as I was reading My Utmost for His Highest devotional (www.utmost.org) :

There is nothing, naturally speaking, that makes us lose heart quicker than decay—the decay of bodily beauty, of natural life, of friendship, of associations, all these things make a man lose heart; but Paul says when we are trusting in Jesus Christ these things do not find us discouraged, light comes through them. The Place of Help, 1032 L

This quote brings to mind the first verse of Psalm 23:

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

Trusting God in Jesus Christ (or not!) is also addressed in the My Utmost for His Highest devotional:

We say, “It’s easy to say, ’Trust in the Lord,’ but a person has to live; and besides, Jesus has nothing with which to draw water— no means to be able to give us these things.” And beware of exhibiting religious deceit by saying, “Oh, I have no misgivings about Jesus, only misgivings about myself.” If we are honest, we will admit that we never have misgivings or doubts about ourselves, because we know exactly what we are capable or incapable of doing. But we do have misgivings about Jesus. And our pride is hurt even at the thought that He can do what we can’t.

My misgivings arise from the fact that I search within to find how He will do what He says. My doubts spring from the depths of my own inferiority. If I detect these misgivings in myself, I should bring them into the light and confess them openly— “Lord, I have had misgivings about You. I have not believed in Your abilities, but only my own. And I have not believed in Your almighty power apart from my finite understanding of it.”

The God Calling devotional (www.twolisteners.org) gives encouragement and instruction to build our confidence in trusting God for our help:

There is nothing lacking in your lives because really all is yours, only you lack the faith to know it. You are like a King's daughters who sit in rags, and yet around them are stores of all they could desire.

Pray for more faith, as a thirsty man in a desert prays for rain, for water. Swift comes My help, swift and strong. Do you know what it is to feel sure that I can never fail you? As sure as you are that you still breathe? How poor his man's faith! So poor. Do you trust Me as much as you would a friend if that friend came and said he would send you help? Pray daily and most diligently that your faith may increase.

"If ye had faith as a grain of mustard seed, you might say unto this sycamore tree,
Be thou plucked up by the root, and be thou planted in the
sea; and it should obey you." Luke 17:6

Back to the song – the end from the beginning – and thinking about 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 (AMP) - God's love never fails:

⁴ Love endures long and is patient and kind; love never is envious nor boils over with jealousy, is not boastful or vainglorious, does not display itself haughtily.

⁵ It is not conceited (arrogant and inflated with pride); it is not rude (unmannerly) and does not act unbecomingly. Love (God’s love in us) does not insist on its own rights or its own way, for it is not self-seeking; it is not touchy or fretful or resentful; it takes no account of the evil done to it [it pays no attention to a suffered wrong].

⁶ It does not rejoice at injustice and unrighteousness, but rejoices when right and truth prevail.

⁷ Love bears up under anything and everything that comes, is ever ready to believe the best of every person, its hopes are fadeless under all circumstances, and it endures everything [without weakening].

⁸ Love never fails [never fades out or becomes obsolete or comes to an end]. As for prophecy (the gift of interpreting the divine will and purpose), it will be fulfilled and pass away; as for tongues, they will be destroyed and cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away [it will lose its value and be superseded by truth].

… and my journey with Him continues …

Devotional thoughts - Lent 2013 - Day 11

I neglected to write part of the story yesterday in detailing the freedom I experienced from my “woundedness.”  I had also been thinking about the quality and nature of the pain I was in because of my hurt feelings.  The pain that I felt in a physical fashion was from a wound that I could do nothing about physically.  In the natural, there was no hospital or doctor’s office to visit, no (medical) doctor to see, no bandage to apply, no bone to set, no medicine to take, no joint to brace, no ointment to slather on, nothing at which to look or touch.  I marveled at the way we are created – “fearfully and wonderfully made” (Psalm 139:14) - where an emotional wound could cause me to experience pain so similar to a physical wound, with no physical evidence at all that the damage exists.

In the midst of my wonder, it was as if I were being directed to “get rid of all bitterness and wrath.”  I had to confess that I didn’t quite know how to do that.  Then it was as if I saw myself holding a coat I was wearing wide open as I faced the sun.  I remembered reading something the other day about some sick people being brought out into the sun as treatment for their ailment.  And it was as if I heard or thought, “The Sun of Righteousness with healing in His wings.”

So today’s God Calling devotional (www.twolisteners.org) was a confirmation of the healing and deliverance I experienced, saying:

Live outside whenever possible. Sun and air are My great healing forces, and that inward Joy that changes poisoned blood to a pure healthy life-giving flow.

Never forget that real healing of body, mind, and Spirit comes from within, from the close loving contact of your spirit with My Spirit.

"But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun
of righteousness arise with healing in his wings." Malachi 4:2

 

The Our Daily Bread devotional (www.odb.org) challenged me to trust God even in my pain:

In the midst of life’s pain, we need the personal care of the Savior who lived in this world and experienced the same struggles we face. Hebrews 4:15 encourages us: “For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin.” Christ, who died to give us life, is completely sufficient to carry us through our heartaches and dark experiences. He has “borne our griefs and carried our sorrows” (Isa. 53:4).

Jesus knows there is no simple “recipe” to prevent the heartaches of life, so He entered into them with us. Will we trust Him with our tears and grief?

A continued call to serve God through serving others - even the ones who hurt you, no matter the pain (even of hurt feelings) – seems to issue from the My Utmost for His Highest devotional (www.utmost.org) as it says, in part:

If our devotion is to the cause of humanity, we will be quickly defeated and broken-hearted, since we will often be confronted with a great deal of ingratitude from other people. But if we are motivated by our love for God, no amount of ingratitude will be able to hinder us from serving one another.  …

Once we realize that Jesus has served us even to the depths of our meagerness, our selfishness, and our sin, nothing we encounter from others will be able to exhaust our determination to serve others for His sake.

I must confess that I struggle with why my hurt feelings even caused me such angst.

Hebrews 12:1-4

Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,

² Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.

³ For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.

⁴ Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin.

But for now, listening to the song “Who You Are” by the group Unspoken, I just pray to grow in this grace:

Ephesians 4:30-32

³⁰ And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.

³¹ Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice:

³² And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.

… and my journey with Him continues …

That’s Not Your Testimony

Songs: Trust in Him – Clark Sisters w/ Rance Allen (http://www.imeem.com/artists/the_clark_sisters/music/TCwsSNHJ/the-clark-sisters-trust-in-him-remastered-version/)
I Love the Lord – Richard Smallwood

Scriptures: Revelation 12:11

Good News Translation (GNT)

11 They won the victory over him by the blood of the Lamb and by the truth which they proclaimed; and they were willing to give up their lives and die.

New King James Version (NKJV)

11 And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives to the death.

New International Version (NIV)

11They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death.

Amplified Bible (AMP)

11And they have overcome (conquered) him by means of the blood of the Lamb and by the utterance of their testimony, for they did not love and cling to life even when faced with death [holding their lives cheap till they had to die for their witnessing].

Isaiah 1:18 (KJV)

Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.

I was reminded recently of when God spoke to me a couple of years ago about the uniqueness of my testimony …

At the church I was attending, an initiative was going on one month where the goal was to get 100% of the congregation to tithe. I had a temporary job, and was grateful for the resources from which to give my 10%. I was telling the Lord so when I seemed to sense He wanted me to tithe 100% of the money I was earning. I quickly replied that the church didn’t mean for us to tithe 100% - they wanted 100% of the members to tithe 10%. Just as quickly, He replied:

I know what they mean; you know what I said.

So, I gave 100% of the money I earned for that period until my job ran out. In talking with one of the church’s officers, I shared what I had been instructed to do, and his reply was something like, “I can’t wait to see what the Lord is doing with this. Maybe you will share your testimony later.”

One Sunday soon after that conversation, a woman in church was invited to give her testimony as to what God was doing in her life because of her obedience during that time in the area of tithing. She stated that God had asked her to tithe 100% of her earnings. I must admit that I was glad to know that I wasn’t the only one hearing that from Him. When she obeyed (like me, after some further conversation and clarification), she told of how she got this huge, unexpected windfall of money, and how material blessings just seemed to be multiplying in her life. I was about to get excited, thinking of all I wanted Him to do for me financially when I sensed His correction:

That’s not your testimony.

I must admit, that was not what I wanted to hear. But He reminded me of other occasions, other lessons:

1. …of the time in church during one Bible study, when discussion had centered on whether God causes or allows things (especially “bad” things) to happen to us. He had challenged me with a question regarding a woman who shared that she had cancer and felt that her purpose in life was to help others with cancer.

If her having the cancer would aid in and advance her purpose of helping others with cancer, would I not have caused it?

2. …of the time when I was watching a television program where the pastor speaking was making the statement that if you did what they did you could have what they had. God had posed a question to remind me of the individual nature of His blessings.

If what they have is for their purpose, and would be a hindrance to you in yours, why would I give it to you? It is true; I am not a respecter of persons, but I am a respecter of purpose.

3. He reminded me from His Word about the dangers of comparing ourselves with one another:

2 Corinthians 10:12-13 (New International Version)

12We do not dare to classify or compare ourselves with some who commend themselves. When they measure themselves by themselves and compare themselves with themselves, they are not wise. 13We, however, will not boast beyond proper limits, but will confine our boasting to the field God has assigned to us, a field that reaches even to you.

Galatians 6:4 (New Century Version)

Each person should judge his own actions and not compare himself with others. Then he can be proud for what he himself has done.

4. He reminded me from His Word about the differences He allows:

Hebrews 11:32-40 (Amplified Bible)

32And what shall I say further? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets,
33Who by [the help of] faith subdued kingdoms, administered justice, obtained promised blessings, closed the mouths of lions,
34Extinguished the power of raging fire, escaped the devourings of the sword, out of frailty and weakness won strength and became stalwart, even mighty and resistless in battle, routing alien hosts.
35[Some] women received again their dead by a resurrection. Others were tortured to death with clubs, refusing to accept release [offered on the terms of denying their faith], so that they might be resurrected to a better life. [I Kings 17:17-24; II Kings 4:25-37.]
36Others had to suffer the trial of mocking and scourging and even chains and imprisonment.
37They were stoned to death; they were lured with tempting offers [to renounce their faith]; they were sawn asunder; they were slaughtered by the sword; [while they were alive] they had to go about wrapped in the skins of sheep and goats, utterly destitute, oppressed, cruelly treated--
38[Men] of whom the world was not worthy--roaming over the desolate places and the mountains, and [living] in caves and caverns and holes of the earth.
39And all of these, though they won divine approval by [means of] their faith, did not receive the fulfillment of what was promised,
40Because God had us in mind and had something better and greater in view for us, so that they [these heroes and heroines of faith] should not come to perfection apart from us [before we could join them].

“Okay, okay,” I said, “I get it.” In His mercy, He wanted to make sure I did (get it). When I got home that day and turned on the television, there was another television pastor ministering, saying that he had heard from people who told of how God had miraculously met their needs, but he wanted to hear the testimonies of those where it seemed like their needs had not been met – the money, the healing, the “whatever they needed and had been believing God for” had not come. Then, in the next couple of days, I got a newsletter from a ministry where the pastor was speaking of so many who felt abandoned by or were disappointed with God because of what they were going through.

Isaiah 55:8-9 (Amplified Bible)

8For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, says the Lord.
9For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.

So now I just trust that God knows best, is working all things together for my good, hears and answers my prayers in the best way for His glory to be manifest in my life. He knows my true needs, regardless of the circumstances and how things seem to me.

Romans 8:32 (New King James Version)

32 He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?

Father God, I pray that I would grow in (the) grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. To Him be all glory both now and forever. Amen.

... and my journey with Him continues ...