Some things that’ve spoken to me lately…
Lately it seems that God is everywhere I look. Yes, He’s always been everywhere and in everything and yet sometimes, as a weak, frail and faithless human I sometimes forget. But He said that when we seek Him we shall find him and boy have I been finding Him everywhere. Thank God for that and for the words He shared with me through various sources just this past week alone.
This is a devotional sent in the newsletter for a church I attended for a few years. I stopped attending this church several months ago but I still get the newsletter. This devotional may be one reason why. Just goes to show that God uses everything for a blessing…
“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important that food, and the body more important than clothes?...Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?” Matthew 7:25-27
This passage comes to mind often, but not because I’m good at following it. Rather, I catch myself worrying about things beyond my control and the Holy Spirit brings these verses to mind.
We all worry, and all worry is due to our sinful nature. Worry means that we fail to trust God. Worry means that we doubt God’s competence or control. Worry means we think God is doing a poor job.
The truth, though, is that we don’t have to worry. God is sovereign; he is in control. He loves us, and he will not give us more than we can handle. And though we will suffer (a painless life is not guaranteed to us, any more than it was guaranteed to our crucified and ridiculed Lord, Jesus Christ) we can be sure that our suffering has meaning.
When we grasp that truth, we can rejoice in our blessings, for they are from God. We can even rejoice in our sufferings, because God is in control and he loves us. We can be free from the tyranny of worry that plagues this fallen world in which we live.
J.D. (the pastor)
I do worry a lot more now than I used to. I used to be a carefree person letting very little stress me out. I miss those days. Days when things seemed to just take care of themselves. (when in fact it was merely God taking control.) When all the things that plague me now I was able to just shrug off and go about my business. I suppose the fact that I worry more now says a lot about where my faith is truly at with my Savior. Somewhere along the way, as I got older and life got harder, I stopped trusting fully in Him and the truth that He will always be with me and never forsake me and nothing is too big or too heavy or too hard for Him to handle.
Reading that part about worry meaning we think God is doing a poor job really shook me. I’d never ever SAY or even truly FEEL that God is doing a poor job in my life, but really, when I question Him or cry out to Him that I feel lost and abandoned that really is what I’m saying, isn’t it? That truly shakes me. Because my whole life is built around my worship and love of my sovereign God. But I realize, I am also human. And while it hurts Him, He understands.
The next two things that have spoken to me lately are quotes I receive on email from Heartlight.org.
“Our life is full of brokenness - broken relationships, broken promises, broken expectations. How can we live with that brokenness without becoming bitter and resentful except by returning again and again to God's faithful presence in our
lives.” -- Henri Nouwen
This I’ve found to be more than true. You know, I’ve said often enough that I never feel closer to God than when I’m in crisis. Each time my world is shaken I know I can turn to Him and He is always there. Kind of in contradiction with the worry, though, isn’t it? I suppose another part of being human is being fickle, right?
”Heaven is not here, it's There. If we were given all we wanted here, our hearts would settle for this world rather than the next. God is forever luring us up and away from this one, wooing us to Himself and His still invisible Kingdom, where we will certainly find what we so keenly long for”. -- Elisabeth Elliot
You know, this answers quite a bit of the “why” of the things that go wrong or things that disappoint me, though I’d have never thought of it that way on my own. And yeah, I’ve had quite a bit of disappointment in my life. Things that I wanted so badly, prayed for, reached for, longed with all my heart for and were denied me. Things that happened that shook my world, changed the face of my life and the lives around me, things I didn’t (and don’t) understand, things that hurt. But it’s easy to forget in the midst of longing that this is just a waiting place. A holding gate, if you will. I’m not meant to stay here. I have a home filled with golden streets, a mansion, a choir of angels and the very best of all, a loving Father who waits to fold me in His arms and kiss it all better.
Up There the things I long for down here will be so much nonsense because I’ll have more than I dreamed could possibly exist. Truer things. Things that perhaps I can’t touch or taste or hold but things that will live IN me. And all the things of this earth will matter no more.
Does knowing this stop me from longing for the things I long for down here? Not entirely. I’m human. I live in this world where it’s drilled into us daily that there are certain things that one must have to be accepted and normal in society. I’ll always desire those things. Or at least, I’ll believe that I desire them. But knowing that there’s more to living than what can be found here lessens the ache a bit. Eases the burden of being denied the things I thought I wanted.
And you know what else? God knows what we need and our needs are often times entirely different than what we THINK we need. This, too, is something I’m learning.
God confessed to me recently that I have everything that I asked for. Everything. It doesn’t look like what I asked for but it is. He sustains me with the blessings in my life. Blessings I overlooked because I was still searching for what I asked for and all the while it was right there in front of me. Right where I could touch it. But I couldn’t see it. A part of me still longs for the things I saw instead but I know that God’s wisdom is infinite and He and He alone fully understands my needs. And if those things my heart longs for are meant for me I will have them but in God’s time. Not mine.
And you know what? God’s time is always the perfect time. :-)
This is a devotional sent in the newsletter for a church I attended for a few years. I stopped attending this church several months ago but I still get the newsletter. This devotional may be one reason why. Just goes to show that God uses everything for a blessing…
“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important that food, and the body more important than clothes?...Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?” Matthew 7:25-27
This passage comes to mind often, but not because I’m good at following it. Rather, I catch myself worrying about things beyond my control and the Holy Spirit brings these verses to mind.
We all worry, and all worry is due to our sinful nature. Worry means that we fail to trust God. Worry means that we doubt God’s competence or control. Worry means we think God is doing a poor job.
The truth, though, is that we don’t have to worry. God is sovereign; he is in control. He loves us, and he will not give us more than we can handle. And though we will suffer (a painless life is not guaranteed to us, any more than it was guaranteed to our crucified and ridiculed Lord, Jesus Christ) we can be sure that our suffering has meaning.
When we grasp that truth, we can rejoice in our blessings, for they are from God. We can even rejoice in our sufferings, because God is in control and he loves us. We can be free from the tyranny of worry that plagues this fallen world in which we live.
J.D. (the pastor)
I do worry a lot more now than I used to. I used to be a carefree person letting very little stress me out. I miss those days. Days when things seemed to just take care of themselves. (when in fact it was merely God taking control.) When all the things that plague me now I was able to just shrug off and go about my business. I suppose the fact that I worry more now says a lot about where my faith is truly at with my Savior. Somewhere along the way, as I got older and life got harder, I stopped trusting fully in Him and the truth that He will always be with me and never forsake me and nothing is too big or too heavy or too hard for Him to handle.
Reading that part about worry meaning we think God is doing a poor job really shook me. I’d never ever SAY or even truly FEEL that God is doing a poor job in my life, but really, when I question Him or cry out to Him that I feel lost and abandoned that really is what I’m saying, isn’t it? That truly shakes me. Because my whole life is built around my worship and love of my sovereign God. But I realize, I am also human. And while it hurts Him, He understands.
The next two things that have spoken to me lately are quotes I receive on email from Heartlight.org.
“Our life is full of brokenness - broken relationships, broken promises, broken expectations. How can we live with that brokenness without becoming bitter and resentful except by returning again and again to God's faithful presence in our
lives.” -- Henri Nouwen
This I’ve found to be more than true. You know, I’ve said often enough that I never feel closer to God than when I’m in crisis. Each time my world is shaken I know I can turn to Him and He is always there. Kind of in contradiction with the worry, though, isn’t it? I suppose another part of being human is being fickle, right?
”Heaven is not here, it's There. If we were given all we wanted here, our hearts would settle for this world rather than the next. God is forever luring us up and away from this one, wooing us to Himself and His still invisible Kingdom, where we will certainly find what we so keenly long for”. -- Elisabeth Elliot
You know, this answers quite a bit of the “why” of the things that go wrong or things that disappoint me, though I’d have never thought of it that way on my own. And yeah, I’ve had quite a bit of disappointment in my life. Things that I wanted so badly, prayed for, reached for, longed with all my heart for and were denied me. Things that happened that shook my world, changed the face of my life and the lives around me, things I didn’t (and don’t) understand, things that hurt. But it’s easy to forget in the midst of longing that this is just a waiting place. A holding gate, if you will. I’m not meant to stay here. I have a home filled with golden streets, a mansion, a choir of angels and the very best of all, a loving Father who waits to fold me in His arms and kiss it all better.
Up There the things I long for down here will be so much nonsense because I’ll have more than I dreamed could possibly exist. Truer things. Things that perhaps I can’t touch or taste or hold but things that will live IN me. And all the things of this earth will matter no more.
Does knowing this stop me from longing for the things I long for down here? Not entirely. I’m human. I live in this world where it’s drilled into us daily that there are certain things that one must have to be accepted and normal in society. I’ll always desire those things. Or at least, I’ll believe that I desire them. But knowing that there’s more to living than what can be found here lessens the ache a bit. Eases the burden of being denied the things I thought I wanted.
And you know what else? God knows what we need and our needs are often times entirely different than what we THINK we need. This, too, is something I’m learning.
God confessed to me recently that I have everything that I asked for. Everything. It doesn’t look like what I asked for but it is. He sustains me with the blessings in my life. Blessings I overlooked because I was still searching for what I asked for and all the while it was right there in front of me. Right where I could touch it. But I couldn’t see it. A part of me still longs for the things I saw instead but I know that God’s wisdom is infinite and He and He alone fully understands my needs. And if those things my heart longs for are meant for me I will have them but in God’s time. Not mine.
And you know what? God’s time is always the perfect time. :-)
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