For when I am weak, then am I strong. Hebrews 12:10b

This verse has always been a struggle for me. I don't like being thought of as weak. I like to be able to "carry my weight." Yet it seems more and more I am weak. I have fibromyalgia. There are days when my arms and legs hurt so badly, it hurts to move. Today is one of those days.

But today my reading was in 2 Corinthians 12. Paul states, "That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weakness, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong." I don't know of ANYONE who would like to delight in any of those things. Those are the things we try to avoid at all costs. Yet it was Christ's own command for us to "take up your cross and follow Me." Funny how I've just connected the dots and seen taking up the cross does mean weakness, insults, hardships, persecutions and difficulties. 

Christianity does not seem to be for the weak, but yet it is. Because it is ONLY in the power of Christ that we can truly walk. And that's where the world sees the difference. How can we as followers of Christ carry on if we are truly experiencing weakness, insult, hardship, persecution and difficulties? Only by the grace and mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ. Am I letting the world see me as weak so that Christ can work?

So the talk is good - but what is the practical. As I began my reading this morning, the Lord gave me the thought: When am I doing the greatest battle with the enemy? When I am down on my knees praying. On days like these I can't do a whole lot of reaching the world, BUT I can pray. And there is no power on heaven or on earth that can stop that. And my God is such a faithful God Who will answer. Am I weak? Absolutely. But He still chooses to use me in the battle for souls and that's all that really matters. Not that I'm used, but that the battle continues so that others may come to know Christ as Saviour. 

So I delight in my weakness so that I may pray.

God is in Control

It is two days after the election and like 50% of the American people, I am a little disappointed. My candidate did not make it to the White House. But my prayer for the day had been, "Father, please put into office whoever would be best so that You may be gracious and merciful to the US."

Tuesday evening before I went to sleep I read from the devotional book Moments of Peace for a Woman's Heart. This just happened to be my reading for that day:

HE WILL NEVER FAIL YOU
Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for He Who promised is faithful.

Hebrews 10:23 NIV  

All people fail at one time or another. The best-laid plans can come up short. God will never fail you. He is the one constant in your life that you can trust, utterly and without reservation. 

You won't have to wonder if He'll be there tomorrow or if He will still love you. He will. You can count on that and on all the other promises God has made to you in the Bible - more than 5,000 in all. Though He may not do things in the way you expect, you can be certain that He will never, ever let you down. He is faithful.

The Lord is faithful in all His words, and gracious in all His deeds.

Psalm 145:13 NRSV

His timing for devotions never ceases to amaze me. This little book does not have dates in it so that you are to read them on certain days. Nor did I start this at the beginning of the year. It was actually a gift from my daughter who thought I might need it while she is serving the Lord in Asia for 3 months. I could not have planned for this reading for Election Day; no one could. Only God could. He knew it was exactly what I needed to hear from Him so that I might be reassured.

Do I believe that God answered my prayer? ABSOLUTELY! AND I believe He answered yes to my prayer. I believe that the man put in the White House is the one God will use to be gracious and merciful to the US. The thing that I am realizing is that it may not be in the way I thought it should be.

I believe the true Christians are going to have to take more serious stands about what they believe. We are going to have to truly start loving our neighbours as ourselves. But even more importantly we are going to have to truly begin to love the Lord our God with our WHOLE hearts, and souls and minds. We must give up on the idea that we have rights. We are NOT OUR OWN. We were bought with a price.

Christ never promised an easy way. He said, "Take up your cross and follow Me." He did promise peace and joy and rivers of abundant life. The question is: Am I willing to take up that cross?  He will more than fully answer with His peace, joy and life. And from that I will see God being gracious and merciful t the US.

On Holy Ground

I am going through the daily devotional Jesus Calling by Sarah Young. There are some days where she writes and I really have to stop and think about it, like this morning. Here's what she wrote:

Learn to listen to Me even while you are listening to other people. As they open their souls to your scrutiny, you are on holy ground. You need the help of My Spirit to respond appropriately. Ask Him to think through you, live through you, love through you. My own Being is alive within you in the Person of the the Holy Spirit. If you respond to others' needs through your unaided thought processes, you offer them dry crumbs. When the Spirit empowers your listening and speaking, My streams of living water flow through you to other people. Be a channel of My Love, Joy and Peace by listening to Me as you listen to others.

I never considered myself on holy ground just because I was talking to someone else. I usually don't consider myself to be "ministering" to someone unless I've specifically determined I want to talk to them about spiritual things. Usually a conversation is just something that happens; I might pray that God would keep my mouth shut about things I don't need to talk about. But holy ground?

I appreciate when people are open and honest. When I ask someone how they are doing, I really want to know. If they answer with fine and they look fine, I take them at their word. I do scrutinize them. It never occurred to me they were opening up their souls. There is one friend I meet with on a regular basis and we do open up to each other. But all people opening their souls just because they are talking to me?

I'm realizing that I don't truly believe God has Divine Appointments because if I did I would realize they are continuously happening. My life is not just a random chaos, but a serious plan that Someone has thought through so that I could bring Him glory.

I am ashamed to admit that many a time I have offered dry crumbs, never considering that the Lord Jesus was serious when He talked about the streams of living water flowing through me. Though I benefit from those streams and I shall never thirst, the point is THEY FLOW THROUGH ME. They are to flow through me to reach others and bring healing to them.

I pray that I might be changed more and more to be so aware and dependent on Him that no one has to get dry crumbs from me anymore and that I would know the place He has me is holy ground.

 

An Eternal Kingdom

This morning I was reading in Daniel chapter 4 and a phrase struck me. in verse 3, King Nebuchadnezzar is speaking and he says this, "How great are His signs, how mighty His wonders! His kingdom is an eternal kingdom; His dominion endures from generation to generation." The phrase that struck me is "an eternal kingdom."

I have always been taught and do believe that God is in complete control. I have no problem with that. It's actually a very comforting statement to me. BUT an eternal kingdom? I have known He is King of kings and LORD of lords, but that His kingdom is eternal?

An eternal kingdom is one that has no end but one that has no beginning. I think of the Millennial Kingdom when Christ will reign on earth for a thousand years. That will begin after He has returned to earth. But I think I've been looking at it all wrong.

He is reigning and has been reigning and will continue to reign His kingdom for all of eternity. Looking at my King who is now allowing people (including me) to live their lives the way they want, even if it offends Him or hurts Him. Why? So that we might truly see the Great and Gracious God He is. So that we might know Him in a more intimate way. But do we want that?

People may ask, "Why does He allow people to die or get sick or hurt? Why doesn't He just show Himself for Who He is and then we'll believe. And then we wouldn't have all the suffering and pain." This God could do those very things, but then we could never know Him the way He really needs to be known. And even if He did take away those things and show Himself, people still wouldn't believe. Jesus Christ, being fully God, did that on this earth and they crucified Him.

I am greatly comforted this morning knowing that God's kingdom is eternal. I can rest in knowing that He has been and is and will continue to be in perfect control of His kingdom. And one day I'm going to see Him face to face and reign with Him. I can't wait for that day!!!

Seeing Me Again

As reading through Oswald Chambers My Utmost for His Highest, I came across this statement, "Watch the kind of people God brings around you, and you will be humiliated to find that this is His way of revealing to you the kind of person you have been to Him." For the past few days I've been very upset with my daughter's friend. This girl has continuously missed appointments, not returned calls, and then when my daughter is leaving the country has the gall to act like she didn't know the date when in fact she had been invited to the going away party 2 days earlier. My daughter's feeling have been constantly hurt and when she's tried to point it out, the girl manages to turn the situation around, make it my daughter's fault and my daughter ends up feeling guilty. As you can see I'm not really fond of her and very upset with her.

Now after pouring that out and reflecting upon Oswald Chambers' statement, I begin to see something else. I do this with God. I have missed many appointments with God. I've not returned His calls and yes, He does call. He's invited me to special meetings with Him and I can come up with excuses very easily to miss those meetings. I find it very easy to make excuses and even sometimes blame Him for situations. I know God does not feel guilty but I do know I hurt Him. 

And now I'm very ashamed. Ashamed for the way I've been feeling about this girl - not that I excuse her for what she's done, but ashamed for the way I've been reacting to her. That is not my Father's way. But even more ashamed for the way I've treated my Father. Sometimes coming to a place where we see we are wrong is so difficult, but we need to so that we can be right with our God. It's time for me to get it right with Him.

Seeing Me

Today as I was reading in Ezekiel, it hit me how God continuously brought up the fact that Israel offered their children to their idols. I began to look at North America in a different light. What is an idol? Anything that takes the place of God in a person's heart. Here in NA each of us as individuals have done this. Our idols are ourselves. Unfortunately, we have also been sacrificing our children to these idols. How you may ask? Every time an abortion is performed we have put self as an idol and made that child the sacrifice for that idol. How God's heart must be breaking centuries after the Israelites were condemned for what they had done. We don't even give the child the chance to breath; no, we are too important for that. May God convict us of our selfishness and pride to presume to replace Him and that we may stop these sacrifices. They are much too precious and we ourselves are of way too little value.