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“Rejoice Always? Really?!!”

Rejoice

Have you ever had the thought, “How can I really be joyful in this life?  There is so much sorrow so how can I have so much sorrow and really rejoice?”  It is hard to understand how sorrow and joy can coincide but they really can.  We cannot do it in and of ourselves.  It is only as we allow the Lord to have full access to our lives that we can rejoice through it all.

What we see

We see so little compared to what God sees.  We may listen to the news and hear all the evils that are transpiring in this world.  But we see so little compared to what God sees.  He sees it all.

I am going to veer off here for a few sentences.  May I suggest that listening to the news is nonproductive?  I don’t listen, read, or watch the news.  There may be little snippets I see posted on Facebook or someone may mention to me, “Did you hear….?”  I usually haven’t heard so they give me a little run down.  Sometimes I check it out further but for the most part, I don’t.  What does it gain us in our spiritual walk to focus on the wickedness of this world?  It is discouraging and can suck the joy out of life.  How many people are depressed and angry because of what they dwell upon?  We have got to keep our focus where it belongs.   Our focus should be on having a solid connection with God and then be a witness for Him through our lives.

God sees

God sees all the wickedness of this world but He is also rejoicing, “over one sinner that repenteth.”  And yet it pains His heart every time we don’t accept His ways and choose the wicked things of this world to fill our lives.  The wicked things can be filling our lives as we do them or it can be filling our lives as we vicariously take part.

Philippians 4:8 “Finally, brethren whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.”

If we would make this our Motto in life it would make a difference.  Just because it is claimed to be “true” doesn’t mean it is of “good report”.  When I think of the news there is so much bent to what is said you never really do know what is true.  It is all bent to whatever political party they represent.  Well, I want to represent the “political” party of Jesus.  I want to be like Christ.

Prepare

The only way that we can be like Christ is to be prepared.  We need to be in the God’s Word and in prayer.  As we are in the word we need to be storing it in our hearts by putting it to memory.  This is the only way we will be able to rejoice through all circumstances.

This reminds me of a story that was shared with me.  It was about two men that climbed a mountain together.  It was a dangerous mountain.  The mountain was steep with rock climbing as well as ice climbing.  The mountain was also higher elevation.  It was dangerous with lots of crevasses as well.  I don’t remember how many days it took to make it to the top but they did make it.

The descent

The difficulty came on their descent.  One of them, when going slowly down through the snow stepped in a spot that sent him over the edge.  He broke his leg majorly.  They came up with a plan of how they could get down.  His friend would get well positioned and then lower him 300’, then he would station himself and his friend would follow.  It was a very painful thing for him to be lowered but it was life or death.  His friend couldn’t “care” about his screams of pain he just had to keep lower him.

Then came the time that his friend lowered him and he dropped over a cliff and was hanging and he could not get to the ledge to get well established so his friend could descend.  They were too far apart to communicate so they both waited in the dangerously cold night.  I don’t remember how long his friend waited but he eventually had to make the hardest decision of a person’s life.  He had to decide to cut the rope.  It was now life or death for himself.  He could not survive if he did not keep moving down.

It was so hard to arrive back at camp, where there was another guy waiting for them.  He explained what had happened.  He was in such bad shape himself with frostbite and exhaustion, besides the emotional trauma.  The guy that had remained at the camp felt they should go from base camp down right away but he could not get him to leave.

Falling

When the rope was cut loose the guy on the other end fell into a crevasse.  Surprisingly,  he survived the fall but now what.  He had a lot of rope but what good is that when you have a broken leg.  He anchored himself so he wouldn’t fall farther and called for help but there was no answer.  After a while, he decided to lower himself into the crevasse more to see if there was another way out because he had tried to climb up but with his broken leg he could not.

As he lowered himself he found a spot that was a gradually going up vertically and he was able to crawl out of the crevasse.  It was very painful, and took great effort and several days, with no food or much water to make it back to camp.  What he did not know is when he got to camp would there be anyone there.  But thankfully when he did make it back to camp his friend was still there and his life was spared.  It was nothing more than miraculous.  We have such a drive to live that we will push our bodies beyond the limit in an effort to survive and live.

Do you want to live?

As I have thought of this story it made me think about eternal life.  It actually brought tears to my eyes thinking about it.  We will put so much effort into surviving in this life but how much effort do we put into surviving for eternal life.

Having eternal life is a life and death situation.  How much privation are we willing to endure to survive.  Our spiritual bodies are broken and it is painful but how much effort are we willing to make no matter how much pain or privation it causes.  Are we willing to give up those things that will keep us from having eternal life?  Are we agonizing with God to the point of our sweat being “as great drops of blood” like Jesus did?  Do we want to live?  How much effort are we willing to make?

There will come a time that all our human resources will be cut off and it will be up to us to choose the right things and make the right choices.  We will be alone.  Some of us may even be alone at this moment in our choices to live.  There will come a time ahead of us that we will no longer have “food” (God’s Word) to nourish our spiritual bodies.  There will come a time when “water” will be scarce.  Are we filling ourselves with “food” (God’s Word) right now so that when the time comes we will be sustained?

Grim

You might be saying about now, “I thought you were talking about rejoicing, this sounds grim.”  It may sound grim.  But I can tell you from experience that as I surrender all to the Lord and walk side by side with Him, filling my life with His Word, it brings joy.  I can rejoice through the trials, privations, and hardships.  But if I dwell or get involved with the things of this world, joy fades away.

No matter what we may be going through as long as we are surrendered to God we can know that it will all work for our good.  In this, we can rejoice.

Dear Father,

Help us to see our need for You in our lives.  You are the only One that can give us peace and joy, as we surrender to Your will.  Continue to show us the way.  Thank You for Your patience with us.

In Jesus Name,

Amen

Surrender all to God today.  Keep your focus on Him and fill your mind with His Word.

Love you all.

What do you do to help keep joy in your life?

 

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“Travel Carefully!!”

Travel Carefully

For those of us who live in certain places around the world, we have snow this time of the year.  I love the beauty of the snow. It covers all the imperfections.  Although the beauty is wonderful the roads are another story.  The roads can be icy and very slippery, especially when you get off the main road.  The main roads are kept clear by the graders and the salt that they put on the roads to melt the ice.  But even the main roads, at times, are treacherous.

One day I was on my way to work on more treacherous roads.  One vehicle in front of me slid and ended up in the oncoming traffic with an emergency vehicle heading his way.  At the same time, a pickup truck ended up in the ditch to my right.  He drove along the ditch for a while before he was able to make his way out of the ditch.  I am grateful that there was no serious accident and no one was hurt.

More than one road

This experience made me think of the Christian walk.  The beauty of the snow reminds me of the righteousness of Christ.  As we repent of our wrongdoings Christ righteousness covers us and makes us as “white as snow” (See Isaiah 1:18).

As we travel on the “main road” at times it can get slippery if we are not keeping it sprinkled with the salt of God’s Word.  There are times that we slip and slide and even go into the “oncoming traffic” going in the wrong direction but all we need to do is cry out to God in repentance and He will get us immediately back on the road.  At other times we may completely slide off the “road” into the ditch and we go along like everything is just fine.  But praise be to God He gets a hold of us and He makes a way of escape and we are able to get right out of the ditch. He doesn’t force us, He waits until we cry out to Him and then He helps pulls us up.

Trials and persecutions

As we travel this road we will have trials and persecutions along the way.  But as long as we keep our eyes fixed on Jesus He will see us through.  We don’t need to grumble or complain we just need to trust.  And as we trust in Him we will be able to rejoice.

Matthew 5: 10-12,  “Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.  Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake.  Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.”

1 Thessalonians 5:18,  “In everything give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.”

It can be so difficult to give thanks and have joy in our heart during times of trial and/or persecution.  But if we put our full trust in God He will give us joy.

Dear Father,

Thank You for Your Word that can keep us from “slipping”.  Help us to cling to those promises when the trials and/or persecutions come.  Thank You that we can trust You and that You will bring us through every difficulty.  Your love is unbounded for which I am grateful.

In Jesus Name,

Amen

Come to Jesus today, He is calling You.  Trust Him with your life.  He will work out every circumstance for You good. (See Romans 8:28)

Love you all.

I love how God is revealed in nature and He can show us connections between nature and our Christian walk.  What has He showed you today?  I would love to hear your story.  Share your story below in the comments.

 

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“Meekness or Anger?”

Meekness or anger

These two words are the opposite of each other.  You cannot be meek and angry at the same time.  As Christians is there ever a time for anger?  This seems to always be the question.  And there are reasons, or I should say excuses, that we always come up with.  Someone may say, “Well, there is righteous indignation!”  And that is true but I believe our natural nature has a hard time portraying a righteous anger.  We tend to have a violent anger or a silent anger that is jabbing.

What about Jesus?

There are many people who look at the story of Jesus cleansing the temple of money changers and say, “Now there is righteous anger.”  And yes I can agree.  But how Christians tend to portray the story of the cleansing of the temple is a violent anger.  I don’t believe that Christ did it in a violent way.  I believe He did it with tears in His eyes and voice.  He was sorrowing over Jerusalem. (See Luke 19:41-48)

No one feels comfortable and safe with a violent angry person, especially children.  And the children were not afraid.  Jesus was meek.

Matthew 21:12-16

“And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the money changers, and the seats of them that sold doves, And said unto them, It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves. And the blind and the lame came to him in the temple; and he healed them. And when the chief priests and scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children crying in the temple, and saying, Hosanna to the Son of David; they were sore displeased, And said unto him, Hearest thou what these say? And Jesus saith unto them, Yea; have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise?”

Anger

When I looked up anger in the Strong’s Concordance, it said anger is a natural disposition, temper, and character.  It is movement or agitation of the soul, impulse desire, any violent emotion but especially anger.  In the regular dictionary, one thing it said was, feeling or showing anger or strong resentment.

When I think of anger I tend to think about characteristics, like yelling, destruction, thinking of one’s self and not others.  The atmosphere is anything but relaxed.  There is tension and everyone feels uncomfortable.  “A wrathful man stirreth up strife: but he that is slow to anger appeaseth strife.”  Proverbs. 15:18

The “rewards” that come from anger reminds me of the story of Moses.  God had told him to speak to the rock, for water to come forth for the people and in his anger, he struck the rock.  God did not allow him to go into the Promised Land. (See Numbers 20:7-12) Our anger will keep us out of the Promised Land, Heaven.

Meekness

When I was looking up meekness in the Strong’s Concordance there were many things that I could glean but this is the one I chose.  “Mildness of disposition, a gentleness of spirit.  Meekness toward God is that disposition of spirit in which we accept His dealings with us as good and therefore without disputing or resisting.”

If we totally trust and accept His dealings we never have a reason to get angry.  But it is not easy and we can’t do it without His help.  When I think of meekness I think of someone who is not swayed in any way to the things that happen to them.  They are on an even keel.  This is what is pleasing to God.  “But let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price” 1Peter 3:4.

The rewards for meekness are worth it all.  “Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth” Matthew 5:5.  “But the meek shall inherit the earth; and shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace” Psalms 37:11.  I want to have meekness instead of anger.  How about you?

In what ways can I show meekness?

When I think of meekness I think of how I answer anything with the knowledge that I have, whether it be spiritual knowledge or any other knowledge.  Do I do it in a humble way, in a “know it all” way, or even in anger?  “But sanctify the Lord in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear.  Having a good conscience; that, whereas they speak evil of you, as of evildoers, they may be ashamed that falsely accuse your good conversation in Christ.  For it is better, if the will of God be so, that ye suffer for well doing than for evil doing” 1Peter 3:15-17.

Dear Father,

Help us to do things with meekness.  Having anger and a know it all spirit is natural to our human nature but we want You to come in and change us.  Thank you for Your Grace that has the power to change us.

In Jesus Name,

Amen

Surrender all to Jesus today so that He can fill you with the spirit of meekness.

Love you all.

What are your thoughts?  Have you had an experience where God has given you a meek spirit?  I would love to hear your story about how God has worked in your life.

 

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“Designated Driver”

Designated Driver

When you hear this term your mind probably immediately goes to someone drinking or doing drugs and their mind does not think clearly or even fast enough to drive.  But in this blog, I am going to be talking about this term in a different way.

One thing that I struggle with personally is falling asleep while driving.  This is not a very good thing to have happen.  I have tried different things to help me but alas they don’t work, I only have one answer.  Yes, it is true that I could drink caffeine but the damage it does to my body is not worth it to me.  I had to find other answers.  There are many little tricks that I can do but the one that works the most is communication.

Communication

One of the things that have helped me when I am driving to stay awake is communication.  My mom will often come with me and we will communicate back and forth and it keeps me alert. Now it has to be a two-way conversation because if my mom were doing all the talking I would still have trouble staying awake.  There have been times in the past where I am having such difficulty that I will stop and let her take over the driving.  As I sit in the passenger’s seat I no longer feel the pressure to stay awake.  I can be in full conversation and even be talking myself and I fall asleep in mid-sentence.

Woke up by a semi

I have never had this happen but imagine yourself driving down the road having a struggle falling asleep at the wheel.  Your mind does not even think about the realization of your situation.  All you can think about is just relaxing and sleeping.  But suddenly you hear a horn blow and you look up and see a semi-truck coming at you.  You are no longer thinking of sleeping.  You are suddenly fully awake and swerve just in time to miss the semi-truck.  The adrenalin is running now and you are fully awake.  But as you drive on it start to not seem so worrisome to you anymore.  The drowsiness starts in again and you don’t feel the urgency to even worry about it.

You need a designated driver

It makes me think of the Christian road.  We “drive” along the road of life and things seem to get monotonous.  At that point, we start to get drowsy.  We keep on going along having conversations with God but tending to talk more than we listen.  As we keep talking the activeness of our minds become inebriated with ourselves.  And eventually, we start falling asleep to the reality around us.  All we care about is us.  We find ourselves drifting and a “semi-truck” is heading right for us and unless we veer back onto the right path we will be destroyed with selfishness.

The time has come, we need to “pullover” and allow the Lord be the “driver” in our lives.  We need to surrender all to Him.  He knows “road” very well, with all its potholes, curves, and supposed detours.  And as long as we allow Him to do the “driving”, He will navigate through all these things without a problem.

As He becomes our “designated” driver, He will change our lives so that we will no longer be inebriated with self.  But He does not force Himself in, we have to give Him the wheel.  And as soon as we don’t like the direction our lives are going and we grab that wheel back, He will give it to us.

Right decisions

There is a difference between my driving and allowing my mom to drive and Jesus being a spiritual driver.  He always needs to be in the driver’s seat and we better not relax and fall asleep.  We need to stay in active communication with Jesus and keep our minds active with making the right decisions.

If a “detour” comes up Jesus is not going to choose the right direction for us, we have to consent for Him to continue, “driving” or He will give us back the “wheel”.  We have to make the decision; He will not make it for us.  It is so easy to take the wheel of our lives back in any given situation.  “I want to get angry, He had no right to do that to me.”  I just took the wheel back.  Jesus will not force me to follow His ways.  But if I say, Lord, I am struggling with being angry I need you to continue, “driving” and I am going to choose to not be angry with Your power.”  He will give you the strength and He will stay in the driver’s seat.

“It’s too good to be true”

It sounds easy on paper but letting go of self and letting Jesus have full control is not easy.  This will take great effort.  We will have a battle with self.  It may take crying out to God on your knees, wrestling with self.  But the great news is, as long as we keep hanging on to Jesus, allowing Him full access to our lives, we can have the victory.  Hang on to the promises of God.

Hebrews 13:5,  “Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have:  for he hath said, ‘I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.’  So that we may boldly say, ‘The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me.”

God says we don’t have to have fear because He will help us.

Dear Father,

I want You to be the “driver” of my life, through the indwelling of Your Spirit.  Thank You for Your love for me.  And even if I fail and take back the wheel, You are just a call away.  Thank You for Your willingness to forgive.

In Jesus Name,

Amen

Surrender all to Jesus today and let Him be the “driver” in your life.

Love you all.

I would love to hear your thoughts.  Is there an area that you have struggled with?  How did God give you the victory?