Today’s thought is timely. It is taken from Eugene’s Peterson’s modern translation, The Message (MSG). “10 So, rebel-kings, use your heads; Upstart-judges, learn your lesson: 11 Worship God in adoring embrace, Celebrate in trembling awe. 12 Kiss Messiah! Your very lives are in danger, you know; His anger is about to explode, But if you make a run for God—you won’t regret it!” (Psalm 2:10-12 MSG).
Warnings are everywhere these days. Here are a few examples to lighten your day: On a Sears hair-dryer: "Do not use while sleeping." On a bag of Fritos: "You could be a winner! No purchase necessary. Details inside." On Tesco's Tiramisu dessert (printed on bottom): "Do not turn upside down." On packaging for a Rowenta iron: "Do not iron clothes on body." On Boot's Children Cough Medicine: "Do not drive a car or operate machinery after taking this medication.” On Sunsbury's peanuts: "Warning: contains nuts." On a Swedish chainsaw: "Do not attempt to stop chain with your hands." You got to smile. Sadly, these warning labels are on these products for a reason! I saw one hair-dryer that warned, “Do not use in shower.”
We laugh at things like this, but the reason they are on these products is because we live in a litigatious society. I am amazed at the various court cases in this country that have awarded huge cash settlements to people who were injured doing dumb things. A children’s Halloween superman costume contained this warning: “This suit does not enable the wearer to fly.”
Warnings are everywhere today except in the most important place: in the church. It is not popular preaching to sound any sort of spiritual warning to people today and our pulpits have complied. I think of one large church where the pastor actually declared, “We are not going to talk of anything negative in this church. Sin and hell are negative doctrines and will not be mentioned.” Great marketing, poor theology.
The warnings on packages are there for a reason. The warnings in Scripture are there for a reason. David puts it all in perspective in our text: “10 So, rebel-kings, use your heads; Upstart-judges, learn your lesson: 11 Worship God in adoring embrace, Celebrate in trembling awe. 12 Kiss Messiah! Your very lives are in danger, you know; His anger is about to explode, But if you make a run for God—you won’t regret it!” (Psalm 2:10-12 MSG). Popular message? No. You won’t find this or anything similar in the how to manuals of church growth which are so popular today. You will find them in God’s manual of church growth however. We are not called to be popular. We are called to be faithful. Don’t shy away from the hard message. Someday it will be too late.
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
“1 Happy are those who reject the advice of evil people, who do not follow the example of sinners or join those who have no use for God. 2 Instead, they find joy in obeying the Law of the Lord, and they study it day and night. 3 They are like trees that grow beside a stream, that bear fruit at the right time, and whose leaves do not dry up. They succeed in everything they do. 4 But evil people are not like this at all; they are like straw that the wind blows away. 5 Sinners will be condemned by God and kept apart from God’s own people. 6 The righteous are guided and protected by the Lord, but the evil are on the way to their doom.” (Psalm 1:1-6 TEV).
Do you want real happiness? Not the momentary fleeting pleasure that so many mistake for happiness, but real, deep seated happiness that can’t be touched? Psalm 1 tells us how to obtain it.
First, watch your associates. I am alarmed at the number of professed believers who constantly seek out unsaved friends for counsel and advice. How can they help you? “But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” (1 Corinthians 2:14 NKJV). My personal opinion is that the only reason a believer might seek the advice of an unbeliever is because that believer is looking for justification to do something he or she already knows they ought not do. Just a thought, but that thought is based on years of experience and observation. What is not my opinion are the words of this Psalm, “1 Happy are those who reject the advice of evil people . . .”
As much as I like modern translations, there is still great value in the older, more traditional translations. When I memorized these verses I did so in the King James Version (which my son is convinced was the newest translation of my youth): “Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.” Did you catch the downward spiral of this verse? First the individual walks with the unbeliever. The concept here is that this is where he or she finds their direction; where they go for advice and comfort. The Holman Christian Standard Bible translates this portion of this Psalm, “How happy is the man who does not follow the advice of the wicked . . . .”
The person who seeks such advice as they walk through life soon begin to settle in and find comfort among the wicked. They take their stand with them. I was appalled recently to read of a singles Christian Bible study which is held every Tuesday at Hooter’s. Why? Because that’s where these professed believers are comfortable. They have taken their stand. They are comfortable in surroundings that should really make them very uncomfortable. They are not spiritually sensitive.
The final step downward is the person walks in the company and counsel of the ungodly, then they take their stand with them, finally they are setting down in fellowship with “those who have no use for God.”
So, the question of the hour is, where are you looking for happiness? Where are you looking for fulfillment? Where do you turn when you need advice and guidance? Look in the wrong places and you will go down the wrong path to your own doom. Look to God and you will be firmly established.
One final thing. This has nothing to do with experience. Experience and feelings will mislead you again and again. We need to seek guidance in what Dr. Francis Shaeffer called, “True truth.” The absolute, infallible, inerrant Word of God.
Do you want real happiness? Not the momentary fleeting pleasure that so many mistake for happiness, but real, deep seated happiness that can’t be touched? Psalm 1 tells us how to obtain it.
First, watch your associates. I am alarmed at the number of professed believers who constantly seek out unsaved friends for counsel and advice. How can they help you? “But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” (1 Corinthians 2:14 NKJV). My personal opinion is that the only reason a believer might seek the advice of an unbeliever is because that believer is looking for justification to do something he or she already knows they ought not do. Just a thought, but that thought is based on years of experience and observation. What is not my opinion are the words of this Psalm, “1 Happy are those who reject the advice of evil people . . .”
As much as I like modern translations, there is still great value in the older, more traditional translations. When I memorized these verses I did so in the King James Version (which my son is convinced was the newest translation of my youth): “Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.” Did you catch the downward spiral of this verse? First the individual walks with the unbeliever. The concept here is that this is where he or she finds their direction; where they go for advice and comfort. The Holman Christian Standard Bible translates this portion of this Psalm, “How happy is the man who does not follow the advice of the wicked . . . .”
The person who seeks such advice as they walk through life soon begin to settle in and find comfort among the wicked. They take their stand with them. I was appalled recently to read of a singles Christian Bible study which is held every Tuesday at Hooter’s. Why? Because that’s where these professed believers are comfortable. They have taken their stand. They are comfortable in surroundings that should really make them very uncomfortable. They are not spiritually sensitive.
The final step downward is the person walks in the company and counsel of the ungodly, then they take their stand with them, finally they are setting down in fellowship with “those who have no use for God.”
So, the question of the hour is, where are you looking for happiness? Where are you looking for fulfillment? Where do you turn when you need advice and guidance? Look in the wrong places and you will go down the wrong path to your own doom. Look to God and you will be firmly established.
One final thing. This has nothing to do with experience. Experience and feelings will mislead you again and again. We need to seek guidance in what Dr. Francis Shaeffer called, “True truth.” The absolute, infallible, inerrant Word of God.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Ezekiel 33:30-32 in the New Century Version (NCV) reads, “But as for you, human, your people are talking about you by the walls and in the doorways of houses. They say to each other: ‘Come now, and hear the message from the Lord.’ 31 So they come to you in crowds as if they were really ready to listen. They sit in front of you as if they were my people and hear your words, but they will not obey them. With their mouths they tell me they love me, but their hearts desire their selfish profits. 32 To your people you are nothing more than a singer who sings love songs and has a beautiful voice and plays a musical instrument well. They hear your words, but they will not obey them.”
When I read those words I thought, “How applicable to the church today!” For many church is nothing more than an alternative from of entertainment. They come and enjoy the music, they participate in the various activities offered, but they don’t take the message to heart. Ezekiel said of the people of his day, “With their mouths they tell me they love me, but their hearts desire their selfish profits.” The prophet Isaiah had a similar observation, “The Master said: ‘These people make a big show of saying the right thing, but their hearts aren’t in it. . . they act like they’re worshiping me but don’t mean it.’” (Isaiah 29:13 MSG).
Now I am not a prophet or the son of a prophet, but I am willing to venture that a whopping 80% of people who attend church today are firmly in Ezekiel’s and Isaiah’s category of people who listen but don’t really care what God has to say.
Tough words; hard words. Some who have read them have responded by calling me in their own minds “judgmental” and harsh. Think about it though. In the area I am writing from we have at least 6 what church growth specialists call “Mega Churches.” Now I would think that if the vast number of people who attend these churches were fully committed Christians their impact on society would be phenomenal. Is that what we are seeing? Unfortunately not. In fact what we are seeing is a large group of people who claim church membership but whose lives reflect the values of the world. “With their mouths they tell me they love me, but their hearts desire their selfish profits.”
Lest you think the above statement is nothing but envy on my part, let me state that one man at one of these churches stated, “We have a beautiful worship service–it’s great. But it is not uncommon to leave the service and find people in fist-fights in the parking lot because someone did not let them out when they wanted out.” “They sit in front of you as if they were my people and hear your words, but they will not obey them.”
What is true in the Mega churches holds true in the mini churches as well. We seem to have a Christianity today that is much more form than function. Oh, dear reader, if this describes you, a beg of you, repent. If your Christianity is a Sunday only thing or if your walk with Christ does not have a major impact in how you walk daily in the world, something is horribly wrong. No one can come to Christ and leave the same!
When I read those words I thought, “How applicable to the church today!” For many church is nothing more than an alternative from of entertainment. They come and enjoy the music, they participate in the various activities offered, but they don’t take the message to heart. Ezekiel said of the people of his day, “With their mouths they tell me they love me, but their hearts desire their selfish profits.” The prophet Isaiah had a similar observation, “The Master said: ‘These people make a big show of saying the right thing, but their hearts aren’t in it. . . they act like they’re worshiping me but don’t mean it.’” (Isaiah 29:13 MSG).
Now I am not a prophet or the son of a prophet, but I am willing to venture that a whopping 80% of people who attend church today are firmly in Ezekiel’s and Isaiah’s category of people who listen but don’t really care what God has to say.
Tough words; hard words. Some who have read them have responded by calling me in their own minds “judgmental” and harsh. Think about it though. In the area I am writing from we have at least 6 what church growth specialists call “Mega Churches.” Now I would think that if the vast number of people who attend these churches were fully committed Christians their impact on society would be phenomenal. Is that what we are seeing? Unfortunately not. In fact what we are seeing is a large group of people who claim church membership but whose lives reflect the values of the world. “With their mouths they tell me they love me, but their hearts desire their selfish profits.”
Lest you think the above statement is nothing but envy on my part, let me state that one man at one of these churches stated, “We have a beautiful worship service–it’s great. But it is not uncommon to leave the service and find people in fist-fights in the parking lot because someone did not let them out when they wanted out.” “They sit in front of you as if they were my people and hear your words, but they will not obey them.”
What is true in the Mega churches holds true in the mini churches as well. We seem to have a Christianity today that is much more form than function. Oh, dear reader, if this describes you, a beg of you, repent. If your Christianity is a Sunday only thing or if your walk with Christ does not have a major impact in how you walk daily in the world, something is horribly wrong. No one can come to Christ and leave the same!
Monday, April 20, 2009
“I, Jude, am a slave to Jesus Christ and brother to James, writing to those loved by God the Father, called and kept safe by Jesus Christ. Relax, everything’s going to be all right; rest, everything’s coming together; open your hearts, love is on the way!” (Jude 1:1-2 MSG).
In his letter, Jude focuses on the problem of apostasy – turning away from God’s truth into error. In a day that is swarming with false teachers, every Christian needs to read this small book on a regular basis.
So often we know when something is wrong with us physically. The symptoms are obvious and we take immediate action to correct the problem. Unfortunately we are not as vigilant spiritually. The result is bad teaching creeps into our lives and bad thinking corrupts our life-styles.
The problem is not new. Satan is the great deceiver and our sin natures are immanently susceptible to anything that will feed it. The wonderful promise of God is that those who know Christ, really know Him, are kept safe by Him! We don’t have to wring our hands in worry, stress over whether or not things will work out, “everything’s going to be all right” What a marvelous promise!
What has you stressing today? Can you give it over to Jesus? Will you exchange your worry for His rest?
In his letter, Jude focuses on the problem of apostasy – turning away from God’s truth into error. In a day that is swarming with false teachers, every Christian needs to read this small book on a regular basis.
So often we know when something is wrong with us physically. The symptoms are obvious and we take immediate action to correct the problem. Unfortunately we are not as vigilant spiritually. The result is bad teaching creeps into our lives and bad thinking corrupts our life-styles.
The problem is not new. Satan is the great deceiver and our sin natures are immanently susceptible to anything that will feed it. The wonderful promise of God is that those who know Christ, really know Him, are kept safe by Him! We don’t have to wring our hands in worry, stress over whether or not things will work out, “everything’s going to be all right” What a marvelous promise!
What has you stressing today? Can you give it over to Jesus? Will you exchange your worry for His rest?
Thursday, March 26, 2009
"‘Come now, let us reason together,’ says the LORD. ‘Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.’" (Isaiah 1:18 NIV).
Earlier in this introductory chapter to the book of Isaiah, God had systematically listed the main sins of Israel. He calls them "a sinful nation, a people loaded with guilt, a brood of evildoers, children given to corruption." Hardly a complement. Israel had persisted in sin and God was ticked! He’s so upset with these hypocrites that he says, (Isaiah 1:12-14 MSG)"Quit your worship charades. I can’t stand your trivial religious games: Monthly conferences, weekly sabbaths, special meetings – meetings, meetings, meetings – I can’t stand one more! Meetings for this, meetings for that. I hate them! I’m sick of your religion, religion, religion, while you go right on sinning." . Sounds a little like some folks today does it not?
That is the bad news. In the middle of His scathing rebuke God says in effect, "Come on now, lets discuss this. We can fix it; actually I can fix it if you’ll let me. I can take your sins, as deep as their stains might be and make them pure as the freshly fallen snow! There is no stain of sin too deep that I can’t clean it up!"
What a marvelous message of hope! No matter who you are or what you’ve done, God can and will forgive you if you come to Him in faith through Jesus Christ. Isaiah wrote these marvelous words from the mouth of the Father looking forward to the day they would be a reality; you and I have the pleasure of living in that reality as we stand in the shadow of the cross. The Old Testament sacrifices covered over sin; Jesus Christ removes the sin!
Perhaps you are a believer and you have struggled with some hidden sin – hidden to others, known to God and painfully real to you. You’ve struggled with that sin and you’ve wondered how God views it. I’ll tell you: if you are in Christ, that sin has been paid for by Christ and removed from your record by His shed blood! In God’s eyes, His redeemed children are as pure as the driven snow!
Thank God for His provision and find release for your struggle. He’s forgiven you in Christ, ask Him to help you apply that forgiveness in your emotions.
Earlier in this introductory chapter to the book of Isaiah, God had systematically listed the main sins of Israel. He calls them "a sinful nation, a people loaded with guilt, a brood of evildoers, children given to corruption." Hardly a complement. Israel had persisted in sin and God was ticked! He’s so upset with these hypocrites that he says, (Isaiah 1:12-14 MSG)"Quit your worship charades. I can’t stand your trivial religious games: Monthly conferences, weekly sabbaths, special meetings – meetings, meetings, meetings – I can’t stand one more! Meetings for this, meetings for that. I hate them! I’m sick of your religion, religion, religion, while you go right on sinning." . Sounds a little like some folks today does it not?
That is the bad news. In the middle of His scathing rebuke God says in effect, "Come on now, lets discuss this. We can fix it; actually I can fix it if you’ll let me. I can take your sins, as deep as their stains might be and make them pure as the freshly fallen snow! There is no stain of sin too deep that I can’t clean it up!"
What a marvelous message of hope! No matter who you are or what you’ve done, God can and will forgive you if you come to Him in faith through Jesus Christ. Isaiah wrote these marvelous words from the mouth of the Father looking forward to the day they would be a reality; you and I have the pleasure of living in that reality as we stand in the shadow of the cross. The Old Testament sacrifices covered over sin; Jesus Christ removes the sin!
Perhaps you are a believer and you have struggled with some hidden sin – hidden to others, known to God and painfully real to you. You’ve struggled with that sin and you’ve wondered how God views it. I’ll tell you: if you are in Christ, that sin has been paid for by Christ and removed from your record by His shed blood! In God’s eyes, His redeemed children are as pure as the driven snow!
Thank God for His provision and find release for your struggle. He’s forgiven you in Christ, ask Him to help you apply that forgiveness in your emotions.
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Wednesday, March 18, 2009
When God is Silent
“To you I call, O Lord my Rock; do not turn a deaf ear to me. For if you remain silent, I will be like those who have gone down to the pit. 2 Hear my cry for mercy as I call to you for help, as I lift up my hands toward your Most Holy Place.” (Psalm 28:1-2 NIV).
There is no sound more deafening then the silence of God. Been there done that, and if you are honest, so have you. We cry to God and plead with Him for some favor or some deliverance and all we are met with is silence. C.S. Lewis described this horrible silence this way: “Meanwhile, where is God? This is one of the most disquieting symptoms. When you are happy, so happy that you have no sense of needing Him, so happy that you are tempted to feel His claims upon you as an interruption, if you remember yourself and turn to Him with gratitude and praise, you will be – or so it feels – welcomed with open arms. But go to Him when your need is desperate, when all other help is vain, and what do you find? A door slammed in your face, and a sound of bolting and double bolting on the inside. After that, silence. You may as well turn away. The longer you wait, the more emphatic the silence will become. There are no lights in the windows. It might be an empty house. Was it ever inhabited? It seemed so once. And that seeming was as strong as this. What can this mean? Why is He so present a commander in our time of prosperity and so very absent in time of trouble?” Lewis, C.S., A Grief Observed, (Bantam Books, New York, 1961, pp. 4-5).
Many times when we read our Bible, we do so through the proverbial rose colored glasses. What I mean is, we tend to put the major players on saintly pedestals, picture them moving and writing to us from Ivory Towers of ease. That is not so, and unless you realize this two things are bound to happen. First, you will miss great truths of comfort for your own heart. Second, Satan will convince you that spirituality is for a select super saints so you might as well now give up.
Look again at our passage. It doesn’t appear that David is crying for God’s help from a place of safety. Frankly, had this “man after God’s own heart” been in a safe place many of the Psalms would never have been written. But this is what I want you to notice: apparently even David had bouts of struggling with the silence of God!
If you are going through one of those silent times, take heart. God has not moved nor has He turned a deaf ear to His child. Lewis discovered this. Later, he writes, “You can’t see anything properly while your eyes are blurred with tears . . . And so perhaps with God. I have gradually been coming to feel that the door is no longer shut and bolted. Was it my own need that slammed it in my face? The time when there is nothing at all in your soul except a cry for help may be just the time when God can’t give it: you are like a drowning man who can’t be helped because he clutches and grabs. Perhaps you own reiterated cries deafen you to the voice you hoped to hear.” (Grief pp. 53-54). By the way, as you work through this Psalm, you will discover that this is David’s experience as well. His pleas will turn to praise when God’s silence obviously breaks.
One final thought. I don’t know when this Psalm was written, what circumstances it may have arisen from. While the Psalm itself was probably written in a brief time, you can be sure that the experience from which this Psalm is written comes from a life-time of experience. Life experience is another thing we tend to forget when we study the Bible. Let’s speculate for illustration purposes. Let’s suppose this Psalm comes out of David’s cumulative experience with Saul. Let’s suppose for a minute that verses 1 & 2 were written the day he ran and verses 6-7 were added to the Psalm the day he got to stop running. Do you realize that we would be looking at a 13 year period? Incredible! But even in the “silent” years you can be sure of this, God was working (at least behind the scenes) and God did still care about what was happening with David. Why was God silent? He was preparing the shepherd boy to be the shepherd of Israel.
If God is silent to you right now. Don’t give up. Don’t give in. Charles Spurgeon said, “When you can’t trace His hand, trust His heart.”
There is no sound more deafening then the silence of God. Been there done that, and if you are honest, so have you. We cry to God and plead with Him for some favor or some deliverance and all we are met with is silence. C.S. Lewis described this horrible silence this way: “Meanwhile, where is God? This is one of the most disquieting symptoms. When you are happy, so happy that you have no sense of needing Him, so happy that you are tempted to feel His claims upon you as an interruption, if you remember yourself and turn to Him with gratitude and praise, you will be – or so it feels – welcomed with open arms. But go to Him when your need is desperate, when all other help is vain, and what do you find? A door slammed in your face, and a sound of bolting and double bolting on the inside. After that, silence. You may as well turn away. The longer you wait, the more emphatic the silence will become. There are no lights in the windows. It might be an empty house. Was it ever inhabited? It seemed so once. And that seeming was as strong as this. What can this mean? Why is He so present a commander in our time of prosperity and so very absent in time of trouble?” Lewis, C.S., A Grief Observed, (Bantam Books, New York, 1961, pp. 4-5).
Many times when we read our Bible, we do so through the proverbial rose colored glasses. What I mean is, we tend to put the major players on saintly pedestals, picture them moving and writing to us from Ivory Towers of ease. That is not so, and unless you realize this two things are bound to happen. First, you will miss great truths of comfort for your own heart. Second, Satan will convince you that spirituality is for a select super saints so you might as well now give up.
Look again at our passage. It doesn’t appear that David is crying for God’s help from a place of safety. Frankly, had this “man after God’s own heart” been in a safe place many of the Psalms would never have been written. But this is what I want you to notice: apparently even David had bouts of struggling with the silence of God!
If you are going through one of those silent times, take heart. God has not moved nor has He turned a deaf ear to His child. Lewis discovered this. Later, he writes, “You can’t see anything properly while your eyes are blurred with tears . . . And so perhaps with God. I have gradually been coming to feel that the door is no longer shut and bolted. Was it my own need that slammed it in my face? The time when there is nothing at all in your soul except a cry for help may be just the time when God can’t give it: you are like a drowning man who can’t be helped because he clutches and grabs. Perhaps you own reiterated cries deafen you to the voice you hoped to hear.” (Grief pp. 53-54). By the way, as you work through this Psalm, you will discover that this is David’s experience as well. His pleas will turn to praise when God’s silence obviously breaks.
One final thought. I don’t know when this Psalm was written, what circumstances it may have arisen from. While the Psalm itself was probably written in a brief time, you can be sure that the experience from which this Psalm is written comes from a life-time of experience. Life experience is another thing we tend to forget when we study the Bible. Let’s speculate for illustration purposes. Let’s suppose this Psalm comes out of David’s cumulative experience with Saul. Let’s suppose for a minute that verses 1 & 2 were written the day he ran and verses 6-7 were added to the Psalm the day he got to stop running. Do you realize that we would be looking at a 13 year period? Incredible! But even in the “silent” years you can be sure of this, God was working (at least behind the scenes) and God did still care about what was happening with David. Why was God silent? He was preparing the shepherd boy to be the shepherd of Israel.
If God is silent to you right now. Don’t give up. Don’t give in. Charles Spurgeon said, “When you can’t trace His hand, trust His heart.”
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
"The Lord said to him, ‘Who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or mute? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the Lord? 12 Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.’" (Exodus 4:11-12).
Exodus 4:12 is my life verse. I will not go into details here, but until I was 16 I had a serious speech impediment that resulted in my being sent to special speech therapy classes from 1-11th grade. Because of that impediment, though I was a Christian, I had real reservations about God’s love and Sovereign control over things. Like many there was a line I did not want to cross, feeling that somehow God must be protected.
Then I read this passage. Look again at verse 11. Did you catch it? God takes full responsibility for each individual creature, handicaps and all! Suddenly it dawned upon me that I wasn’t simply the genetic amalgamation of my parents; a chance by-product of the biological act, but God was working in and through the processes to produce a person exactly according to His perfect specification–impediment and all! He had a plan. Redpath is right: "There is nothing -- no circumstance, no trouble, no testing -- that can touch me until, first of all it has gone past God and past Christ, right through to me. If it has come that far, it has come with some great purpose, which I may not understand at the moment. But as I refuse to become panicky, as I lift up my eyes to Him and accept it as coming from the throne of God for some great purpose of blessing to my own heart, no sorrow will ever disturb me, no trial will ever disarm me, no circumstance will cause me to fret, for I shall rest in the joy of what my Lord is."
What is it that your are facing today? Please understand that (1) God has a purpose in it, (2) it has not taken Him by surprise nor somehow slipped under His radar, and (3) if you will trust Him you will discover that in the thorn there is a blessing.
Exodus 4:12 is my life verse. I will not go into details here, but until I was 16 I had a serious speech impediment that resulted in my being sent to special speech therapy classes from 1-11th grade. Because of that impediment, though I was a Christian, I had real reservations about God’s love and Sovereign control over things. Like many there was a line I did not want to cross, feeling that somehow God must be protected.
Then I read this passage. Look again at verse 11. Did you catch it? God takes full responsibility for each individual creature, handicaps and all! Suddenly it dawned upon me that I wasn’t simply the genetic amalgamation of my parents; a chance by-product of the biological act, but God was working in and through the processes to produce a person exactly according to His perfect specification–impediment and all! He had a plan. Redpath is right: "There is nothing -- no circumstance, no trouble, no testing -- that can touch me until, first of all it has gone past God and past Christ, right through to me. If it has come that far, it has come with some great purpose, which I may not understand at the moment. But as I refuse to become panicky, as I lift up my eyes to Him and accept it as coming from the throne of God for some great purpose of blessing to my own heart, no sorrow will ever disturb me, no trial will ever disarm me, no circumstance will cause me to fret, for I shall rest in the joy of what my Lord is."
What is it that your are facing today? Please understand that (1) God has a purpose in it, (2) it has not taken Him by surprise nor somehow slipped under His radar, and (3) if you will trust Him you will discover that in the thorn there is a blessing.
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