God’s Encouragement for Changing Times
As I sought the Lord recently, I received some words of encouragement that I want to share with you today.
Focus on new doors. Jesus tells us in Revelation 3:8,
“See, I have set before you an open door, and no one can shut it.”
Our world is changing rapidly, so it can be tempting to stay with the familiar. Yet when new doors open, we should ask Him to show us which ones to enter and what steps to take. God can see the end from the beginning, and He knows what He is doing.
We will see the hand of God and the finger of God. We should reach up to God like little children, knowing there is no safer place to be than with Daddy. His hand will support us and protect us.
Romans 8:38-39 promises:
Neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God…
We will also see God’s finger at work. Exodus 31:18 says the Ten Commandments were written by God’s finger, and Luke 11:20 tells us Jesus used it to cast out demons. We have seen many miracles in the past, and we should look for more demonstrations of God’s power in the future. It will be undeniable when He moves.
Expect God to act. We must not look at our circumstances or rely on what our senses tell us. No matter what we are facing, we should trust God to move. He has promised, and He will uphold His Word.
Go forth into new things. Let’s obey when God calls, even if we are stretched. All we have to do is take those first steps. He is our provider, and He will send the resources. If the Dow drops, that is not our God. Our God is greater, more powerful, and able to do exceedingly above all we could ask.
Colossians 1:9-12 says,
Ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding; that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, for all patience and longsuffering with joy; giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light.
We have the great privilege of preaching His glorious Gospel and laying up treasure in heaven. So as He calls, let’s respond with joy, “Here we are, Lord; send us!” God bless you.
What to Do If Hurt Happens
By Lynette Kittle
“Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you” – Colossians 3:13
As Christians, we hope we can count on those we meet in church or Christian settings to be loving, kind, and compassionate in every situation. Unfortunately, disillusionment, wounds, and hurts can occur when these unrealistic ideas of perfect Christian relationships shatter, collapse, and leave us feeling devastated and lost in many ways.
Dealing With Failed Expectations
A few years ago, a friend asked for prayer for her father, who felt driven away from the church where her family had served for over a decade. Following the separation, he seemed broken from the experience, leaving her deeply concerned with her Dad’s lack of focus and passion for the things of God. Sadly like so many individuals, the fellow Christians at his church had disappointed him and let him down in a spiritually devastating way. Because they are individuals who say they love God, his expectations for their behavior and treatment of one another were so much higher than what he experienced.
Experiencing the Wounds of Others
Growing up as a pastor’s kid and then later as a pastor’s wife, I’ve experienced deep hurt within church walls and through the actions of fellow Christians. Like me, many, if not most, who enter and serve full-time ministry will also experience the painful sting of well-intended church members who have the ability to wound their leaders right to the core of who they are, like knife wounds to the heart.
Unfortunately, wounds aren’t restricted to just church leadership but to many who actively attend and participate in church. Individuals can be totally surprised by brutal, cutthroat attacks from within the body of Christ inflicted by those they trusted as fellow believers.
What Can Be Done?
Gratefully we can take measures to prepare our hearts ahead of time for possible wounding, rather than thinking it won’t ever happen, especially since these types of hurts often blindside people when they least expect it. Whether intentionally or unintentionally, people hurt people, and that includes believers in Jesus Christ. Below are five ways to help safeguard and prepare for possible disappointment and hurt within the Church so if it comes, it won’t shake our faith and knock us off track in our relationship with God.
1. Put on the full armor of God. As Ephesians 6:12 explains, “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.”
It’s not just people, even within the Church. There are spiritual forces and powers at work to divide and destroy from within our church walls. To be prepared, we are instructed in Ephesians 6:14-17 to put on the full armor of God so that we can against them.
2. Activate prayer. Prayer is a powerful resource we have to turn to and put into motion. As Ephesians 6:18 urges, “And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people.”
3. Forgive. Cultivate a tenderness to forgive others as God has forgiven us. “Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you” (Ephesians 4:32).
4. Resist disillusionment with God. Like my friend’s Dad, disappointment and hurt can cause Christians to disconnect from God. The devil works through wounding to cause us to doubt God, to believe He didn’t protect us in the situation, and even more so, that maybe He’s really behind those who caused the hurtful actions.
Hurt blurs our vision, causing us to blame God rather than imperfect people who are being led by divisive spiritual influences. It’s vital in these situations to guard our hearts from letting others cause disillusionment with Him.
5. Fix our eyes on Jesus. As Hebrews 12:2 urges, it’s important for us to fix our eyes on Jesus rather than what other Christians may say or do in the name of God. It’s key to loving the Church even when the people within it have caused pain.
Wrestling with God – Streams in the Desert – August 20
- 202220 Aug
And Jacob was left alone; and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day (Genesis 32:24).
God is wrestling with Jacob more than Jacob is wrestling with God. It was the Son of man, the Angel of the Covenant. It was God in human form pressing down and pressing out the old Jacob life; and ere the morning broke, God had prevailed and Jacob fell with his thigh dislocated. But as he fell, he fell into the arms of God, and there he clung and wrestled, too, until the blessing came; and the new life was born and he arose from the earthly to the heavenly, the human to the divine, the natural to the supernatural. And as he went forth that morning he was a weak and broken man, but God was there instead; and the heavenly voice proclaimed, “Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel; for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed.”
Beloved, this must ever be a typical scene in every transformed life. There comes a crisis-hour to each of us, if God has called us to the highest and best, when all resources fail; when we face either ruin or something higher than we ever dreamed; when we must have infinite help from God and yet, ere we can have it, we must let something go; we must surrender completely; we must cease from our own wisdom. strength, and righteousness, and become crucified with Christ and alive in Him. God knows how to lead us up to this crisis, and He knows how to lead us through.
Is He leading you thus? Is this the meaning of your deep trial, or your difficult surroundings, or that impossible situation or that trying place through which you cannot go without Him, and yet you have not enough of Him to give you the victory?
Oh, turn to Jacob’s God! Cast yourself helplessly at His feet. Die to your strength and wisdom in His loving arms and rise, like Jacob, into His strength and all-sufficiency. There is no way out of your hard and narrow place but at the top. You must get deliverance by rising higher and coming into a new experience with God. Oh, may it bring you into all that is meant by the revelation of the Mighty One of Jacob! There is no way out but God.