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I have chosen the way of faithfulness; I have set my heart on your laws. Psalm 119:30
Remember the story of the Little Red Hen? She scurries around the farmyard trying to get the ingredients for making some her great homemade bread. She asks for help from all the farm animals and none of them are willing to help so she does it all herself. When the aroma of the bread wafts through the farmyard all the animals gather together for a taste only to find that she wasn’t willing to share since they weren’t willing to help.
One moral of that story might be that you have the choice to do whatever you want, but you may not like the consequences of your choices. Little Red Hen never appears to be angry with those who refused to help. She didn’t chastise them in the least. The request was made, the refusal received, and life went on.
Perhaps one of the most precious gifts God has given us, next to salvation itself, is the freedom to choose. He didn’t create robots, he created humans. He didn’t put within us a computer chip programmed to respond correctly in every situation. He gave us a mind that, like his could reason, explore and think. He gave us emotion so we could enjoy the sunsets, smell the fresh spring rain and look in awe at the mountains majesty.
But choice has a downside. Choosing to follow the path of faithfulness isn’t the easy button in life. In fact, choosing the path of faithfulness often leads us along a trail that is most difficult. Choosing to follow God is easy when things are going well, but true character, true faith, is shown when things don’t go the way we want them too.
It’s easy to believe in a God of love and grace and mercy and all things comfortable. It’s hard to believe in a God that allows us to suffer the consequences of our own poor choices. It’s easy to choose a God who rescues us from adversity. It’s hard to believe in a God that allows us to go through the frustration of being falsely accused; of being attacked for openly sharing our faith; chided for following a list of rules that seems antiquated and irrelevant in comparison of with the way the world is going.
The apostle Paul writes, “Don’t grow weary in doing good.” He knew what he was talking about. His life in Christ was full of pain, adversity, being falsely accused and physically attacked. Yet he finished the course, he fought the good fight.
God doesn’t always ask the big things of us. Sometimes he asks for a series of little steps, little choices. The decisions we make along the way will be hard but the reward is worth it. True faith says we will follow more closely to him when human wisdom screams at us to go the other way.
PRAYER: Father God, it’s easy to follow you on the good days when I’m not tempted, not mistreated, not feeling under attack. But I haven’t seen very many of those days. Empower me to see you on the hard days; those days when nothing seems to go right. On those days help me to choose you regardless of the cost. Amen.
Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. Ephesians 1:4 (NLT)
“We won’t really know until we open him up and have a look inside.”
Imagine the feeling of a parent or spouse as they hear those words. Perhaps you don’t have to imagine. You may have been the one in the waiting room praying, worrying, hoping. Trusting God helps, but it doesn’t take away the knot in the stomach.
Even though the tests medical science has come up with are amazing, there is still an element of ‘surprise’ once the surgery begins and the surgeons look inside. Often they don’t really know how to ‘heal’ the situation until they are in the process of the surgery.
Many times we assume that our Heavenly Father is like the surgeon. He sees us and the problems we have. He sees the wound of our souls and has a rough idea of what he will do to make us ‘whole and usable’ for his purpose. He begins the surgery of our heart, but doesn’t really know what will happen until he gets inside of us. His actions are determined by what he discovers inside. Our healing is dependent on discovery.
Viewing God as some great surgeon with scalpel in hand is contrary to the picture that the Bible paints. Even the best of surgeons are dependent on what they see in the present and what they’ve seen in the past. The Father sees your future. The Father sees you in your entirety. He sees your physical limitations, your emotional make-up and your spiritual struggle, and after all that, he chose you!
He isn’t surprised by your addiction. He isn’t surprised by your anger. He isn’t surprised by your struggle with pornography or worry or financial demise. He saw your divorce coming before the earth cooled. He knew all about you and still he chose you.
Not only did he see your present before you saw your past, he sees your future as well. A surgeon looks at your physical condition and determines your prognosis. With the Father your prognosis is dependent on Jesus Christ and what he did for you on the cross. The empty tomb of Christ is a symbol of what the Father thinks of you. Resurrected. Perfect. Eternally blessed. Ready for heaven. Established as his dearly loved children.
PRAYER: Father God, I never tire of the reminder that you loved me enough to choose me even though you knew my weakness. Thank you that your love is based on the person of Jesus Christ and not the mortal soul I am. I’m eternally grateful for the truth that I’m chosen by you. Amen.
Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, because they don’t know what they are doing.” Luke 23:34 NCV
When life doesn’t turn out the way we’d like it too our first inclination is to put the blame on someone else. We get stopped for speeding and blame our boss for being so unbending about getting to work on time, or blame the kids for taking so long getting ready. We fight all the way to church and blame the pastor for not having a good sermon rather than considering the fact that our anger kept us from hearing the Spirit’s soft, gentle voice. We put on extra pounds and rather than exercise and make wiser choices we blame the fast-food place for not serving ‘healthy fried foods’ (whatever that means). We spill our hot coffee as we leave the drive through and blame the coffee shop for having hot coffee!
I still find it humorous to see some of the warning labels on the products we buy. “Warning: Items taken out of the oven may be hot and cause burns.” Really? Perhaps the best one lately is the commercial with a computer generated pickup snowboarding down a mountain side with the disclaimer warning us that “We shouldn’t try this at home because pickups can’t snowboard.” Again. Seriously?
We spend millions of dollars a year trying to protect ourselves from ourselves because we’ve never really learned to accept responsibility for our actions. It started in the garden of Eden. Adam blamed Eve who blamed the snake (Satan) and we’ve been blaming ever since.
But the ultimate ‘blame-game’ we play started in the streets ofJerusalemabout 2000 years ago when we sent an innocent man to the cross. Jesus of Nazareth was condemned to die, not because of the Romans, not because of the Jews. He was condemned to die by a group of angry people who needed someone to blame for their struggles. Someone to blame for the oppression of the political system they were under. Someone to blame for the burden religion had placed on them. Someone to blame for the physical pain and the relational wounds they suffered.
So who did they blame? A man who’d spent his entire life serving others for no profit of his own. A King who chose to leave the splendor of his throne to live in the ghettos and wilderness of Palestine. A ruler who gave up his authority to be governed by the selfish, greedy subjects of his own kingdom. A Savior who came to show life to the very people who would put him to death.
It’s no wonder that this man prayed “Father forgive them for they don’t know what they are doing.” They didn’t! To this day there are people who continue to blame the one who promised us tribulation and that he’d be with us throughout the pain. We continue to blame the victim.
PRAYER: Lord Jesus. I humbly bow before you today in praise and thanksgiving for giving your life so I could live. Forgive us for the times we blame you when we need to take responsibility for our own rebellion. Thank you for the grace you give us to move on. Help me extend that same forgiveness to others who still ‘don’t know what they are doing’. Amen.
Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. Matthew 11:29
In New Testament Palestine the Ox was the primary piece of equipment for the farmer. Attached to various loads by a yoke the ox would carry the burden of the farmer all day long.
When a young ox was in training it would be teamed up with an experienced ox with a double yoke. The straps on the experienced ox were bound tightly to the animal, while the straps for the younger ox were loose. In this way the bulk of the burden for the load was placed on the more experienced ox.
Jesus uses the picture of a yoke and oxen to teach us a lesson about his expectations of us and our assurance from him that he will walk beside us along the way.
There are times in our lives when we, either vocally or inside ourselves, voice the statement, “This is too much for me to bear. I can’t do this anymore.” Each of us carries a multitude of different burdens. Some of those burdens are ‘self-inflicted’ such as addictive behaviors, the affair we can’t leave, the pornography we can’t stay away from, the anger we can’t let go of, the person we refuse to forgive.
Other burdens we bear have been placed on us from other sources. The wounds of an abusive spouse or parent; the feelings of abandonment we harbor, even as an adult, because of parents who left us or were too busy with their career to tend to their families; the rules and regulations of religious dogma; the limitations due to health or age issues.
Whatever your burden is, whether self-inflicted or otherwise, Jesus’ promise is the same. He walks beside you. You may feel your burden is too great, but he is bearing the brunt of the load and feeling the majority of the pain.
As he walks the path with you remember that he is gentle, not demanding; understanding, not judgmental; grace-full, not critical. Jesus has no desire to make our lives burdensome and harsh. Because of his passionate love for us, Jesus comes alongside us to help us carry the burdens that weigh us down on the journey we call life.
What burden are you bearing today? Worry? Fear? Guilt? Shame? Disappointment? Physical burdens? Jesus wants to come alongside you to help ease your burden as you learn to walk with him and love him. He doesn’t promise to take the burden away, but he will never let you bear it alone. It’s good to have a friend like him to help along the way.
PRAYER: Lord Jesus, I have many friends and family that love me and encourage me. But none of them understand the weight of this burden I bear. Until now I’ve tried to carry it myself. I ask that you would walk beside me and help ease the load I carry. Amen.
But let all who take refuge in you be glad; let them ever sing for joy. Spread your protection over them, that those who love your name may rejoice in you. Psalm 5:11
Years ago now the news broke in my area of a young person who died tragically in a house fire. What made the death even more of a tragedy is that when he heard the smoke detectors in the middle of the night, he got scared and hid under his bed. When his parents frantically checked his room they didn’t see him and thought him to be outside. He was too scared to answer their calls.
By the time they realized he hadn’t made it outside it was too late. The young man perished from smoke inhalation. The fire was put out quickly. The rest of the family, while devastated at the loss of a loved one, was able to rebuild and go on with life. But the wound of that night haunted them for years. “He was so close to safety,” his dad remarked, “yet his fear was so much greater than his understanding of the situation it twisted his thinking with deadly consequences.”
When we are afraid, for whatever reason, we naturally look for a safe place to regroup. We seek a refuge that will protect us from further pain or harm, a place where we can feel safe and comforted. A place of refuge that will allow us to reach the full potential of our being.
The strength of our refuge determines the amount of peace, safety and healing we take with us on the journey. Some take refuge from emotional pain in new relationships. But relationships are fickle at best and can’t offer the lasting peace we crave. People who aren’t comfortable with the relationship they have with themselves find it difficult, if not impossible, to find true fulfillment in relationship with someone else.
Others seek refuge in addictive behaviors, anger, religious experience, careers, social action and a variety of other things bent on helping them suppress the fear and anxiety in their lives and replace it with comfort and a sense of well-being.
Those who learn how to take refuge in our Heavenly Father find peace in the midst of tragedy; encouragement in the face of disappointment; healing when anger raises its ugly head. Why? Because our human intellect tells us a refuge is protection from the outside, but the eternal, unshakeable refuge we have in God through Jesus Christ is an internal refuge that guards what external refuges can never protect, our souls.
Our bodies will fail us. Old age and/or death are 100% likely for each of us. Relationships will fail. Careers will end. Dreams will slip away in the night. But there is nothing in the seen or the unseen world that will ever break through the refuge of our souls that Jesus Christ offers us.
PRAYER: Father God, I thank you for the protection that you offer us through Jesus Christ. I thank you that we can find complete inner peace and safety when we take refuge in you. I confess I too often seek refuge from things that don’t last. Empower me to learn how to rest in the refuge you can give so in the midst of my adversity I can find rest. Amen.
Mike Fisk & Built with Grace 