God in the Details

 

God does not often show Himself strong for us during a trial. Initially, this hurts our feelings and causes us to doubt His love for us. However, God's love is exactly what prevents Him from rescuing us from life's hurts and challenges.

God is teaching us that this life is inconsequential in His larger scheme of the ages. His goal in our life is to transform our body, soul and spirit from this humble, earthly state into conformity with His glorious eternal plan for us.

He also shows us that all things, even our health, finances, comfort, suffering, family and life are subject to Him (Philippians 3:20-21). As His Spirit sanctifies us, we learn to submit to His will and to surrender our entire life to His wisdom and direction.

This gives us hope in God, rather than despair from overwhelming circumstances, thoughts and feelings. He is constantly at work in our life, planting seeds for a miracle in all of our trials.

We just have to patiently wait for Him to reveal them to us. He longs for us to trust in Him alone, and to desire His will instead of our own goals and plans.

We eventually learn that our suffering in this world cannot be compared to the glory of living in God's presence both now and throughout eternity (Romans 8:18).

Hardships are merely temporary and fleeting, especially as we keep our eyes on Christ and the prize of our inheritance of the Kingdom of God (Acts 17:11; 1 Peter 4:12-13; James 1:1-13).

Prayer:

Father God, help us to meditate on the truth that You are in complete control of everything in this world. Allow this fact to penetrate deep within our soul - our thoughts, choices and feelings - so that we learn to trust You and not our human reasoning throughout every moment of our day. We do not need to understand Your thoughts, because they are so much more profound than our thoughts (Isaiah 55:8-9).

You simply ask us to remain open and willing to submit to and accept Your will and ways - even in the trials. You renew our human spirit by making Your truths known to us. We are created in Your image (Colossians 3:10), we have Your mind (1 Corinthians 2:16), and by Your Spirit we learn to walk as You would walk in our shoes (1 John 2:20).

Thought for the Day:

As the reality of the fact that our life is hidden with Christ in God becomes more of a reality every day, we draw away from the world, the flesh and the devil and find our true joy only in service to our King Jesus. - Romans 12:2

Though We Suffer Loss

 

Whoever offers praise, glorifies God (Psalm 50:23). We praise Him in our victories, our successes, and our blessings, as well as in our diseases, our worries, our fears and our setbacks (Job 13:15).

There are many times when things do not go our way. We feel frustration, remorse, defeat and hopelessness; yet, we rejoice in the God of our salvation, who is our strength (Habakkuk 3:17-19).

This connection with God acknowledges that He is in control of our life at all times. It humbles us and causes us to shift our focus from our self and our problems to Him, our Problem Solver.

The more we establish and maintain our unity with God, the fewer trials and negative experiences occur in our life. When they do come, as trials always have a way of infringing on the best of times, the trauma is short-lived because of our positive attitude.

We see the daily blessings in the negative situation, and we see the hand of God working in the details to bring us encouragement and support as we suffer loss and ill health.

Job knew the power of prayer. He lost more in one day than most people lose in a lifetime. He suffered anguishing emotional, mental, financial and physical loss all at the same time. Yet, he chose to praise the Lord.

Sitting in the pile of ashes, scraping his boils with broken pieces of pottery, his trust in God never faltered. He endured endless days of torment and suffering with His hope planted firmly in the Lord.

Prayer:

Father God, the length of Job's suffering discouraged him and caused him to question You, and to wish to die and end his misery; but You sustained him through those harsh and unwarranted issues and blessed him with more than he lost. We thank You that regardless of the circumstances we experience You are always in the midst of them with us.

It is encouraging to see that Satan has no power over us. There are only two ways that he can inflict us: if we open the door to him by our attitude and behavior, or if You give him permission. We know that if we walk uprightly before You, anything we suffer will result in more blessings in the end. Therefore, we praise You, even if You decide to slay us (Job 13:15; Daniel 3:8-18).

Thought for the Day:

When we experience the challenges of life, we learn to trust in the Lord with our whole spirit and soul, and to walk in His will rather than in our own goals and plans (Proverbs 3:5-8), as we live each moment by faith in His faithfulness, and guided by His Holy Spirit.

God is Able

 

God is able to do immeasurably more for us than we can ever imagine (Philippians 4:19). However, He resists the proud and unrighteous and only responds to the humble and upright in heart (Ephesians 3:20; James 4:6).

His power works in authentic Believers and calls us to a deeper relationship with Him. He desires that we dedicate our entire heart, soul, mind and strength to His service (Mark 12:30).

Daily, we come to know Him more intimately through prayer, including times of listening; Bible reading and meditation; fellowshipping and worshipping with other Believers; and walking by His Spirit moment by moment throughout the day.

Limiting God to our human understanding is foolish and prevents us from fully trusting Him with our life. There is nothing He requires of us that is impossible, as long as we trust in and rely on His power within us (Matthew 19:26).

We also allow Satan's lies, perpetuated by devilish people in this world, to prevent us from enjoying God's bountiful fellowship with us day by day (Matthew 5:19).

His desire is to conform us into the likeness of His Son Jesus and to work out everything in this life for our ultimate good (Romans 8:28-29). Our humble submission to His will guarantees His blessings in our life.

Prayer:

Father God, we look forward to You accomplishing Your will on this earth and in our life, just as it is already produced in heaven (Matthew 6:10). We do not want to convince You to do our will through our prayers and petitions; but to pray according to Your Spirit that Your will shall be done.

We trust in Your perfect plan for our life and we submit to the direction of Your Spirit each moment of the day (Proverbs 3:5-8). We present our self to You as an empty vessel for You to fill with the mind of Christ, the fruit of Your Spirit and Your divine nature (1 Thessalonians 5:17).

Thought for the Day:

We humble our self under the mighty hand of God and surrender our body, soul and spirit for Him to use for His glory; as we acknowledge that He can do infinitely more in and through us than we ever could on our own. - 1 Peter 5:6-7