When Our Children Reject Us

 

When my daughter grew into a young woman, she distanced herself from me for sharing Jesus and Bible verses with her and some of her friends. She believed that I was trying to convert them and this offended her. She stopped contacting me and eventually told me to stop contacting her. People ask me all the time how I can possibly deal with my daughter’s rejection of me.

I remind these caring people that my trust and hope is in God. My spirit is Born Again and Christ in me helps my human soul. My soul – my thoughts, emotions and choices – misses fellowship with my only daughter. However, my spirit rejoices, because she realizes my strong commitment to Christ.

One day she will comprehend that I live my life according to all of the teachings of Christ, not just the popular ones. For the glory of God, I imparted to my children the wisdom of Biblical precepts and knowledge (Proverbs 22:6; Deuteronomy 4:9; 6:6-9).  I know that one day they will all be encouraged and strengthened by these same convictions, which I cling to.

God has a plan for each of our children. God fills our quiver with them and then shows us in which direction to aim them as arrows into the future (Psalm 127:4-5; Proverbs 29:17). Paul commended Timothy because he shared the same faith as his mother and grandmother (2 Timothy 1:5). My younger son already shares and lives by Biblical faith. I look forward to the day when my daughter and my older son come to faith in Christ as well (2 Timothy 3:14-15).

Prayer:

Father God, we surrender our children to Your care and Your purposes for their life. Teach our children by Your Spirit and impart Your wisdom and peace into their lives (Isaiah 54:13). We release them into Your care, protection, direction and provision (Psalm 127:3–5). Humble them until they exalt You in their life. Protect them in the palm of Your hand and draw them to Your bleeding heart by Your sacrificial love.

Thought for the Day:

Children are a gift from God; they are a reward from Him. – Psalm 127:3

The Mind of Christ

Jesus laid down His life for everyone ever born in the entire world throughout the ages of time (John 3:16). However, most people reject His provision. This also occurred in the days of Noah. There was plenty of room in the Ark, but only one family chose to believe God. Jesus asks us to take up our cross daily (Matthew 16:24). He commands us to love one another with the same sacrificial love that He has for us (John 13:34-35).

Jesus gave up His home in glory, humbled Himself and took on the form of a man in order to pay the sin debt we owed (2 Corinthians 8:9; Philippians 2:7). He came to serve, not to be served (Matthew 20:28). We take His yoke upon us and learn of Him (Matthew 11:29). Then, we allow Him to meet the needs of the saved and unsaved through us. We take on one another’s burdens, just as He took our sins upon Himself.

Jesus wants us to network with others to provide for the needs of our community. Each day, as God gives us an opportunity, let us do good things for everyone, and especially for those in God’s family (Galatians 6:10). God equips us to love Him with all of our heart, soul, mind and strength (Mark 12:30), and then provides us with His strength to minister to His Body. He is our constant help and our refuge in times of trouble (Psalm 46:1).

God’s grace is totally sufficient for us, and His strength is made perfect in our weakness. Therefore, we can actually boast in our weaknesses, because then the power of Christ is manifested through us. We take pleasure in trials and tribulation, because when we are weak, He is strong within us (2 Corinthians 12:9-10). There is no need for us to entertain fearful or depressing thoughts over our circumstances, because God’s joy becomes our strength (Nehemiah 8:10; Isaiah 12:2).

God is never far from us, and He always hastens to help us, even when His timing is not as fast as we would like it to be (Psalm 22:19). At times, spiritual warfare is taking place in the heavenly realm, just to provide us with our needs (Daniel 10:12-14). When the fiery darts of Satan descend upon us, God is our shield. Our heart safely trusts in Him, because He always helps us. His provision gives us joy and fills our heart with songs of praise for Him (Psalm 28:7-8, 118:14).

Prayer:

Lord God, be gracious to us, as we wait upon You. You give us your strength with each new morning and You save us in our times of trouble (Isaiah 33:2; Isaiah 40:29-31). You give us stable passage as You call us to walk among the mountain tops with You (Habakkuk 3:19). You gave us Your example by forfeiting Your home in glory and by taking the form of a servant in human likeness (Philippians 2:7). Therefore, we lay down our life for You and for those You bring our way, because we want to love You as You have loved us.

Thought for the Day:

Jesus loved us so completely that He gave up His heavenly identity and humbled Himself as a man.

Sacrificial Love

In following Jesus’ example and direction, we live with sacrificial love for everyone around us. We put the needs of others ahead of our own needs. We give our resources, time, energy, empathy and compassion. However, this lifestyle will deplete our emotional energy, if we live it in the flesh. Codependent people are servants at heart, and they give so much to so many so often, that they burn out. God tells us to love others as we love our self. We need to take time to meet our needs too, and to allow others to meet our needs.

The only way we can truly love others sacrificially is through obedience to the Spirit of God. We grow into the fullness of the stature of Christ because His Spirit transforms us into His likeness (Ephesians 4:13; 2 Corinthians 3:18). God’s love within us allows us to forgive the slights, abuses and violations perpetrated against us. He also enables us to cry with those who suffer; and rejoice, without jealousy or bitterness, with those who are celebrating (Romans 12:15).

The world, the flesh and the devil do not want us to love unconditionally. They want us to fling accusations concerning our trials into the face of God (Matthew 16:23). They want us to react in hate, to wallow in bitterness and to unleash all of our negative emotions on the one who hurt us. However, Jesus says to turn the other cheek (Matthew 5:39). It is hard to do that when our normal response is to fight back. With each temptation to disobey the Lord, we struggle to lay down our life, and instead, to take up His life within us.

We face a struggle between our fleshly nature and God’s Spirit (Galatians 5:1, 25). We want to do what is right, but we often fail in times of crisis (Matthew 6:22-23, 16:13-16). Finding Christian friends who are experiencing a similar life crisis soothes our soul and gives us prayer partners. God proves His love and kindness to us as He guards, fortifies and leads us through these troubled waters. In the end, God’s faithful Saints will receive commendation, prominence and even more authority, once the Lord returns for us (1 Peter 1:7).

Our sacrifice of love is an expression of our love for and gratitude toward God. The world recognizes us as Believers, because of the depth of our love for one another and for the world around us (John 13:34-35). There are so many hurting people in the world who need the love of God; and we are just the ones to show them that we love them, because He first loved us. We have the only true, eternal hope, which is available to offer to our hurting family, friends, associates, neighbors and even people we have only just met (Romans 5:5).

Prayer:

Father God, many of life’s storms come to prove that our faith in Your faithfulness is valid, and worth more to us than any earthly riches. You often allow tribulation in our life to prove to us that You love us, or to redirect our course of action and to center us in Your will for our life. We can patiently wait and watch for Your divine intervention on our behalf (Exodus 14:13). Help us to share Your sacrificial love only with those You want us to reach out to.

Thought for the Day:

God so loved the whole world that He sacrificially gave His only begotten Son to save us from a life of sin.

It's Not Your Normal Beatitudes

 

Faith and works are opposites. We prove our faith by our works, but we cannot work to build up our faith (James 2:17). Exercising our faith brings us patience, until patience does her work of perfection in us (James 1:3-4). Everything in the spiritual life begins and ends with Christ. He authors as well as completes our faith, because He took our shame and conquered sin death. Now He sits in His rightful place on His throne at the right hand of God (Hebrews 12:2).

We always view the Beatitudes as attributes that Jesus requires of us in order for us to inherit His blessings. We look discouragingly at the long inventory, and abandon any hope of ever reaching such holy heights in spirituality. However, Christ in us turns the remarks of His message into a declaration of His work in our life, rather than an itemized list of accomplishments to which we should aspire (Matthew 5:1-12). Look at the Beatitudes from God’s perspective rather than from ours. 

As long as we live in pride, the eyes of our understanding are glazed over by our arrogance (Ephesians 1:18). We cannot understand God’s Word. Only when Christ reveals to us how poor in spirit we actually are, do we have any hope of inheriting the Kingdom of God. Realizing our depravity, we call on Christ to save us. We mourn our hopelessness and He comforts us with His salvation. Only by admitting our sinful state of corruption may we inherit the earth.

We live our life sanctified by His Spirit, hungering and thirsting after more and more righteousness until He satisfies our longing and fills our famished soul (Psalm 107:9). God shows us His mercy, as we are merciful to fellow sinners, and forgives us as we forgive others (Acts 17:11). When we submit to God, He guarantees that we will see Him, because He cleanses our heart from sin. Due to the work of Christ in our life, the Lord of peace allows His children to act as blessed peacemakers.

Even if we are persecuted for the sake of righteousness, Christ in us bears the pain and gives us the inheritance of His Kingdom as our own. Faith connects us to the reality of God’s Spirit, and His Spirit assures us of His faithfulness. We live by faith in the Son of God, because He loves us and gave Himself as a ransom for our sins (Ephesians 5:2). The Kingdom of Heaven is not about the carnal pursuits of eating and drinking, but about seeking His Spirit’s righteousness, peace and joy (Romans 14:17).

Prayer:

Father God, if our identity is wrapped up in our performance, we are slaves to society. We work our self into a frenzy to acquire success and this world’s goods. We work like slaves to secure a retirement that may never come. We run on a treadmill that leads to an endless road of hectic activity. As authentic Born Again Christians, You place Your boundless fullness in our human spirit. We ask You to use our body, soul and spirit for Your glory.

Thought for the Day:

It is time to stop taking God’s love for granted (Romans 5:8), and to start loving others with eternal, sacrificial love rather than only through impatient tolerance (John 13:34).