God's Purpose in Troubling Times

 

 

Have you noticed the slow deterioration of life, as we know it? Governments, financial affairs, justice, personal commitments, geography and climate are all failing. What hope does mankind have of surviving into eternity? There is only one sure hope and that is a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. 

 

The coming of God's Kingdom is just around the corner. We are only ready to enter into it if we realize how intensely our fleshly indulgences grieve God's heart and that we need a Savior. God offers us His free gift of salvation. We simply admit that we are sinners, turn away from our selfish lifestyle and turn to follow Jesus. 

 

There is an unprecedented time of intense suffering coming to the world. Yet, God is not willing for anyone to perish (2 Peter 3:9). He offers His ark of salvation for anyone who is willing to come aboard (Matthew 24:37). Like Jesus, we live to serve our living God. 

 

Sometimes, we have to realize that the "prince of Persia" is hindering God's answer to our prayers, and intense spiritual warfare is going on (Daniel 10:13). That is what my husband and I experienced when we followed God's direction to sell our little brick, cottage home and to pay cash for a manufactured home in order to get out of debt. 

 

It started with my six weeks of bronchitis, pneumonia, and pleurisy. We moved into the new home with termites, leaking roof, A/C breaking down every other week, and a bank that had way too many hoops to jump through to refinance our former home as a rental. However, God is always the victor. 

 

He is blessing three of His families with our former home, and we started a Bible study group in our new mission field in our new manufactured home community. We also have a growing number of new neighbors attending our New Life church with us. God delights in blessing His children, and He uses us in ways that we could never imagine. 

 

Prayer: 

Father God, remind us that we need to confess with our mouth that "Jesus is Lord," and to sincerely believe in our heart that You raised him from the dead. Then we are justified and reconciled to You for eternity (Romans 10:9-10). Give us a revelation of Your Kingdom so that we may advance its reach in this world and prepare for its coming to the earth. Help us to have a heart for the lost that are heading for an eternity in hell. 

 

Give us opportunities to share Your love with those willing to hear Your Truth. May Your Kingdom come, and Your will be done on earth as it is already done in heaven (Matthew 6:10). It is a privilege when we realize that You have plans for us even in our trials. We dedicate our life to wholly yield to You our thoughts, words, and deeds. We look for a seed for a miracle in every trial we ever experience.

 

Thought for the Day:

I am loving life in God's presence, regardless of the circumstances. Jesus told us that in this world we WILL have tribulation. It is just a fact of life here on this sin-cursed earth. If we trust in Him with our WHOLE heart, and do not rely on our human understanding, He always sweetens the bitter lemons of circumstances into lemonade (Romans 8:28).

God’s Eternal Compassion

 

 

Many people scoff at Believers who say that Jesus’ return to earth is eminent. This influences their desire to commit their life to Him. Yet, God’s mercy is everlasting and is new every single morning. He desires that no one should perish in eternal torment, but that everyone will accept His free gift of salvation through Jesus Christ (Psalm 100:5; Lamentations 3:22-24; 2 Peter 3:8-10).  

 

When we first come to the saving knowledge of God’s plan for our life, we love Him because He loved us first (1 John 4:19). However, through the years of our increasing intimacy in our union with Him, we learn to love Him for who He is and for His personal compassion and care for each one of us (Psalm 86:15).

 

Satanic forces are rampant in our world and attempt to draw us away from God’s love and redemption. They fill our mind and draw our hearts away from God with sage inspiration that sounds good to the human mind. However, there is no eternal salvation in any of the deeds or promoters of these false religions and ways of thinking (John 10:10-11; 2 Peter 1:16).

 

If God is in us, nothing anyone can say or do against us will prosper. Lying tongues will be silenced, persecutors will be won by our continued faith in Christ, and God freely gives us everything we need to flourish in our lifetime. His love for us is everlasting (Romans 8:28-32; 1 John 4:7-11; Jeremiah 31:3).

 

God is with us through every heart break and tribulation we experience; therefore, we have no reason for discouragement, confusion, or defeat. He abides within us and walks with us and gives us strength to endure every trial we encounter without fear or disappointment or grief (Isaiah 41:10).

 

Prayer:

Father God, we thank You that nothing and no one can separate us from the love of Christ. No tribulation, exposure, distress, persecution, hunger, peril, demonic force, or threat of death either now or in the future can ever separate us from You because You dwell in our spirit. We are more than conquerors because of Your love for us. Thank You for the height, depth and circumference of Your love for us in Jesus, our Lord (Romans 8:35-39). 

 

You are so good to us, full of mercy, abundant in Your grace, and always ready to forgive our transgressions when we call on You (Psalm 86:5). You are love, and Your love is personified to us through Jesus Christ during His life on this earth. Teach us how to reside in Your love, so we can dwell in You and You can inhabit us with the fullest measure of Your being (1 John 4:16; John 3:16-19 Amplified Bible). We are learning to love You and trust in You with our whole heart.

 

Thoughts for the Day:

We have so much for which to thank God for providing for us: salvation, clothing, food, shelter, eternal salvation, soul fulfillment, etc. We can learn contentment in both our abundance and in our lack, regardless of our negative experiences on this earth. We will pass through the floods, survive the fires, abundantly rebuild after natural disasters, and experience loss. Yet, through His love, we dwell with Him for eternity if we allow Him to convert our life from one of carnality to spiritual maturity and Godly obedience to Him.

- 1 Timothy 6:8-16; Psalm 136:26; Isaiah 43:2

Living in Prayer

 

My favorite questions to ask people are, “How was your week?” and “Is there anything we can lift up for you in prayer?” It is rare that a person has no need for prayer. This world is too full of trouble and trials to pass up even one day without prayer. In fact, God’s Word admonishes us to pray without ceasing (1 Thessalonians 5:16-28).

 

Living with a prayer in our heart is a common habit of authentic Born Again Believers. We realize that we can do nothing without God (John 15:5-7), and that all things are possible only with God (Matthew 19:26; Proverbs 3:5-6). God’s Holy Spirit inspires us to pray for people even when we have no concept of their need – He knows, and that is all that matters.

 

One day I woke up with a disappointed church member on my heart. His life fell apart, and he became a recluse, dropping out of church attendance and fellowship. I prayed for him for several hours that day. That evening, without knowing about my prayer focus, my Pastor-husband told me God gave him a divine appointment with this same man, and they had a great time of chatting about so many things.

 

The next Baptist Men’s group meeting rolled around, and my husband invited this man to attend and eat some of the Southern Gumbo he was preparing for the group at our former Bluebird Café. I was washing dishes at home and guess who I saw walking across the lawn toward the Bluebird? Yep…

 

God uses prayer to do spiritual warfare in heavenly places (Ephesians 6:12). His angelic Beings, who are for us, war against satanic forces that fight against us. When we pray, we allow God’s Spirit to use us to verbalize the will of God for our self, our family, our neighbors, and our acquaintances.

 

Prayer:

Father God, thank You that through the “hard knocks” of my life I learned that a codependent lifestyle is demonic oppression; that our thoughts often negatively control our emotions; and that repressed emotions in our subconscious mind continue to affect our conscious thoughts. You taught me to allow openness to Your will to keep me in Your peace, and that the fruit of Your Spirit can replace the negative characteristics of our personality (Galatians 5:22-23). 

 

I also learned to surrender complete control of my body, soul, and spirit to You and to allow patience to have her perfecting work in me (1 Thessalonians 5:15-25; James 1:3-4). I quit using anger, anxiety, and worry as tools of self-preservation; and instead, I learned to trust You in each moment of time to work out every trial for my good (Romans 8:28). Thank You that our faith in Your faithfulness fills our life with overflowing joy.

 

Thoughts for the Day:

We are not dependent on what others think and feel about us, but only on God’s searching inventory of our life. If He points out a sin to us, we repent and rely on Him to free us from its bondage. If He changes the direction of our life, we submit to His choice for us and trust only and completely in His goodness, grace, and compassion, even if we do not know where we are going, and if His direction makes no human sense at all.

- Genesis 12:1; Galatians 5:1; Psalm 139:23-24

Freedom from Our Consequences

 

 

In our Christian walk, we participate in spiritual disciplines like praying, reading God’s Word, doing good works, and loving others as Jesus loves us. However, we do not rely on these practices for our eternal salvation. As we submit to the Holy Spirit’s sanctifying work in our life, we enjoy our life so much more, as well as bearing much fruit for His Kingdom (John 12:24).  

 

We accept Jesus as our Savior first; and then next, we make Him Lord of our life. We give up our own plans and embrace His will for us instead. We give up our sin-filled life for His service, which ultimately saves us from reaping many consequences from our ill-conceived choices (Mark 8:34-35).

 

As Christ-followers, we nail our corrupt and sinful passions and desires to the cross of Christ, and they are crucified with Him (Galatians 2:20, 5:19-23). This is a life-long process as He perfects us a little more each day - giving us an abundant and fulfilled life. We are no longer under sin’s control, but we are more than victors by the freedom of God’s grace (Romans 6:12-14, 7:18).

 

Submission and complete surrender require character traits that are not part of our personality, but as God’s Spirit replaces our nature with His fruit, His power gives us the ability to live a bountiful life (Galatians 5:22-23). Rather than trusting in our self, we trust in the will of God and enjoy the freedom that results (Galatians 5:1).

 

We submit our selfish tendencies to God, which allows Him to work in and through us. Anything that is more important to us than God is an idol. We turn over these issues to God’s Spirit and obey Him as He removes them from our life. God’s blessings on our life requires that we love Him more than our self-life and more than any created person or thing.

 

Prayer:

Father God, we trust You every moment of our day, and we live for You rather than for our self or any idol which we adopted as our focal point. Thank You for recording in Your Word the parable Thank You for including in Your Word the words Jesus told about a group of people who recited to Him the reasons they should be allowed into His fellowship. His challenging words to them echo in our soul: “depart from me, I never knew you.” Jesus warned us that our unbelief condemns us to an eternity without His presence and of condemnation and suffering in hell (Matthew 7:21-23).

 

Keep us from living as a false convert who felt conviction for our sin, but were never converted. We want to allow You to make us a new creation in You (2 Corinthians 5:17). We do not want to continue to wallow in sin and deprivation, but to flourish by Your Spirit and to walk in Your Word. We were not born to gratify our needs, but to serve You with every fiber of our being (Ephesians 2:10). Not our will, but Yours be done both in us, and also on earth as it is in Heaven (Matthew 6:10).

 

Thoughts for the Day:

As we fully rely on God, we mature spiritually, grow in our faith, are relieved of the punishment for our sins as well as experiencing conformity to the image of Jesus. As we daily die to our self-life, we rejoice in the existence we have in Jesus Christ, our Lord. We serve as His ambassadors in this world as we follow His perfect plans for our life.

- John 3:30; Galatians 5:24-25; Ephesians 4:22-24; Colossians 3:10; Romans 6:1-6

Managing Stress

 

Doctors and scientists agree that stress is a killer. It slowly erodes our health in many areas, and this is totally unnecessary. When we access God’s peace, we override the influence of stress on our spirit, soul, and body (Ephesians 2:14-18; Philippians 4:6-7). God gives us many resources to combat stress in our life.

 

One is to teach us the balance between the expectations of responsibilities, and times of rest and relaxation. We often overly schedule our daily calendar and overcommit in areas where God is not calling us to participate. This isolates us from our family, friends, and church family that otherwise can offer us support for our trials in life.

 

God gives us His Body to help us to realize that there is strength in numbers. The Body not only supports us spiritually, but emotionally, physically, and mentally as well. When we only function in the areas in which God calls us to minister, this allows others the privilege of service and the joys of giving their time and effort in His calling for them too.

 

Satan loves to destroy churches by dividing a Body of Believers over inconsequential aspects. This weakens our light in our community, and it disgraces the name of God before unbelievers. Satan undermines our assistance to God with petty squabbles, satanic lies in our mind, and hurt feelings.

 

When we allow Satan’s lies, wounded feelings, and differences in our talents, opinions, and service to erupt into controversy between us and members of our church family, we disrupt the flow of a means of God’s love and support in our life and community. United we stand in the power of God’s Spirit and calling on our life, but division causes undue stress for everyone.

 

Prayer:

Father God, help us to rely on Your Word during times of stress in our life. The loss of a loved one, our vocation, our home, our income, our treasured possessions, and/or our health will all increase our stress. Remind us that our connections to Your Body through our world-wide church family help us to flourish during these times of trials through their outpouring of love and support for us.

 

Your presence in our life each moment of our day helps us to traverse rocky roads with confidence in You, and we look for the miracle that You plant in every trial we experience. Remind us to spend more time in the study and reading of Your Word during times of stress, to breathe deeply, and to fellowship often with Your Saints. We experience Your goodness and grace each moment of the day as we commune with You in prayer without ceasing.

 

Thoughts for the Day:

The Lord takes pleasure in our fulfillment in body, soul, and spirit, and He pours out on us His great love and compassion. As we lift up our heavy head and heart to Him, He helps us in every time of need. He instructs us in His ways and in His will for our individual life through every stage of glory that His Spirit leads us through.

- Psalm 35:27, 121:1-2, 8; Lamentations 3:20-25; 2 Corinthians 3:18

 

A Good Marriage - A Successful Second Marriage

 

 

It is a known fact that second marriages are not any more successful than our first marriage that ended in divorce or the death of our loved one. This is caused by a phenomenon called “rebounding” and possibly even a “fairy tale view” of what we think marriage should be. 

 

Too often, a divorcee or widow will run from one marriage to another. They do not allow themselves time to recover mentally, emotionally, physically, financially, and spiritually from the initial abandonment or emotional loss before jumping into another wedding. This causes them to haul the heavy baggage of their unresolved conflicts into their next marriage. 

 

Some people worry about being alone for the rest of their life, and they marry the first person who is kind to them or who has the physical attributes that attract them. The mental health experts all advise us to date many people for six months or more. This gives us an extensive idea of what type of person we can enjoy, get along with, and live with on a daily basis. 

 

Loneliness or fear may cause us to marry the same type of person that just divorced us or passed away. Many divorcees and widows ignore the red flags, which pop up with a new person. The anger in their voice, the controlling attitude, the slight irritation or disappointment, the selfish decisions, their lack of interest about what concerns us, the absence of warm affection, the broken promises, etc. are all red flags to alert us to the person's real personality. 

 

They may mask their true identity for a while, but once they know they won our affections, they gradually let their guard down. So, when we find someone who really interests us, we should casually date them as a potential mate for three months first; and then at least three more months of seeing the person every day with their family, friends, and workmates. 

 

This gives us a better view of how they really act, because they cannot pretend in front of people who already know them well. Some people even prowl around looking to marry people with money so they can take advantage of them. 

 

Giving marriage a second chance requires that we enter a new relationship with our eyes wide open. Listening to God’s Spirit will prevent us from being blindsided with another major financial as well as emotional loss. God may use us without a mate in this new chapter in our life. He has plans for us that are for our good. 

When we follow God's plans for us instead of our carnal instincts, and evil and deceitful heart (Jeremiah 17:9-10), He will provide for us better than we can in our finite scope of life. He will also give us the opportunity to deepen our intimate union with Him during this time by our self, which is the greatest gift we can ever receive this side of heaven.

 

Prayer:

Father God, the devastation of divorce or the death of our beloved spouse causes us to doubt our self, fear the future, and believe that we will be lonely and unhappy for the rest of our life. Teach us that You are our mate and that You will provide for all our needs, even the intimacy, which we crave (Isaiah 54:5; John 17:21). You stick closer to us than a brother (Proverbs 18:24). 

 

You care about all our needs; so remind us to cast our cares on You, rather than to seek a mate too quickly and to marry out of Your will for us (1 Peter 5:7). Remind us that wisely using the time after a divorce or the death of our loved one gives us the opportunity to increase the depth of our relationship with You – the true Lover of our soul. You are amazing, God, and we worship You with our whole heart.

 

Thought for the Day:

Many people unsuccessfully spend life looking for love; however, when we put our trust in God, He showers us with His unconditional agape love, and eventually may bring a reliable mate along for us in His timing and way. We can spend the time after a loss to make new friends, develop new hobbies, increase our exercise time, and serve in the ministries of our church family. These all increase our feelings of self-worth and help us to heal from the wounds of loss, rejection, and abandonment.

God’s Everlasting Life

 

 

Everlasting life is God’s free gift to all those willing to believe in salvation through Jesus alone (John 3:16-17). If we choose not to believe, we condemn our self to eternal destruction because of our unbelief (John 3:18). Once we are comfortable with our new place in God’s Kingdom, we can get to know others in His Body of Believers.

 

We learn through Bible studies and fellowship with God’s other adopted children what it means to have a forever family, and to be free from our position as aliens and foreigners on this earth (1 Peter 2:11). God is love, and those who love Him and other people are born of God and know God. However, those who follow selfish ambitions and goals do not know or love God (1 John 4:7-8).

 

Faith, hope, and love go together, but the greatest of them all is love (1 Corinthians 13:13). Love is one word that comprises such a wondrous facet of other character traits. Someone who loves has ultimate patience, is kind, does not envy, or push oneself to the forefront. They do not behave inappropriately, nor seek their own agenda (1 Corinthians 13:4-5).

 

They do not get so angry that it causes them to sin, nor do they think the worse about another person. They have no joy in sinful activity, but only rejoice in the truth. They bear the hard parts of life as well as the good, remain hopeful in God’s provision, and they endure whatever life throws at them through Christ in them (1 Corinthians 13:6-7; Colossians 1:27).

 

God came to earth in the form of a man, suffered and died to pay the penalty for us of our iniquity, and He rose again to bring redemption to anyone willing to totally surrender their life to Him (John 15:13; Psalm 26:7). We find shelter from our circumstances under the shadow of His wings, and He helps us to victoriously walk through every trial.

 

Prayer:

Father God, there is no supreme being, or god on this earth who can compare to You; yet, so many choose to follow a person or to worship their possessions and achievements instead of You. You keep all Your covenants with people, and You continually show mercy to Your Saints who walk before You with their whole heart (2 Chronicles 6:14). You call us Your children, even when the world does not recognize You or our testimony of Your goodness in our life (1 John 3:1).

 

When we were still sinners, separated from You by the great chasm of our unbelief, You showed Your love to us and continually drew us to Yourself (Romans 5:8). Fears often torment us in our circumstances, and prevent us from seeing the perfection of Your love. However, there is no fear in Your love, because Your perfect love destroys all fear as we commit to focus our faith on Your faithfulness (1 John 4:18). 

 

Thoughts for the Day:

God devotedly cares for those who allow Him to love others through them because we are God’s unconditional love “with skin on.” Each day we are ambassadors for Christ and God’s representatives in this broken and pain-filled life through which we traverse. God keeps His covenant with us and with those in every generation after us because of His love for us.

- Deuteronomy 7:9