Words of Inspiration BlogInspirational and Uplifting

The Voice Of God

Psalms 40:12b, 13 – Mine iniquities have taken hold upon me, so that I am not able to look up; therefore my heart faileth me. Be pleased, O Lord, to deliver me: O Lord, make haste to help me.

O Thou, to whose all-searching sight
The darkness shineth as the light!
Search, prove my heart; it pants for Thee;
Oh, burst these bonds, and set it free!
G. TERSTEEGEN

Yes, this sin which has sent me weary-hearted to bed and desperate in heart to morning work, that has made my plans miscarry until I am a coward, that cuts me off from prayer, that robs the sky of blueness and the earth of springtime, and the air of freshness, and human faces of friendliness,–this blasting sin which perhaps has made my bed in hell for me so long,–this can be conquered. I do not say annihilated, but, better than that, conquered, captured and transfigured into a friend: so that I at last shall say, “My temptation has become my strength! for to the very fight with it I owe my force.”
W. C. GANNETT.

Dear Friends – May these words of encouragement bless you deeply today and motivate you to take a second look at your circumstances, a reevaluation if you will of the hurts and pain, the brokenness and bitterness, and yes, even the  agonizing anger that has taken deep root within your soul to the depths that you are barely able to lift your head. And as you take a second look may you, by God’s grace, come to the revelation that your life is not over. Your best days are yet to come. The innermost desires of your heart are still God’s desires for you and He is still willing and able to bring about great things in your life if you are trusting Him.

So often in life we allow things to overwhelm us when we’ve truly prayed and asked God for guidance. People disappoint us and hurt us. People betray us. Friends walk away. Disasters happen at inopportune times and catch us unawares. The enemy likes nothing better than to see us struggling in pain and disillusionment. He is at work in our discouragement, slowly isolating  us because when we are discouraged and depressed the first thing we do is want to be alone in our misery. Once we’re isolated there is a constant barrage of destructive thoughts. We begin to feel that our situation is somehow an exception to all the rules. We are certain that our pain is different than what others suffer, deeper, more devastating, more traumatic, and in allowing these thoughts to continue, before you know it the enemy has moved in and set up a stronghold.

Beloved, scripture says there is nothing new under the sun. That means every human experience is not new even if we’ve determined in our hearts that surely no one has been hurt like this, surely no one has suffered so many blows that they are no longer able to function. The worst thing we can do in desperate times is convince ourselves that our situation is too far gone for God to give assistance, our situation is too heavy for God to carry us through, and worst of all, God doesn’t seem to even notice our situation anymore and Heaven seems silent.

When we have suffered so much for so long it begins to look hopeless to us. When the darkness is unrelenting though we pray fervently to the best of our ability, we stand on the brink of giving up. But the good news is this is when God is doing His greatest work in us. For you see, the seeming silence of Heaven, when it seems God is not talking to us, is actually just the opposite. God is preparing us for great things. We have others around us watching us, watching what we will do, how we will react, and just when is our God going to show up. Well it may not seem like it but God is always on time. Just when we think we’ve surely lost our minds  and everything else in our life, He shows up. God knew you could handle the stress, the anxiety, the seeming overload because He gave you what it takes beforehand. He knew you could do it but did you? He never left your side. He has every confidence in us but do we have the same confidence in Him?

In Joel Osteen’s book “Every Day A Friday” he says, “When He (God) is silent, don’t assume He has left you. He is right there with you during the test….God is not mad at you when He is silent. He has not forsaken you. His silence is a sign that He has great confidence in you. He knows you have what it takes…”.  Scripture says He never gives us more than we can handle without making a way of escape. Knowing this, we should be rejoicing even in the tough times because what a privilege to discover the God that created the Universe has such confidence in us. So may we never be tempted to throw away our confidence as it is truly one of God’s priceless treasures and His word says it has great recompense of reward.

If you want the deeper things of God it takes a greater faith. You must learn to trust Him with your life and all that it encompasses. If your wounds are always open and bleeding then the pain is easily triggered by sometimes unexpected events, but usually a more familiar happening, a song, seeing a particular person, a certain locale. You may go back and relive the painful experience. You may revisit the devastating circumstances over and over in your mind. Yes, you may even feel justified in doing so because in your reality, it was an exceptional pain, an exceptional injustice. But beloved, in doing so we only hurt ourselves. God wants us to let it go and let Him heal us. We can’t be healed if we constantly look back, constantly indulge ourselves in these excuses that no one understands us or how bad our pain really is. God understands us, God understands how deep the pain is and how devastating to our lives the wound has become, but He not only offers healing if we trust Him, His word says what the enemy means for evil God will use for good, our good, and the good of those around us.

There will always be opposition to our faith. We have to understand that to go higher with God usually means more opposition, greater obstacles. But God is the one that will fight for us. When we come to the end of ourselves and can’t seem to find a way to keep going then God will carry us. He doesn’t want us to spend our lives running around putting out fires. He doesn’t want us to waste our days avoiding every trigger of that familiar failure, pain, etc., running from life looking for some safe haven with which to rest. No, He will fight our battles for us while we continue to trust Him and grow and begin to experience all the life He’s providing, exceeding, abundantly above all we could have ever asked or thought. As Tullian Tchividjian so profoundly states it, “The gospel is not a command to hang onto Jesus. Rather, it’s a promise that no matter how weak your faith may be in seasons of spiritual depression, God is always holding on to you”.

If you’re plagued with torment from the past, past hurts, past failures, commit it to Him. Commit it to Him and leave it alone. God is able to deal with it. Scripture says He will vindicate us. Scripture says He prepares a table before us in the presence of our enemies. By trusting Him explicitly, even if you just start with baby steps, soon you will be sitting at that table dining on God’s bounty while your enemies look on. What a testimony! And by baby steps I mean perhaps you are deeply troubled, so troubled that you can’t even lift your head or speak, but give God a day, give Him a week, totally let it go and trust Him for a short amount of time. Then as  you see He is faithful in the short-run, trust Him for the long haul. He is the same yesterday, today and forever. What He’s done for others He will do for you. With man these things seem impossible, but not with God, for with God all things are possible.

Don’t let the enemy isolate you and convince  you you can’t be fixed, your problems are too complex, too far reaching. No shut the door on him and  his wiles for scripture says he comes to steal, kill and destroy. As believers we are commanded to take captive every thought that sets itself up against God. Yes, we may feel bad about life, but we’re not failures utterly. We may have been down for a season, but don’t count us out. The pain may have been devastating but give it to God. Allow Him to take whatever brokenness and/or bitterness that is keeping you from living life to the fullest and bring about His good in your life. For when you allow Him free reign in your life you often find the scope of His Love and healing is far greater than you ever imagined. Not only do you find peace, joy, healing, strength for the journey that you’re on, but His Love touches others in your life, and before long you’ve got a powerful testimony rather than a pitiful mess.

If you are so distraught that the only prayer you can utter is, “I commit this to You”, that is good enough for God. Do it every time you feel like you can’t make it. God is a God of justice and He will not allow us to be used and abused indefinitely when we are trusting Him for our care. God will show up when we least expect it and show Himself strong on our behalf. Those who stand against us or those who may not necessarily stand against us but have hurt us deeply will see God show up and bless us. Yes, dear ones, you will set at His table and dine in their very presence. Man may have counted you out, but God says you’re just getting started.

So if Heaven seems silent to you, my friends, just know of a certainty that you are much farther along than you realize. Know assuredly that God has been at work in your life in a powerful way. For in the silence you’ve been searching, searching the scriptures, praying for wisdom, direction, deliverance. Take heart, for God has heard your prayers and the pit you have been in for so long will soon be forgotten when His glory is revealed to you, in you, on you, through you, and all to the glory of God. Scripture says “by grace ye are saved, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God”, and what a gift it is. We don’t earn it, we can’t buy it, we just reach out and by faith we believe it, and we receive it. This great grace is touching your life today because you have chosen to trust Him, and the glory is about to be revealed. Don’t give up and don’t give in, only believe. Let the very thing that broke you, the very circumstance that brought you into the pit you’ve been in for so long, be the catapult in your life to be all that God created you to be. Let the very thing that makes you feel the weakest, hurts unbearably, and causes you the greatest fear, be the thing  that with God’s help you capture and conquer, so that as W. C. Gannett said,  ”My temptation has become my strength! for to the very fight with it I owe my force.”

In His Love,

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