Preparing to see wonders…

April 21st, 2005

Last night I spent some time in a Bible study on the baptism of Jesus. The author talked some about how God uses those who are His to prepare straight paths for His will. She especially talked surrounding the coming of Christ how God used people who were ready to be used, Joseph and Mary, Zechariah and Elizabeth, and in yesterday’s she focused on how John the Baptist prepared the way for the Messiah.

“The voice of one crying in the wilderness:
Prepare the way of the Lord;
Make His paths straight.
Every valley shall be filled
And every mountain and hill brought low;
The crooked places shall be made straight
And the rough ways smooth;
And all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”
Isaiah 40:3-5/Luke 3:4-6

The word used for paths (tribos) means “beaten pathway”. When I saw this I started to wonder if I go to God so regularly that my life is like a beaten pathway towards Him, or if there is any debris or clutter in my life that keeps God from using me to do great things and to prepare the way for Him. Is there a beaten pathway in my life straight and smooth for the Lord to come in and use me? When I look at the Gospel story of how God became man and came to earth to be born of a woman and walk and live as we do I am amazed. This is a wondrous thing, that God looked down on all mankind to appoint people to prepare the way for His Son and He chose Mary, Joseph and the others. I just can’t get this question from my mind: Am I prepared to do a great work of God?

God does great works every day. Everything He does is good and for His glory. Nothing happens that God did not intend and everything that happens is in His control and enveloped by His sovereign will. Sometimes we fall into a dark hole where we start saying, “Does God even work in my life?” And we wonder why He isn’t answering prayers, changing people or adapting our circumstances. Great works are God’s specialty. If we forget this we need to go back and read of the creation in Genesis and of Christ’s coming in the gospels. This is not a different God. He did wonders in the lives of Moses, Abraham, David, and so many others. He is the same God today! 2 Corinthians 1:20 says,

“For all the promises of God in Him are Yes,
and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us.”



All of God’s promises in both the Old and New Testaments of joy, love, goodness, peace, fellowship, hope, forgiveness, salvation and sanctification are made possible and completed in Christ Jesus. If I am abiding in Christ I will be prepared to see the “Yes” to all of God’s promises in my life. So I should not be posing the question of whether or not God is doing great things, instead, I should be asking myself if I am prepared for God to work in my life.

The author of this study states that in order to be prepared we need to be consecrated or sanctified to God, available and prepared to see His wonders. My mom and I had a conversation yesterday about that word sanctified. It means clean, dedicated, and holy and set apart. If I am sanctified to Him, I can see His wonders. With this thought two verses come to mind:

“Also I say to you, whoever confesses Me before men,
him the Son of Man also will confess before the angels of God.”
Luke 12:8

“Draw near to God and He will draw near to you.”
James 4:8

I couldn’t stop thinking about this even after I finished that chapter in the Bible study book. All of the promises of God are yes in Christ and that I can see those wondrous promises in my own life if I am set apart and sanctified to Him. Of course my question is how can I prepare myself for this? What I am finding is this: God is holy, I am not. I have sin. If I am going to confess Him and draw near to Him, I must be putting my sin behind me and choosing to walk in His righteousness. A very eye-opening passage on this is

“Cleanse your hands, you sinners;

and purify your hearts, you double-minded.
Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up.”
James 4:8-10
Being prepared has much to do with being broken, humble and aware of my sin. Repentance, the message of John the Baptist is one that I need to come to grips with today. I know that I try to make excuses for my sin. I like to call sin by other names so I won’t feel so bad. I shift the blame to others or my circumstances or try to ignore it. But the truth is that sin is a problem in my life as it is in every life. Not one person is clean of sin, and God will not be in the presence of sin. But those who believe are free of the bondage of sin and can draw near to the presence of God.
“Repent therefore and be converted,
That your sins may be blotted out,
So that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord”
Acts 3:19
God does great and wondrous things, if I am to be a part of them, I must be holy, pure, clean and sanctified. This is how I will be prepared to see His works in my life. I need to take my sin seriously, not just praying, “God, please forgive all the wrong things I did today.” The more I draw near to God and see how holy He is I must mourn over my sin, I must become broken. Instead of praying in a general flippant sense I can acknowledge specific ways that I had sinned in my every way, action, words, attitudes and thoughts. I must agree with the Lord in His word that my sin is against Him and that He detests it. I can ask for His forgiveness and cleansing. Seeing this very pointed explanation of confession and repentance I have really started to ask myself, do I quench the Spirit by not confessing my sins daily to the Lord? Do I have weeds of sin growing in my heart cluttering the path where it should be beaten down to make a clear way for Him?

God may be waiting on me to do some amazing things in my life or use me for His purpose but He wants to see that I am prepared for His works and sanctified to Him. I just think of how Christ came and was perfect and spotless. When He was baptized it did not symbolize cleansing, but of His devotion to the will of the Father. In Luke 3:22 God shows that He is “well pleased” by sending His Spirit onto Jesus. I want the Lord to be pleased with me. I want to know Him, to put my sin behind me daily and draw near to Him with a pure heart. Who knows what kind of wonders and works I could see, if only I will become prepared by being sanctified.

“And Joshua said the people,
‘Sanctify yourselves,
For tomorrow the Lord will do wonders among you.”
Joshua 3:5


Looking Back and Looking Ahead

April 20th, 2005

I was looking back at some of my previous entries here and I found a rather amusing one from February. In it I state that I am shocked at how our gas prices have “jumped from $1.97 to $2.05.” I laughed when I read this because when I filled up my car last week it was $2.79 a gallon! Missy told me that gas is supposed to be going up a nickel a day for awhile. So now I’m eyeing my gas gauge as it hovers just under a quarter of a tank and hoping to really prolong the pending doom of filling up, Haha!

It’s been a good week so far here. Our friend Brad flew up on Monday for a job interview, and we had a great time visiting with him. Work has been exceptionally slow and quiet and I am enjoying the minimal schedule in the office even with time to read and blog. I was feeling rather down earlier in the week, but Bobby and I had a good conversation about losing heart. He was saying that whenever we lose heart, we are loosing sight of who God is. That is a hard reality to face because I want to believe that I know God and have a clear view of who He is. But I can see now how diverted my attention gets when things go wrong. Bobby said that we really start to lose hope when we forget God’s promises. He showed me an essay he was working on and I really liked this portion of it:

———————————————————————————-
In Ecclesiastes, Solomon said that there was nothing new under the sun and that all was vanity. He goes on for two chapters describing how he hated life and how all of man’s days are sorrowful. Then he says this in Ecclesiastes 2:24-26

‘Nothing is better for a man than that he should eat and drink, and that his soul should enjoy good in his labor. This also, I saw, was from the hand of God. For who can eat or who can have enjoyment without Him? For God gives wisdom and knowledge and joy to a man who is good in His sight…”


When Solomon brings God into his thinking his tone takes a radical turn. He is no longer viewing life under the sin, but is seeing that life comes ‘from the hand of God’ who reigns above. In fact, when Solomon says ‘nothing is better’ he is essentially saying, “This is the best!” Those who live without God are missing out on the enjoyment He brings to life. They aren’t enjoying the good in their labor that is done for Him. They don’t have the wisdom and knowledge and joy He gives to those who are good in His sight. They don’t have life as it was made to be! When we believe that we are going to see God’s goodness in our lives, we will be able to get out of bed every morning excited about being alive!
———————————————————————————
I’m really missing out if I’m trying to make it each day on my own or stuck in disappointments of life. I’m being renewed today to see that God is so good and that when I am waiting on Him and looking only to Him for strength, direction and sustenance…this is life worth living!
“I would have lost heart unless I had believed
That I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.
Wait on the Lord, be of good courage,
And He shall strengthen your heart. Wait, I say on the Lord!”
Psalm 27:13-14


Two Options

April 19th, 2005

Pain and suffering have been on my mind. I am learning what it means to wait on the Lord, believe in His goodness and be patient with all. These lessons sound nice, but these things are learned through difficult conversations, hard realizations and seeing a great deal of pain in others or caused by others. In all of these things I hurt. I keep coming back to this truth that all of life is in God’s hands and that my focus cannot remain on the overwhelming changing circumstances but on our good and change-less God. He is my healer, comforter, hope and life.

When in the midst of hurt these realities of God are not always fresh on my mind. I can sometimes become very preoccupied with disappointment, with what needs to change, wondering why it is happening or what I ought to be learning from it. Sometimes I try to justify my self-pity by stating what has happened: struggling with my job or church, being ignored or taken advantage of, hearing a stranger slander someone close to me… I think that if I state the simple facts that they make my wallowing in them okay. But then I remember 1 Peter 3:17

“For it is better, if it is the will of God,
to suffer for doing good than for doing evil.”



I like what John MacAurthur says about this verse, “You have two options. The first is to do right even if it results in suffering.” If I am walking in obedience and suffering and pain are included in it or come afterwards I must accept this as part of God’s sovereign will for my life. MacArthur continues, “The second option is to do wrong, which will also result in suffering.” If I compromise God’s word and settle for the way I deem to be best I will cause myself hurt because of my own disobedience. This isn’t saying that every time I obey God’s will I will suffer, but sometimes there will be painful things about obeying God. I might not get to have what I want or hoped for. I look at my life today and I never would have thought things in my family would be the way they are in terms of hurt, but I also never would have thought I would have the fulfillment and happiness that Lord gives me as well. I would much rather be in God’s will and live with some hurts in it rather than following my own plan and never knowing Him. It is all a matter of obedience or disobedience. Both options are present in God’s will. He wills that if I suffer, that I endure it in doing what is right so that I will grow in His strength and in doing so glorify Him. It is also in His will that if I do wrong I will suffer because He is perfect and just and if I am disobedient, He will chastise me.
MacArthur ends his thoughts with this: “So do good and avoid bringing suffering on yourself for all the wrong reasons.”


Life After Taxes

April 18th, 2005

This weekend a couple of friends and I visited some local garage sales to see what bargains we could find. After a couple of hours, none of us had found anything we couldn’t live without. Even at our last stop, I didn’t find anything, but I eyed a long fluffy-looking cream-colored couch and sat down on it while my friends looked around. The woman who lived there came over and started to talk to me about the couch and telling me what a nice piece of furniture it was. I agreed, and as one does at garage sales, asked how much she wanted for it. She stated, “I’ll give it to you for five dollars.” I had no plan to buy a couch, but immediately responded, “I’ll take it.” I spent some time later that afternoon cleaning it and wondering what we could do with our old one. Bobby’s grandma had given us a loveseat when we were married, but it is well worn and out-dated, ’80s style…I keep it hidden under a slipcover. So we are excited that four adults can sit on this new one at the same time, and even lay completely outstretched on it too. This purchase was my bargain of all time and I doubt that I will ever top such a deal!

Other than the new-couch excitement, we had a relaxing weekend. Friday evening we attended a high school musical presentation of “Hello Dolly!” Saturday afternoon we enjoyed the sun at a baseball game. Sunday we had various church activities and at night Ty came with us out to a delicious dinner at California Pizza Kitchen. I’m glad that it is Monday, and post-the April 15th tax deadline. I think it’s going to be a nice slow week at the office.

I’ve been giving some thought the last few days to time. I get somewhat overwhelmed when I think about time and how fast it passes, we can’t change it and how it never stops. The concepts of time have really begun to pre-occupy my thoughts: How long? When? Are two questions I am often asking and I have to remind myself to believe fully and rest in the fact that God controls time. He invented time and he has put man into its realm and we live in submission to it because it never stops, but only keeps on passing each second without change. The sun rises and sets with all of mankind for all of history and in the entire universe obeying its toll. There are several things in my mind that I am looking forward to or wondering about and they are all wither future happenings or present realities that have been tainted by happenings in the past. I don’t just dwell on the idea of time, but rather how time and life are inseparably woven together. Or more particularly how my life and time are connected and I cannot, in my small mind comprehend my future developing in it. In a minimal sense I can recognize the fact that God has always existed in eternity past and that He will always exist in eternity to come. But I find myself often feeling bewildered as I seek to walk close to this everlasting God confined to this realm between these two eternities. This morning I turned to the Word to better align my perplexed thoughts of time and life with God’s.

“Indeed You have made my days as handbreadths,
and my age is nothing before You;
Certainly every man at his best state is but a vapor.”
Psalm 39:5

“You do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away.”
James 4:14

Life is short and there is much uncertainty in it. This is what I was feeling very discouraged about and realized that I need to learn to stay focused on the fact that God is certain. He gives meaning and purpose in life for us to redeem the time He gives us.
“The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.”
2 Peter 3:9

“See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise,
redeeming the time because the days are evil.”
Ephesians 5:15-16

God keeps me here for a purpose: the work of spreading His name and bringing Him glory. I have many ways to spend the time I have been given, but it is all a matter of focusing on God and not time or life.

“So what shall I offer to my Lord?
All that I’ve asked Him, He’s done more.
Return to your rest, oh my soul,
For His goodness has made me whole.

He delivers my soul from death,
My eyes from tears.
He keeps my feet from falling,
My cry He will hear.

I will offer my thanksgiving
That’s all I have to give.
I called upon the name of the Lord
And He let me live.”



What Happens After We Die?

April 15th, 2005

Last night Bobby and I watched a very interesting edition of the CNN show Larry King Live. Larry had a number of religious leaders making up the panel: an evangelical Christian, Roman Catholic, Muslim, Jew, Atheist and spiritualist. The question posed to each of them was, “What happens after we die?” Most everyone on the panel except for the evangelical Christian and the Atheist said that what happens depends on the works and righteousness you produce in life. Some said there was no such thing as hell. The Atheist was convinced that there is nothing after death, but simply the end of existence. Others sounded hopeful, that somehow all that they have done will get them into good favor with God. John MacArthur was the only one who talked about Jesus. So, needless to say, there were many concerning viewpoints represented and I found it refreshing when Larry turned to John MacArthur and asked him “What happens after we die?” John MacArthur answered, “Well, when you die, you go to one of two places, according to scripture. You go out of the presence of God forever, or you go into the presence of God forever. Depending upon your personal relationship with Jesus Christ, which is according to the Bible the only way to enter heaven.”

Though the show already aired, I recommend reading the transcript available at CNN’s website by simply following this link:
What Happens After We Die?



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