Monthly Archives: August 2014

Day Twenty-Three: Credit Where Credit is Due

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READ: Judges 7:1-7

(1) Jerub-Baal (Gideon) got up early the next morning, all his troops right there with him.  They set up camp at Harod’s Spring.  The camp of Midian was in the plain, north of them near the Hill of Moreh.

(2-3) God said to Gideon, “You have too large an army with you.  I can’t turn Midian over to them like this–they’ll take all the credit, saying, “I did it all myself,’ and forget about me.  Make a public announcement: ‘Anyone afraid, anyone who has any qualms at all, may leave Mount Gilead now and go home.'”  Twenty-two companies headed for home.  Ten companies were left.

(4-5) God said to Gideon: “There are still too many.  Take them down to the stream and I’ll make a final cut.  When I say, ‘This one goes with you,’ he’ll go.  When I say, ‘This one doesn’t go,’ he won’t go.”  So, Gideon took the troops down to the stream.

(5-6) God said to Gideon: “Everyone who laps with his tongue, the way a dog laps, set on one side.  And everyone who kneels to drink, drinking with his face to the water, set to the other side,”  Three hundred lapped with their tongues from their cupped hands.  All the rest knelt to drink.

(7) God said to Gideon: “I’ll use the three hundred men who lapped at the stream to save you and give Midian into your hands.  All the rest may go home.”

 

THINK:  The book of Judges is filled with violence.  Christians struggle to understand how God’s redemptive plan can involve these events.  Yet God’s power is at work when the Israelites battle foreign, pagan armies.  God uses Gideon to lead the nation into battle for his purposes.  But as he guides Gideon, he asks much of him.  God cuts Gideon’s army down from thirty-two thousand men to ten thousand, and eventually to three hundred.  God wants to show HIS power through Gideon.  He wants Israel to credit him.

     When have you accomplished things in your own strength and taken all the credit while forgetting about God?  When have you accomplished things that seemed big and impossible, knowing you did so only because God intervened?

 

PRAY:  Write a list of huge requests you have for God–things so large that if they came to fruition, you would know they did so only because God intervened.  Spend time praying through this list.

 

LIVE:  Review your list on a regular basis, watching for God’s incredible–and at times subtle–intervention.  As you see God’s faithfulness, thank him often that he is a caring friend.

 

My husband and I have had pretty big plan for our lives for nearly all of our married lives.  Life has happened and things have popped up that have made us rethink when this plan might be able to come to fruition, but it’s never ceased to be our plan.  With our current situation, it appears as though our plan has been derailed.  I don’t know if this means that God has a new plan for us or if He has decided to make this plan happen in His timing so we can’t take credit for it, but I can say that, right now, things look pretty bleak on the front of this thing happening.  And this is not the only dream that has seemingly been derailed.  Usually, I chock situations like this up to the idea that “this must not be God’s will for my life” but these things were pretty big.  So big, in fact, that we had arranged big chunks of our lives and our plans to make them happen.  And they were good goals.  But if I have learned anything over the course of our last three years (and this last year specifically) it has been to remember to hold things loosely, with an open hand.  Everything in my life that I have ever tried to clutch onto, to cling to, has been yanked from my grasp.  And IT HAS HURT to have it wrenched away from me.  But what hurt the most was the realization that what I most hated losing my grasp on was control. 

 

Funny how, when you think you’ve surrendered your life to the Lord, He has to point out to you all the areas where you haven’t really surrendered complete control  It’s like we tell God:  You can have this much, but no more.  You can go this far, but not farther.  Have you ever noticed:  That only works with God for so long before you are brought to a point where he pushes the issue.  Eventually, you have to take a step of obedience (or not).  You have to take a leap of faith (or not). 

 

Maybe you’ll be like Gideon and have to throw out 3 fleeces before you are certain God has really meant what He said or that He was really talking to you.  Maybe you’ll be so scared to be obedient that you’ll have to do so in the cover of darkness, but you WILL do it.  Maybe you’ll question God every step of the way because none of what He’s asking you to do makes any sense, but you still keep walking the path He has set you on.  And maybe you’ll be scared the entire way, but you’ll keep walking.  It’s the faith that keeps you walking, not the fear you feel with every step.  And it’s the faith that will be rewarded – like the so great a cloud of witnesses mentioned in Hebrews 11.  Just don’t stop walking, scared or not.  Then, once you’ve reached the end, you will see that you have walked the path God laid out for you, scared as can be, and what has been accomplished is a lifetime of actions that you never would’ve dreamed you could’ve accomplished on your own.  And for that, you will have to give God all the glory, because without Him, you’d still be sitting in your tent, thinking that surely God is requiring too much of you, even if what He’s asking you to do will lead you straight to the big dreams you’ve hoped for your entire life.

Day Twenty-one: Reflections for Week 3

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Well, this one should have come before Day Twenty-two.  But I got them out of order.  OH WELL!

Yesterday made the end of the third week of working through this devotional.  Hard to believe.  It’s been nearly a month, and one thing that I’ve come to realize through this process, so far, is that motivation to begin will only take you so far.  After that, it takes discipline. 

 

Another thing:  I decided, at the beginning, to blog my way through this because I knew that I would need some accountability to get my way through this, otherwise it would be far too easy to stop.  I was right. 

 

#3 – I enjoy that I’ve received so many likes and follows so far.  But it is very easy for me to look at that and forget why I started doing this in the first place.  It’s nice that so many people are reading this, or looking at it, but my purpose in is (or ought to be) to glorify God and see His Name lifted High, not mine.  Affirmation is great.  It’s wonderful, in fact.  But I should not be reliant upon the number of emails in my inbox to let me know that this is something I need to do.

 

#4 – No…indeed, I need to do because I NEED this.  I need to make the time to get before God every day.  If I don’t, I forget to keep the main thing the main thing.  With all the stuff that I’ve got going on, it’s easy to “get busy” and forget to get with God.  Too many days of that in a row, and my problems begin to seem bigger than my God.  I’ve had enough of my problems looking bigger than my God.  I’ve had enough of feeling like they are going to swallow me whole or take me over. So, I am going to make this my priority.  I have to make it my priority.  That is the only way God is going to be magnified over the course of this walk of mine.

 

#5 – It’s taken me 30 years to figure out #4.  Fortunately, I’ve got it now.  I praise God that He held on to me (and with me) long enough for me to get it.

Day Twenty-two: An Unqualified Yes

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READ:  Joshua 24:16-24

 

(16) The people answered, “We’d never forsake God!  Never!  We’d never leave God to worship other gods.”

(17-18) God is out God!  He brought up our ancestors from Egypt and from slave conditions.  He did all those great signs while we watched.  He has kept his eye on us all along the roads we’ve traveled and among the nations we’ve passed through.  Just for us he drove out all the nations, Amorites and all, who lived in the land.

           “Count us in:  We too are going to worship God.  He’s our God.”

(19-20) Then Joshua told the people: “You can’t do it; you’re not able to worship God.  He is a holy God.  He is a jealous God.  He won’t put up with your fooling around and sinning.  When you leave God and take up the worship of foreign gods, he’ll turn right around and come down on you hard.  He’ll put an end to you–and after all the good he has done for you!”

(21) But the people told Joshua, “No!  No!  We worship God!”

(22) And so Joshua addressed the people:  “You are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen God for yourselves–to worship him.”

        And they said, “We are witnesses.”

(23) Joshua said, “Now get rid of all the foreign gods you have with you.  Say an unqualified Yes to God, the God of Israel.”

(24) The people answered Joshua, “We will worship God.  What he says, we’ll do.”

 

PRAY:  “As you read of the Israelites’ passionate desire to follow God (“We’d never forsake God!”), what is your reaction to them?  When you take a bird’s-eye view of the history of Israel, noticing their many rebellions against God and inability to stay committed, what does it make you think and feel?  Do you relate to Israel at all–in their desire, in their failure, or both?  Talk to God about your thoughts and feelings, eventually sitting quietly to listen for his response.

 

THINK/LIVE:  Write about your prayer experience.  What was it like for you?  What stood out to you about the Israelites?  About yourself?  About God?  If you contemplated your own fickleness or zeal, do you sense that God is leading or challenging you in some way regarding this?  Make a note of anything that seems significant.

 

Passages like this and the feelings/thoughts they dredge up have been convicting for me on many different levels over the course of my life.  When things have been going well, it’s been difficult for me to believe that the Israelites could ever turn their backs on God.  However, over the course of the past three years, it’s been no trouble at all. 

 

It’s easy to give God an unqualified yes when things are going well.  But, when it looks like God is leading your through the valley of the shadow of death, those yeses become more and more hesitant and more and more conditional.  There have been many times when I’ve wanted a guarantee other than Heaven if I am going to be required to walk the path I’m on at the moment.  I’ve prayed many prayers to that effect, as well.  None of them has been granted, so far as I can remember.  Especially during these last three years. 

 

However, the moment that my prayer changed from “God, if you’ll just….” to “God, it doesn’t matter if I ever get what I want, I will worship you and give you all the praise and honor and glory,” suddenly, my situation didn’t look as bleak.  Nothing had changed but my attitude, but BOY!  What a change!

 

I’ve learned a few things about the Israelites, God, and myself over the past year or so.  For one, I’ve learned that I really am no different than the Israelites.  I’m forever chasing after one thing or another that is not God, until He lets me get into some hot water that brings me crawling back to Him.  And all the while, God is there.  Waiting for me to come back to my senses, as soon as I realize that I’ve been chasing after everything BUT Him.  Sometimes that realization takes longer than other times.  But eventually they all look like desperation over being constantly disappointed at never being fulfilled, at never being satisfied.  Yet, when I give God an unqualified yes, I begin to realize that the things I had been using to fill my need for fellowship with God are all woefully inadequate to fill that need.  But, there’s God. 

 

I don’t know who all is reading this.  I don’t know if you are walking with the Lord, or what your walk looks like right now.  Maybe you are going through something so painful you feel like God has left you to fend for yourself and try as you might, every time you cry out for comfort, it seems to come back void.  If that is you,  can I suggest something?  Give God unfettered access to your heart.  Ask Him to search you and see if there is any offensive way in you.  Then ask Him to lead you in the way everlasting.  And then, regardless of what you think He might show you, be receptive to it.  Trust Him.  Know that He loves you enough to only reveal to you what He wants you to work on right now and that He will be with you every step of the way.  What God cares about is your character and transforming you more and more everyday into the image of His Son.  If it feels like He is trying to cut too deeply, ask Him to help you bear up under the pain until the cutting is done.  Know that sorrow may last through the night, but joy will come in the morning.  And when you get the chance to see just how intricate a design He has for your life one day, you will be grateful that you have allowed Him to do this painstaking work in your life.  I beg you, today, give God your unqualified yes.

Day Twenty: Will your anchor hold?

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READ:  Joshua 9:3-9, 11, 14-16

 

(3-6) The people of Gibeon heard what Joshua had done to Jericho and Ai and cooked up a ruse.  They posed as travelers: their donkeys loaded with patched sacks and mended wineskins, threadbare sandals on their feet, tattered clothes on their bodies, nothing but dry crusts and crumbs for food.  They came to Joshua at Gilgal and spoke to the men of Israel, “We’ve come from a far-off country; make a covenant with us.”

(7) The men of Israel said to these Hivites, “How do we know you aren’t local people?  How could we make a covenant with you?”

(8) They said to Joshua, “We’ll be your servants.”

      Joshua said, “Who are you now?  Where did you come from?”

(9, 11) They said, “From a far-off country, very far away.  You servants came because we’d heard such great things about God, your God–all the things He did in Egypt!….Our leaders and everybody else in our country told us, ‘Pack up some food for the road and go meet them.  Tell them, We’re your servants; make a covenant with us.’…

(14) The men of Israel looked them over and accepted the evidence.  But they didn’t ask God about it.

(15) So Joshua made peace with them and formalized it with a covenant to guarantee their lives.  The leaders of the congregation swore to it.

(16) And then, three days after making this covenant, they learned that they were next-door neighbors, who had been living there all along.

 

THINK:  “Is there a place in your life where you are susceptible to offers and flattery, so you can form attachments without asking God for input?  (Attachments refers to relationships and commitments to people, tasks, and organizations.)

 

PRAY:  “Ask God to help you go over your attachments by moving through the following questions as if God were sitting next to you with his arm around you.

          What attachments, if any, have you rushed into without investigating further, especially by asking God what you need to know about the situation?

          Ask God to show you where, if at all, you need to back off from an attachment.”

 

LIVE:  “Wait with an open heart for anything God might say to you.  If nothing comes to you, ask God to make it apparent in the next few weeks if there’s anything you need to know about your attachments.”

 

 

When I first started this blog (back way before this series), I just wanted someone to see me, to be noticed.  To use this as a way of doing something for God that might be important.  The thing is:  I didn’t care so much about it being important to God.  I wanted it to be important to my fellow man.  Surely, if I did something that made an impact in the lives of people around me, that would be good in God’s eyes.  And if that was good in God’s eyes, then maybe I would be  good in God’s eyes.  Doing good to gain approval has been my attachment for as long as I can remember.  Being good enough to be considered worthy of love.  In an effort to gain approval, I have over-committed myself far too often.  I have agreed to things before I’ve thought them out.  I’ve volunteered for things that I didn’t really want to do because I wanted approval.  Fear of rejection has been a pretty big deal in my life because I have believed the lie that I have to perform well to be accepted because who I am surely will not be enough.

 

Realistically, there are plenty of areas in my life where this has been demonstrated as untrue.  Amazing, isn’t it, how good Satan is at magnifying the areas where the lies we’ve believed seem to have proven true so as to overshadow the times the truth has shone out?! 

 

The truth of the matter is:  none of us can ever do anything “good enough” for God because all have sinned and fall short (Romans 3:23).  The Devil is so crafty, however, that he knows just how to twist that verse around in our minds so that he can use it against those who desire acceptance and approval just so they can feel loved, or believe they are loved.  It’s like he says:

“See, even the Bible says you are not worthy, that you have fallen short.”

 

And if you just stop there, it would be easy to believe that there will never be any hope for people such as this, such as me.  However, because God is good, He made a way for us to escape that “fallen-short” state.  Satan knows this, which is why He never volunteers the rest of the sentence (continued in Romans 3:24) or the context for the verse (all of Romans, but specifically chapter 3).  The rest of the sentence (Romans 3:24 says):

“and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Jesus Christ.”

 

If my attachments are based in on Earth, I will always fall short.  Those attachments will always disappoint.  Nothing here can satisfy the longing of a soul that was designed to love God and be filled by Him.  However, if I continually place my faith and hope in the Lord, I will always be satisfied.  I will always be loved and accepted.  Even when I am disappointed by things that happen on Earth.  Even when God allows me to walk through things that hurt or leave me wondering where God is, I can know that it is BECAUSE He loves me and wants me wholly reliant upon Him for my fulfillment and satisfaction. 

 

But, of course, since we are humans, we will forget this.  We will tether ourselves to something here on Earth that will

disappoint us.  We will attach ourselves to things or people that were never meant to be our anchor.  And God, because He is a jealous God, will graciously allow those moors to fail us.  He will allow us to go through something that will force us to place our faith in Him ALONE.  And then, He will not disappoint us.  He may not remove the storm from our lives, but He will calm our spirits so that we can weather that storm.  And we will be able to walk calmly because we are securely tethered (attached) to the only One who has never failed or faltered, and who will never leave us nor forsake us.

Day Nineteen: It Isn’t Brave if You Aren’t Scared

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Today’s passage comes from Joshua 1.

 

READ: Joshua 1:1-9

 

After the death of Moses the servant of God, God spoke to Joshua, Moses’ assistant:

“Moses my servant is dead.  Get going.  Cross this Jordan River, you and all the people.  Cross to the country I’m giving to the People of Israel.  I’m giving you every square inch of the land you set your foot on–just as I promised Moses.  From the wilderness and this Lebanon east to the Great River, the Euphrates River–all the Hittite country–and then west to the Great Sea.  It’s all yours.  All your life, no one will be able to hold out against you.  In the same way I was with Moses, I’ll be with you.  I won’t give up on you; I won’t leave you.  Strength!  Courage!  You are going to lead this people to inherit the land that I promised to give their ancestors.  Give it everything you have, heart and soul.  Make sure you carry out The Revelation that Moses commanded you, every bit of it.  Don’t get off track, either left or right, so as to make sure you get to where you’re going.  And don’t for a minute let this Book of The Revelation be out of mind.  Ponder and meditate on it day and night, making sure you practice everything written in it.  Then you’ll get where you’re going; then you’ll succeed.  Haven’t I commanded you?  Strength!  Courage!  Don’t be timid; don’t get discouraged.  God, your God, is with you every step you take.”

 

THINK:  “Is embracing these words in your life hard or easy?  At what times are you scared?  Why?  When you are fearful, what can you do about it?”

 

PRAY:  “Be blatantly honest with God about your fears, worries, concerns, and anxieties.  Tell him exactly why you are scared, and be assured that he hears you.  Thank him for listening.  Then reread the passage, personalizing the words by making God’s words to Joshua your very own.”

 

LIVE:  “When you find yourself in situations that expose your fears, remember the promises of God–his presence and his guidance for you into the future.”

 

Many times over the past three years, I have found myself worried, anxious, and afraid; those fears and worries and anxieties have intensified a lot over the past year.  I was made aware of this when I was in Lynchburg for my counseling classes.  But one thing that I came to see while I was away was that, those worries and fears and anxieties did not have to control my life.  I could have all the feelings I was having and still be obedient.  I could have all those feelings, feel them all fully, and still walk in faith that God was going to take care of me because He said so.  Being obedient didn’t make me feel less afraid.  And admitting I was afraid did not paralyze me.  I was telling a friend recently that I felt like I had not been walking in faith over the course of this past year because I wasn’t feeling brave.  She flat-out rejected what I was saying.  She said that, in fact, she had seen me walking in faith, pressing into the Lord and to our church body.  She informed me that what she was hearing was a girl who wished her feelings lined up with her walk.  She was absolutely right.  But, wishing that my feelings lined up with my faith did not negate that I had faith.  I came to see that I had believed a lie:  the lie that says “if you don’t feel it, it can’t be real.” 

 

Perhaps that is the very reason that the words “fear not” or “be of good courage” appear no less than 365 times in scripture.  Far too often, I have let fear paralyze me into inaction, to stifle my faith.  Realizing that I only wished I felt what I believed was an eye-opener for me.  I have the faith.  I have taken several steps that have been come from a place of faith without even realizing it because I have been so scared.  But, as a movie I once watched said,

 

 “It isn’t brave if you aren’t scared.”

 

Day Eighteen: Legacies and Consequences

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READ:  Deuteronomy 34:1-4

 

(1-3) Moses climbed from the Plains of Moab to Mount Nebo, the peak of Pisgah facing Jericho.  God showed him all the land from Gilead to Dan, all Naphtali, Ephraim, and Manasseh; all Judah reaching to the Mediterranean Sea; the Negev and the plains which encircle Jericho, City of Palms, as far south as Zoar.

(4) Then and there God said to him, “This is the land I promised to your ancestors, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob with the words ‘I will give to your descendants.’  I’ve let you see it with your own eyes.  There it is.  But you’re going to go in.”

 

THINK:  This section asks us why we think God takes disobedience so seriously, as well as what some of the consequences have been in our own lives for sin.

One thing I can tell you is that I could not even begin to recount all the consequences for my sins, but I know there have been several.  And the one thing I have tried to raise my kids to understand is that there are always consequences.  I hesitate to use the word because it seems to carry such negative connotations, but the actual definition of the word consequence is:

“a result or effect of an action or condition”

Used this way, it’s easy to see that, regardless of whether you choose rightly or wrongly, there is always going to be an outcome.  Hence, there is always going to be a consequence.  It’s basic physics:  for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.

 

In regards to our reading today:  Moses was not allowed to enter the Promised Land because he was disobedient and struck a rock he should’ve just touched.  It seems a little harsh, sure.  But, God does take disobedience seriously.  Why do I think this is? 

 

The best I’ve been able to come up with goes back to the First Commandment.  Exodus 20:3 tells us that we shall have no other gods before us.  What we need to realize is that, what Satan was trying to accomplish in the Garden, when he tempted Eve was not what actually happened.  Satan had tried to usurp God’s authority by saying that He ought to be on the throne.  As a result, God created Hell and struck him and 2/3 of the host of angels who agreed with him, Lucifer, into the lake of fire.  In the Garden, Lucifer/Satan took the form of a serpent and slithered his way into Eve’s thinking by – essentially – getting her to doubt God’s goodness, by leading her down a path that led her to believe that God was holding out on them.  Satan was indeed right when he told Eve that once they ate of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, their eyes would be opened and they would be “like God, knowing good and evil.  So, she ate and she gave the fruit to Adam, and he ate, and immediately, their eyes were opened.  At that point, they realized that they were naked.  And it was at that point, that they first experienced shame.  Then, they did what everyone does when they know they’ve done something wrong:  they tried to hide their sin. 

 

This is where Satan’s plan for dominion over man went sideways.  Instead of seeing Satan as the person who opened their eyes, and to whom they should pay their allegiance, Adam and Eve became gods in their own eyes.  And we have all been in a power struggle for our own lives ever since.  We desperately want to control our own lives.  So does Satan.  And God wants us to come back to Him so that He can show us the way He intended our lives to be in the first place:  being led by the only being that has always known everything and who always has our best interest at heart.

 

So…why do I think God takes disobedience so seriously?  Because it directly negates the very first commandment.  Our disobedience tells God we think we know better what is best for our lives than He does.  Our disobedience states that WE will be the god of our lives. 

 

PRAY:  “Ask God to help you live a life of faith and obedience, the kind of life that honors him at all time.”

 

LIVE:  “Think of Moses-like people you know–older, godly individuals living faithfully for God.  Consider connecting with them and getting to know them and their stories.”

 

There is an old African proverb:  “When an old man dies, a library burns.”  There is such a wealth of knowledge inside the heads of those who have lived longer than us, that when they die, it is indeed like a library has burned to the ground, when that person dies.  The elderly are so often overlooked in this country, which so prizes youth and beauty.  The problem with the thinking that “new and improved” is better is that we forget our history.  We have a big problem with that in this country.  And a nation that forgets its past is condemned to repeat it. 

 

Why else would God spend so much time reminding the Israelites to write His commands on their hearts and to talk about them all the time, and to share them with their children, and remember that God delivered them from evil, and to never forget.  Because they did forget.  Repeatedly.  And time and time again, they found themselves back in the midst of oppression. 

 

Connecting with and getting to know an older, godly individual living faithfully for God will not make our lives easier, but it will help us to get a frame of reference for the suffering we find ourselves going through.  It will help us to see that nothing lasts forever, that while sorrow may last through the night, joy does come in the morning.  Sometimes, that’s all we need to keep up our obedience just one day more.