Don’t Give Up, Trust in God!

 

The Apostle Paul was a man that faced many hardships, including death on numerous occasions.  He was imprisoned and had his fair share of enemies. If there was ever anyone that had a reason to throw in the towel and give up, it was the Apostle Paul, but he never gave up because of his faith in God. His encouragement to Timothy and to us in 2Timothy 4:5(NLT) is “But you should keep a clear mind in every situation. Don’t be afraid of suffering for the Lord. Work at telling others the Good News, and fully carry out the ministry God has given you.” The thing that fueled Paul’s endurance is the same thing that will fuel ours. It is God’s strength. His strength and power is unlimited, unyielding, and inexhaustible. Paul knew that this was his link to all the energy and power he needed to teach others about the love of God, to withstand hardship, and to receive victory in life.

Paul’s transformation experience took place on the road to Damascus. He was on his way to inflict terrible harm on the very people that he taught the gospel after his encounter with Jesus Christ. For some of us, it takes years before we recognize our purpose and make the necessary changes in our hearts and minds, but it didn’t take Paul nearly that long. In a matter of days, he totally switched gears and began to pursue the Will of God in Christ Jesus. Once transformed through Christ, Paul honored God and wanted to do everything in his power to please Him. He sought the Lord diligently, and this is the only way to maximize our lives. Hebrews 11:6(NLT) confirms this for us. It tells us, “But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.”

No matter what you’re facing in life at this moment, no matter how difficult or tough it may seem, victory is yours. You may be facing difficulties in your marriage, and you may want to give up but have faith in God. The Lord is always the solution to our problems, and He wants us to bring all our worries, issues, and troubles to Him. He loves to hear from us, and we do not have to be perfect to get His attention. We simply must believe that He hears us, that He loves us, and that He rewards those that seek Him with their whole hearts.

Many of us have been feeling as though we’re either at our limits or being pushed to it. We can’t imagine going any further, and every morning we’ve awakened to a sense of dread. You might feel that you’re not living up to the expectations of your family, children, friends, the significant person in your life or your job. You feel there’s not enough of you to go around but don’t throw in the towel and give up. I encourage you to commit some quality time to God. Be still and focus on Him and His love.

You can’t forget that you have the strength of God within you because you have the Holy Spirit living on the inside. Philippians 2:13(NLT) tells us, “For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him.” Through His Spirit, God will do a work within us and He is waiting on your invitation to be at work. Through the Lord Jesus Christ, you are equipped to handle all that this world can throw your way, for Jesus tells us in 1John 4:4(NLT), “But you belong to God, my dear children. You have already won a victory over those people, because the Spirit who lives in you is greater than the spirit who lives in the world.” This is our reality, and we must trust it because God says it is so.

I encourage you to pray often. Don’t claim sadness, claim a renewed mind through Christ Jesus. Don’t claim defeat, only claim victory.  Don’t ever give up … don’t ever quit. If there is anyone you can rely on to have our back—if there’s anyone that will never leave or forsake you, it’s your Heavenly Father, our Almighty God! His love is everlasting, and forever. No human being on the face of this earth can come close to matching what God will perform in your life through Jesus Christ. Just lean on Him and trust Him with all your heart! ■

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

“Don’t Give Up, Trust in God!”, written for time2heal ©2022.  All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord! Copyright©2020.  

Where Were the Signs?

 

“He was a man that I trusted – he was someone that I thought would have my back for the rest of my life. How did I miss the signs?” Many women have asked themselves this question. Some of my dearest friends have posed it to me about the relationships they’ve had and have ended badly. They say the men who were once the center of their existences abruptly changed, and that these men demonstrated behaviors that came out of nowhere. In some instances, the men completely lost interest and wanted no further involvement with the relationship whatsoever. They either chose to be unfaithful to their commitment or began to display attitudes and behaviors that were downright hurtful. When all of this seems to come out of nowhere, and you’re caught off guard, you might feel as though you don’t have a clue about how or if the relationship can ever be repaired.

Were there signs? And if there were, why didn’t you recognize them? 2Corinthians 4:4(NLT) provides a clue that helps to answer this question. It says, “Satan, who is the god of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don’t believe. They are unable to see the glorious light of the Good News. They don’t understand this message about the glory of Christ, who is the exact likeness of God.” This is what the enemy does to those that don’t believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Blinding the minds of individuals is one of the enemy’s methods, and he can also do this to believers if they are not suited up in God’s armor.

The tactic behind the devil’s plot is to get our attention diverted so we’re focused on something else besides the light of Christ. Through every relationship that the Lord puts together, He desires to form a strong cord through the marriage of this couple. Unity through the love of Christ strengthens this cord, and it will wrap around generations to come. We know that the devil despises unity and will do anything to tear a marriage apart. God doesn’t want us to ever be ignorant about this.

Our Heavenly Father never changes, and His standards never fluctuate. He has designed everything within the universe according to His Word, and everything in the universe responds favorably to His Word, so when we take our eyes off Jesus Christ, we must allow for the possibility that things can go sour very quickly. Jesus Christ tells us in Matthew 6:33 to seek the righteousness of God and His Kingdom above all other things, and blessings will be added to us. When we put anything else ahead of this, blessings will begin to subtract.

Knowing this should not place us in condemnation by no means. What it should do is show us how diligent we must be to cling to our relationship with God through Jesus Christ. If you’re not married, but in a relationship that you hope will lead to marriage, sometimes the person you love will walk away because they were not meant to journey any further with you. He’s not your destiny partner. This can be a very hurtful thing, but you must never place your love for this person above your commitment to God and your destiny in His Will. He has a wonderful plan for your life, and forever and always, you must trust this more than the disappointment you might feel.

In a marriage, we miss the signs sometimes because our radar isn’t in alignment with the destiny of our spiritual growth in Christ. So, it is possible that your spouse is responding to the reality that you have changed and didn’t realize it. We can become too comfortable and begin to spend less time in prayer, meditation, and communion with God. It isn’t always the case, but there are times that we neglect our relationship with Heavenly Father, and our spouses will begin to mirror this neglect. They unravel because we are unraveling what is meant to be a strong cord. The solution is in the Lord Jesus Christ, and we must refocus, and seek God diligently in prayer. ■

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

“Where Were the Signs?”, written for time2heal ©2022.  All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord! 

God Deserves First Place

 

When you wake up in the morning, what is the first thing you usually think about? Are you inclined to immediately reach for your phone to see what’s happening in the world? I must admit, for a while, the first thing I would do is grab my phone to check the time and then the news. I hadn’t trained my mind to first think about God. As I began to meditate on His Word and understand what He requires of us, I realized the way I started my day didn’t fit the commandment Christ has given all God’s people. This bothered me. In Matthew 6:33(NLT), Jesus Christ said, “Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need.” When it comes to our relationship with God through Christ, “first” means first—number one. This is what God requires. He must be our top priority in every aspect of our existence.

I, like so many of you, truly love the Lord and want to please Him, but I was out of alignment with His standard. I’m so thankful to have received a deeper revelation of God’s Word regarding how we should prioritize our relationship with Him. I knew I had to change the way I was doing things, so I prayed and asked God to teach me how to put Him first. This is something I encourage every believer to do, so that we are sure to give God the place of honor in our lives that He so richly deserves.

Philippians 4:8(NLT) tells us, “And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.” Examine the detail that our Heavenly Father has provided in this verse about how we should discipline our thoughts. Why do you think God is so descriptive in His instruction regarding our thought life? He is so careful about this instruction because our minds are extremely important to our relationship with Him. If we are not honoring God in our minds, dishonor and darkness will spill over into all the other areas of our lives.

You and I are in control of our minds. We have free-will and we make the decisions and choices about what and how we will think. We can choose to think in alignment with the mind of Christ, or we can think like the rest of the world. But God hopes we will choose the mind of Christ so that our thoughts will produce a reality that pleases Him. This is the Christ-centered mind that leads to a more than abundant life! It is the thought life that meets the requirement and produces the blessings of Matthew 6:33.

In Ephesians 4:29-32(NLT), God instructs us, “29 Don’t use foul or abusive language. Let everything you say be good and helpful, so that your words will be an encouragement to those who hear them. 30 And do not bring sorrow to God’s Holy Spirit by the way you live. Remember, he has identified you as his own, guaranteeing that you will be saved on the day of redemption. 31 Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, and slander, as well as all types of evil behavior. 32 Instead, be kind to each other, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you.”

Not only has Heavenly Father told us to put on the mind of Christ, but He’s told us to watch the words that come out of our mouths. He has instructed us to only say things that are good and helpful. This is His Word! It’s His commandment to us, and we are to humble ourselves because His Word is truth, and we must trust this with all our hearts. He is telling us how to live so that we can have a life that is pleasing to Him and a blessing to us as well. The Lord tells us to get rid of the negativity, because not doing so will grieve the Holy Spirit. No believer should ever want to do this. Instead, we must be diligent to always honor God with our lives. We honor God by doing the things He’s told us in His Word. This is what it means to put Heavenly Father and His Kingdom in first place, and this is the place that He alone deserves. ■

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

“God Deserves First Place”, written for time2heal ©2022.  All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord! Copyright©2020.  

Less Talking and More Praying

The hope of every believer is that things will get better. That is always our hope, but we cannot be ignorant of the truth, and we certainly cannot ignore Biblical prophecy. People have been wicked a very long time, and even now, as unprecedented challenges are upon the entire world, arrogance and a desire for more power still consume the hearts of most. As soon as one fire smolders, another begins to burn with unyielding fury. You wonder what’s next, and how bad can it get. Some of us are experiencing a heighten level of anxiety about all this, but God has not changed and neither has His Word. He tells us in Philippians 4:6(NLT), “Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done.” God has told us to pray instead of worrying. It is our responsibility as believers to get very clear about what God is demanding of us in this hour and figure out a way to make sure it happens.

As we look at the trouble in the world, we know that it is the devil’s handywork, and that it is designed to steal our attention away from our relationship with God. 2Corinthians 4:4(NLT) tells us, “Satan, who is the god of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don’t believe. They are unable to see the glorious light of the Good News. They don’t understand this message about the glory of Christ, who is the exact likeness of God.” Our Heavenly Father did not want us to be ignorant concerning His number one enemy. He has told us straightforwardly that the devil is the god of this world. One of the methods the devil uses to add to his kingdom of darkness is to blind people, so they don’t understand the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Their minds are so consumed with this world that they can’t see the truth. They are walking around asleep, and they don’t even know it.

God tells us in 1Thessalonians 5:5(NLT), “For you are all children of the light and of the day; we don’t belong to darkness and night.” Children of the light are those that have come to God, asked Him to forgive their sins, and accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as their personal Savior by believing in his resurrection. John 1:12(NLT) tells us, “But to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God.”

Don’t add to darkness

It cannot be lost on us that there are way more people that have not accepted Jesus Christ as Lord than those of us that have. Now, more than ever, we must prove who we are. If we say that we represent Christ, there should be fruit that backs this up, and one of them is our refusal to add to darkness and our commitment to add to light.

Now is not a time for dwelling on the darkness of what we see around us. It is a time for less talking and more praying. God did not cause the tribulation and disappointments we’ve endured, but through them He has prepared us for such a time as this. James 5:16 tells us that the earnest prayers of the righteous has great power and produces great results. Our hearts have been seasoned through every tear we’ve shed, and today we are better able to pray for others with the authority and power of Christ. This is our responsibility as his followers. We must not allow ourselves to be diverted from this task.

Some of us have wondered what to do, because we’re feeling like we’re surrounded by limitation. This must not keep us from pursuing God’s Will. We hear so much about fulfilling our purpose, and prayer is the way to approach it. God tells us in 1Thessalonians 5:17 to pray without ceasing. This doesn’t mean that we can’t take care of our other responsibilities, but we should be praying much more often than we do. And we should be asking Heavenly Father to help us grow in our relationship with Him so that we reach higher levels of intimacy in our prayer lives.

There are places that we can go supernaturally in prayer that will close the wrong doors and open the right ones. Whole communities, even cities, can be released from darkness because of our prayers, but we won’t get there if we can’t control our tongues. 1Corinthians 6:19-20(NLT) tells us, “Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself, for ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God’s.” Your body is God’s temple. His Spirit lives inside you and prayer time should be one of communing with God through the Holy Spirit. We can have a wonderful encounter with Heavenly Father through His Spirit, and prayer, praise, and thankfulness opens the gate.

We can’t commune with darkness all day long, let it inside our eye-gate and ear-gate continually, and then expect it to be easy to let the peace of God rule our minds and hearts when it’s time to pray. No. We must guard our hearts in such a way that we can enter into that blessed place every time the Spirit beckons us there, but some of us are so consumed with what is happening in the world that we can’t even hear the Spirit calling us. Let’s change this. With all due haste, it’s time to get on our knees for our families, loved ones, and communities. So many people are in trouble, so many are desperate for help. We may not be able to provide financial resources, but we can pray for them in faith, and ask the Father to deploy heaven’s armies to help us all. Prayer in the name of Jesus Christ is the very best help we can offer, and we must be diligent to it because God has called us to get it done. ■

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

“Less Talking and More Praying", written for time2heal ©2022.  All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord! Copyright©2020.