If things don’t happen as we think they should we tend to become impatient. Especially with people.
We often want to change people around us to suit us better.
The Christian walk is all about change …a changed heart, a changed life, a changed covenant with God. But none of this change is brought about by us.
We can’t change people either – though we all wish we could and we all try to. This is reserved for the Holy Spirit alone.
That’s a big challenge to accept – especially in close relationships – to take our own hands off – and let the heart of God in.
In other words to be ready to take my eyes off another’s issues and to turn to the Lord with the attitude of heart to say, “Lord what do you want to do in my heart through this situation?”
This leads us to the cross. To lay down my own life and find God’s Grace. My faith and patience will be tested – but nothing is proved genuine until it’s tested.
Matthew 7:3 And why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye?
James 1:3 knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience.
The desire for perfection often brings with it a lot of pressure and frustration. It’s impossible to be perfect.
Yet the Lord instructs us to be perfect. What does He mean?
All of us have sinned and fallen short of the grace of God. Perfection is not never missing it – it means “complete.”
People say there’s an emptiness in a man that only God himself can fill. We try fill it ourselves with many different things. It can only be filled by Jesus Christ.
Jesus once told to a rich young man to sell all his possessions and follow Him to be perfect. Why? The man’s heart was attached to his riches. Jesus knew that riches could never bring completeness to this man.
Jesus also prayed for perfection of unity amongst his followers – the love of God in Him and Him in them …as a testimony to the world of the love of God.
The only perfection we will ever find is the love of God. That’s why Jesus wants us to be perfect as He is perfect.
Apostle Paul encourages us to put on love which is the bond of perfection.
The cross is the deepest example of God’s love we have. Once a man’s heart grasps that his life can never be the same.
God doesn’t want us to feel that we need to be perfect. His word says that His power is made perfect in weakness. The Holy Spirit helps us even in our weakness.
What He does want is that we accept His love for us – that love is shown in Jesus.
There is no barrier between us and God other than either our unbelief or our pride. Put these aside, find the completion we have in Christ.
There is no religious law He places on us. Are you ready to surrender your life to Christ?
Only His love can make you and I perfect.
Matthew 5:48 Therefore you shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect.
2 Corinthians 12:9 And He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
Colossians 3:14 But above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfection.
We don’t like to loose. We’re taught to stand our ground and defend our rights.
The Christian life though is a “lost life” if we want to walk in the fullness of God’s plan.
Jesus said he is the way the truth and the life. His life is not just a story, it’s a message, and a pattern for us. His purpose was to do the will of the Father and this came at a price.
The price was his own will. The will of God led him to lay down His rights and position… even His life for us even though we don’t deserve it.
We can expect to be led, like He was, “to the cross” if we want God’s will above our own.
An example …a husband is called to love his wife as Christ loves the Church. See where it’s going..? Even though a husband has a God given authority in his home, we are called to be ready to loose our rights for the sake of our wife. If I want to carry the heart of God for her there’s a price to pay – it’s being ready to “loose my life.”
Being ready to accept the work of the cross did not diminish Jesus’ authority. On the contrary, it established his spiritual authority.
If there’s anything the world desperately needs it’s men to accept the work of the cross in their lives. Being ready to loose for the sake of carrying the life of Christ, to be examples of God’s own heart in their homes.
Here’s the thing – this isn’t works. It’s too hard to sustain if it’s my works. It’s only possible by His grace which he makes available to anyone who truly desires it.
The message of the cross doesn’t make sense to our natural reasoning but truly it’s the power and wisdom of God!
Philippians 2:5 Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus,
Ephesians 5:25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her,
Stock markets have fallen. Investments have been shaken. The world is not the same place it was just weeks ago.
But the Lord never changes. We can bank on that! The unwavering faithfulness of God is the basis of our own faith.
Faith is not something we ourselves can generate. The Bible tells us that faith comes from hearing and hearing by the word of God. Faith is imparted into our hearts by the Holy Spirit.
Faith leaps over barriers that reasoning can’t get past. Faith always accomplishes God’s will.
Faith isn’t positive confession, although faith does speak and act. But sometimes it’s silent faith that perseveres through hardship, sickness or persecution. Faith is not a way to avoid troubles, but a way to go through troubles.
Faith truly is a gift that comes from God.
Jesus himself asked that when He returns will he find faith on the earth? Or will he find us positively confessing our own desires and expecting God to act because we have spoken?
Lord, increase our faith!
Romans 10:17 So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.
1 Corinthians 12:9 to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healings by [a]the same Spirit
Luke 18:8 Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will He really find faith on the earth?”
It matters little what we think about the coronavirus. But it matters forever what God thinks. He is not silent about what he thinks. Scarcely a page in the Bible is irrelevant for this crisis.
Our voice is grass. His is granite. “The grass withers, and the flower falls, but the word of the Lord remains forever” (1 Peter 1:24–25). His words in Scripture “cannot be broken” (John 10:35). What he says is “true, and righteous altogether” (Psalm 19:9). Listening to God, and believing him, is like building your house on a rock, not sand (Matthew 7:24).
His voice is not only true; it is perfectly wise for every situation. “He is wonderful in counsel and excellent in wisdom” (Isaiah 28:29). “His understanding is beyond measure” (Psalm 147:5). When he gives counsel about the coronavirus, it is firm, unshakable, lasting. “The counsel of the Lord stands forever” (Psalm 33:11). “His way is perfect” (2 Samuel 22:31).
God’s words in these times are not only true and wise; they are also precious and sweet. “More to be desired are they than gold . . . sweeter also than honey and drippings of the honeycomb” (Psalm 19:10). They are the sweetness of life: “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life” (John 6:68). And with indestructible life come words of unshakable peace and joy: “Your words became to me a joy and the delight of my heart” (Jeremiah 15:16).
And the sweetness is not lost in this moment of bitter providence — not if we have learned the secret of “sorrowful, yet always rejoicing” (2 Corinthians 6:10). The secret is this: Knowing that the same sovereignty that could stop the coronavirus and doesn’t, is the very sovereignty that sustains the soul in it. Indeed, more than sustains — sweetens with hope that, for those who trust him, his purposes are kind, even in death.
“Behold the kindness and severity of God” (Romans 11:22). His providence is sweet and bitter. Naomi did not sin when she said, “The Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me” (Ruth 1:20). That was true. And it was spoken at the very moment when all her fortunes were about to change.
This is not a season for sentimental views of God. It is a bitter season. And God sent it. We know this, because he “works all things according to the counsel of his will” (Ephesians 1:11). All things. Not a sparrow falls to the ground apart from our heavenly Father (Matthew 10:29).
Nature is not sovereign. Satan is not sovereign. Sinful man is not sovereign. God rules them all (Luke 8:25; Job 1:12; 2:6; Acts 4:27–28). So, we say with Job, “I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted” (Job 42:2).
Therefore, God not only comprehends the coronavirus; he has purposes for it. God does nothing, and permits nothing, without wise purposes. Nothing just happens. Everything flows from the eternal counsels of God (Ephesians 1:11). All of it is wisdom. All of it is purposeful. For those who trust Jesus Christ, all of it is kindness. For others, it is a merciful wake-up call: “Let the one who is thirsty come; let the one who desires take the water of life without price” (Revelation 22:17).
This I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I will hope in him.” (Lamentations 3:21–24)
