Do not be anxious about anything Part 2

I should have known that I would be tested on what I wrote yesterday. Morning by morning as I write these blogs, I ask the Lord for something that is relevant to my life. So yesterday I was in danger of being anxious, and as I usually do at such times, I started to work through the passage in Philippians 4:4-7, repenting for where I had failed to follow through. So I was seeking to replace my anxiety with thanksgiving, and all kinds of prayer and supplication. At some level, I was successful. However, in the middle of the night, I found myself wrestling again in my spirit.

So I re-read yesterday’s blog and prayer, and the phrase “all kinds of prayer”stood out to me. I remembered a book by Merlin Carothers called “Power in praise.” His point is essentially that you can praise your way out of inner struggles. And there is always much to praise Him for. In my own life, there is much answered prayer, and many times that the Lord has intervened on my behalf. The Lord delivered the children of Israel out of Egypt, and over and over He told them to remember this deliverance. To Israel in that day, Egypt was the place of bondage, the place of slavery. And we all have our own “Egypts.”

And as with Israel, the Lord has done many, many amazing things in my life, He has performed many miracles and done things that at the time I thought I would never forget. But but is easy to underestimate our capacity to forget. So this is why it’s important for me to journal, to write down the wonderful works of God that He has performed in my life. And what that means is that at times like this I can look back and remember His works, and his promises. And as I did this this morning, as so many times in the past, He lifted me up, set my feet up on a rock and reestablished my peace (Psalm 40:1-2).

Father, I praise and bless and magnify and worship Your name this morning. Thank You for the many times You have delivered me in the past. These experiences of deliverance and the promises of ongoing deliverance help to keep my feet upon the rock of the Lord Jesus Christ. I don’t know how the World manages without You, but I suppose many times they are simply existing rather than having life in all its fullness. As for me, I am not prepared to settle for anything less than all that You have for me, and I pray for others and myself for tenacity and faith to hold You to Your promises. I praise You again this morning Lord in Jesus Name Amen

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving ...

Nobody seems to need to teach us how to worry, it seems to come quite naturally! I was thinking about this this morning, as I was tempted to second-guess myself over some things that took place last night. The tendency I have had in the past to obsess over things, was threatening to raise its ugly head again. But I knew what to do. For a start, I needed to stop being anxious. Easier said than done I hear you say!

You cannot stop worrying by willpower alone, at least I cannot. I have to replace it with something. That’s what the “but” is all about in this quote from Philippians 4:6. The but indicates that we need to replace the worry with all kinds of prayer and supplication, and to do it with thanksgiving. I need to start with the thanksgiving. If I don’t do this, my prayer will likely not be in faith. So I remind myself of His Sovereignty by thanking Him that He is in control. I often go on to thank Him that He has promised to be actively at work in all things for my good (even the thing I am worrying about), because I love Him and I’m called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28).

For me then, when I catch myself worrying, the first thing I do is to seek to reconnect with Him in this way in prayer; to be thankful at the very least for the availability of His grace, and for my relationship with Him. And it is out of this, that I bring my requests (supplications) to Him. I then go on to claim the promise of the next verse, the promise that His peace will guard my heart and my mind. And as I do this for the relatively little things, it is all practice for me to be able to do it in the bigger trials.

Father, You are not a man that you should lie (Numbers 23:19), and I claim this promise of Your peace this morning. And I ask You to overrule anything that was said or done, or was not done last night. And I pray for Your kingdom to come, and Your will to be done on earth as it is in heaven. And I thank You that I can leave the outcome to You in Jesus Name Amen

Answer a fool … (Proverbs 26:4), do not answer a fool… (Proverbs 26:5)

So to answer or not to answer? The full texts of these two verses read “Do not answer a fool according to his folly, lest you also be like him,” and “Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own eyes.” Many would see this as an outright contradiction, but if you think that’s the case, then you need to look a little deeper. Proverbs are pithy sayings, sayings that need to be unpacked to be understood. And the clue here, is to be found in the second part of each of the two Proverbs, which are set side by side for a reason.

In particular, there are two dangers here. The first is the danger of becoming like the fool, and the second, that the fool continues on his way uncorrected. Consider the following two scenarios. In the first you are a new believer, you are easily swayed not yet being established in the truth. The fool has the gift of the gab, and as the saying goes can talk the rear end of a horse. Best to stay away until you are more established. In the second scenario, the fool is your son. You love him and you know how to gently show him the error of his ways, and you do it!

There are many things in the Bible that I still don’t understand, but my experiences is that as I continue to read I have many clarifying revelations. So I learned to not quickly jump to conclusions when I see something what appears to be a contradiction, or something I don’t understand. And time after time, these clarifying revelations have just pointed me to a deeper truth. In particular I learned to hold apparently contradictory topics together in tension and to ask the Lord to show me how two things that appear to contradict can both be true at the same time. And as I say time after time, He has given me clarifying revelation. In this particular case the clarifying question to ask is when to answer and when not?

Father, having spent my entire career in the university setting, I have needed Your wisdom many times, to know when to answer or not, the apparently wise. It’s relatively easy to be humble with those who are humble, but to be humble with those who are arrogant? That’s a different kettle of fish! Thank You that I am starting to discern when I needed to cease and desist because I am becoming like them. And that means Lord, that there are times I need to allow them the last word, even when there are still a bunch of things that I could say! But You didn’t chase after the rich young ruler, You let him go (Matthew 19:22). And I need your wisdom this morning Father, to know when to let go, and when to pursue. Thank You that You promise wisdom when we ask You for it (James 1:5) in Jesus Name Amen

I am not responsible for what others have done to me, I am responsible for my response to what others have done

“You make me mad!” No! What others have done may well have triggered your anger, and your anger may well be out of control, but nobody can make you mad, you are responsible for your response to whatever has happened, and whatever will happen! I am not saying it is easy, it clearly is not, but ……

There was a poem we had to learn at school hundreds of years ago, that started “If you can keep your head when all around are loosing theirs and blaming it on you ….” It ended with “Then you will be a man, my son!” It is talking about maturity, about growing up, about self control, about accepting responsibility for our lot in life. When I first came to Canada in the late sixties, the sort of thing that could be seen on TV often had life lessons along the very same lines I am talking about here. Now the TV, and in fact our whole culture, seems to celebrate immaturity, to wear victimhood as a badge of honour, and as a card to be played to demand rights that oppress others with the tyranny of what is considered to be politically correct.

But it is not the path to life and health and peace. In fact it is the very opposite. Proverbs 25:28 tells us “A man without self-control is like ta city broken into and left without walls.” In the culture of that time, a city without walls was defenceless, and open to attack by all. In the same way, when we do not rule our spirit, the Evil one can manipulate us at will, simply by reminding us of this or that injustice. Joy and self control are two components of the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22), but they are not independent components. You can’t have one without the other! No wonder joy is withered away from the sons of men (Joel 1:12).

Father, as I say self control is not valued so much in our culture, but also as I say it is an essential part of the path to the abundant life. Open up our eyes Lord to see the rewards of doing things Your way, and then help us to be doers of Your way and not seers only. Lord I so want my walk to adorn the gospel so that many can see and fear and put their trust in You. I am am the only one who, with your help I can change. Help me Lord in Jesus Name Amen

Do not fear, for I am with you …. I am your God

The first step in any 12-step program, is coming out of denial. Many times, it takes a major crisis to come to the point of admitting that there is a problem. This is particularly true of the major addictions for example drugs, alcohol etc. But we can be in denial over a whole host of lesser issues. Jeremiah 6:14 in TLB puts it this way “ You can’t heal a wound by saying it’s not there!” Part of what I am trying to say here, is that all of us have inner wounds from the past, and many of us for better or for worse, have simply learned to live with them. But the thief many times uses wounds not dealt to rob us of the abundant life we are promised (John 10:10).

Wounds not dealt with can keep us stuck. And it is subtle, because the victim or the martyr mentality can have its own rewards as we can get a certain sympathy from others. We can be stuck in the past, or stuck in the future. We tell ourselves when this or that happens, then I will be happy. There is a recovery saying that is so relevant here it is “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome.” Perhaps denial is not the right description of this type of scenario but either way wounds not dealt with fester. And the fact of the matter it that we will not attain fullness of life with unaddressed wounds.

There seems many times, to be a strong resistance to dealing with wounds from the past. And part of this is that it is scary, I mean revisiting the past can be painful, even causing us to be re-traumatize. But it is the past that needs to be healed, and the past cannot be healed unless we revisit it in the right way. And the right way is to revisit the past with the Lord so He can heal, to revisit it, not to get stuck there, but to allow the Lord to redeem it. Yes it is scary, but as this morning's verse from Isaiah 41:10 tells us, we do not need to fear for He is with us, and He has promised that when we go through the waters, we will not be overwhelmed (Isaiah 43:2).

Father, I want to ask You this morning to show me anything in my life that I am not seeing, that is robbing me of moving to the next level of the abundant life. I know Lord that there is always more, more of Your abundance, and more that needs to be dealt with. Thank You that You are with me, that You are my God and I am your child. Thank You that as I put my trust fully in You, life unfolds as it should. In Jesus Name Amen.

I can’t do that!

Words have power, the things we tell ourselves have power. I remember it taking years to convince a friend that he is not a loser. And part of what he was telling himself, was that he could never hold a job down. When I eventually did convince him that his lie had become a self-fulfilling prophecy, his response was “That’s evil isn't it?” He has now been holding a job down for several years!

The part about the self-fulfilling prophecy, is that if you believe your are a loser and that you can never hold a job down, then you are not likely to give your all in any job you do land! The point is, if you are going to lose the job anyway, why bother doing your best? It’s subtle, since we don’t realize the lies we are telling ourselves. The point is that if we knew we were believing a lie, we wouldn’t believe it. Initially my friend kept telling me “But it’s true.” And he could give me all kinds of evidence in terms of the jobs he had not been able to keep.

I came to this post because of a lie I had been believing. I have had a love-hate relationship with the computer for years. And I was telling myself “Every time I try to do something on the computer, it goes wrong.” At some level this was a good thing, good for the humility when you need to ask help from a 5-year-old! But what I was telling myself had become a self-fulfilling prophecy! It came to a head this week. After about four hours of total frustration on my part, in spite of all the help I was receiving from others who were more savvy than I, we were still unable to get the USB camera to work on conference video calling. With help I came to the realization that I had allowed my frustration to interfere with my ability to problem solve! After this realization I solved the problem afterwards all by myself (aren’t you proud of me :) )?

Father, who says you can’t teach an old dog new tricks? I thank You Lord, that in You all things are possible. I am wondering this morning Lord, just how many of us, and how often we limit ourselves because of the lies we believe. I want to thank You this morning Lord, for bringing things to a head this week. It enabled me to see that what I was experiencing was inconsistent with the abundant life You call us to. And in seeing this I came to You to help me figure it out, and You did! Truly Lord in You, all things are possible. And I give You all the honour and glory and praise again this morning in Jesus Name Amen

Part 2 of “The king’s heart is in the LORD’s hand … He moves it like the watercourse ..”

I mentioned last day, that those of us who are waiting for Him to effect reconciliation in broken relationships can find comfort in this verse. But many of us (me too) have this tendency to do the Lord’s work for Him, especially when He seems to be taking his jolly good time in changing the hearts of our loved ones!

A dear friend of mine tells the story of when she first got saved of bubbling enthusiastically to her husband about the Lord. At one point, her laid-back husband suddenly exploded, banged his fist on the table, and told her never to mention His name again. She fled to her room, and told the Lord “It’s all up to you now!” In fact, she should have been leaving it to Him in the first place. And she did and he did get saved Hallelujah! I know of other situations, where those waiting for reconciliation have blown it, getting angry with the other person because it wasn’t happening soon enough. And when we do this, it only delays the answer.

In fact, I myself have had to resign as the keeper of the universe a number of times! The picture I have of this tendency, is of an older sibling correcting the younger ones. Since this is not his job, the mother has to deal with his interfering first, before she can deal with the younger ones. And when like him, we become impatient, trying to do the Lord’s job for Him, we need to realize that we too are interfering. And when we are interfering, as with the above illustration, the Lord has to deal with us first.

Father, I want to thank You again this morning Lord, that You are in control, even when we have blown it! And You have promised that You are at work in all things for our good (Romans 8:28), even in this! And a big part of it, is the transformation You affect in our own lives as we wait. This transformation is an important part of the reconciliation. It’s not that we never have to speak or act, but we need to know the how and the when, and also when to zip our mouths. Thank you that You have promised to give us wisdom when we ask (James 1:5) in Jesus Name Amen.