Immediately the father of the child cried out and said, “I believe; help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:24) Our God is faithful. As small children we can become impatient, throw a temper tantrum, and give up before our prayer has been answered. Nevertheless, the Lord needs us to show up and not give up because, “He is not like man that he should lie.” (Numbers 23:19) We alone, out of all the beings whom God has fashioned, dishonor Him by unbelief and tarnish His honor by mistrust. Shame on us for this! Our God does not deserve to be so poorly treated; in our past life we have proved Him to be true and faithful to His word, and with so many instances of His love and of His kindness as we have received and are daily receiving at His hands, it is base and inexcusable that we allow a doubt to lodge within our heart. From now on let us resolve to wage constant war against doubts of our God—enemies to our peace and to His honor—and with an unstaggering faith believe that what He has promised He will also perform. “I believe; help my unbelief!” ~Charles Spurgeon GiGi❤️ “And he said to them, “Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?” Then he rose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm.” (Matthew 8:26) Douglas Miller’s lyrics: “Though the storms keep on raging in my life And sometimes it's hard to tell the night from day Still that hope that lies within is reassured As I keep my eyes upon the distant shore I know He'll lead me safely to that blessed place He has prepared But if the storms don't cease And if the winds keep on blowing in my life My soul has been anchored in, in the Lord” remind us that the storms will surely come. Although they might be raging, when we are anchored in the Lord, we will find peaceful shores again. “I bear my witness that the worst days I have ever had have turned out to be my best days. And when God has seemed most cruel to me he has then been most kind. If there is anything in this world for which I would bless him more than for anything else it is for pain and affliction. I am sure that in these things the richest tenderest love has been manifested to me. Our Father’s wagons rumble most heavily when they are bringing us the richest freight of the bullion of his grace. Love letters from heaven are often sent in black-edged envelopes. The cloud that is black with horror is big with mercy. Fear not the storm. It brings healing in its wings and when Jesus is with you in the vessel the tempest only hastens the ship to its desired haven.” ― Charles H. Spurgeon Let us be encouraged, keep our eyes on God, and fear not the storm. God’s grace is sufficient. GiGi❤️ Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. - James 4: 7
There is no more basic method to handle temptation than pure unadulterated resistance. You may come up with all kinds of schemes or positive practices, but nothing beats saying: "No!" to the Devil and meaning it. The text says that if we resist the Devil he will flee from us. Not just leave us alone, but flee! Why is that? It is because there are so many people who receive him and his invitations that he figures, why waste my time on someone who resists? Resisting the Devil does not means closing your ears to his words. It does not means shutting your eyes to his delicacies. It does not mean ignoring the possible pleasures of his enticements. It does not mean acting as if his temptations are not actually tempting. Resisting the Devil means being able to hear all of his arguments, take his best shot, read his whole proposal and, then, walk away. How can any normal person do that on a regular basis? Did you read what came before "resist the Devil" in verse 7? It says, submit yourself to God. When we submit ourselves to God, we do not give place for the Devil. When we submit ourselves to God, the draw to Him is stronger than temptation's pull away from Him. When we submit ourselves to God, we put ourselves under His care and temptation has to go through Him to get to us. When we submit ourselves to God, we develop a godly discipline and will which can stand in the midst of temptation and yet not be tempted. The best way it not to put yourself in a position to be tempted. The more difficult, but simple way is just to resist. Pastor Benjamin Morris 🙏🏽 “But even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not therefore: ye are of more value than many sparrows.” (Luke 12:7) Sometimes we feel that the Lord has forgotten all about us. We prayed and prayed about it, still no response, or the thing we most dreaded still happens. Be encouraged, because the Lord has not forgotten about us. He has collected our tears in His bottle and our names are written in His book. One writer notes, “God continues to wait in the silence, loving us and calling us back to him. It’s in the silence, in the heart of an honest prayer to him, that we come to witness his presence…God’s silence is never a refusal of our pleas for his love or a lack of concern—it’s an invitation to enter more deeply into his presence.” Charles Spurgeon wrote, “You may fear that the Lord has passed you by, but it is not so: he who counts the stars, and calls them by their names, is in no danger of forgetting his own children. He knows your case as thoroughly as if you were the only creature he ever made, or the only saint he ever loved. Approach him and be at peace.” We are more valued than many sparrows. GiGi❤️ “But when we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned with the world.” (1 Corinthians 11:32) Social researcher, Brene Brown, proposes that “Perfectionism is a self-destructive and addictive belief system that fuels this primary thought: If I look perfect and do everything perfectly, I can avoid or minimize the painful feelings of blame, judgement, and shame.” When we are encouraged in Matthew 5:48, to be “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect.” This is our way of actually striving for spiritual maturity. This is the only perfection that can be attained. Those of us who believe that we are perfect are in actuality hiding behind a false reality. It is when we are chastened by God that we are reminded that we are not. Although painful, His chastisement is a reflection of His love and a sign that we belong to Him. There is no blame, judgment, or shame in the chastisement of God. “You know that a man will see a great deal that is wrong with children in the street, and say nothing about it; but if it is his own who is up to mischief, he will give him a sweet taste of the rod. So, if you belong to God, you cannot sin deeply without having a present judgment, a present discipline; and you ought to be thankful for it, painful though it may seem to be for the time, for «when we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned with the world.»” (Charles Spurgeon) A chastened child is a child that is love, “For whom the Lord loves He chastens.” (Hebrews 12:6) GiGi❤️ "Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates." (2 Corinthians 13:5) And now, my dear friends, the fault of the Corinthians is the fault of the present age. Let not any one of you, as he goes out of the house of God, say unto his neighbour. "How did you like the preacher? What did you think of the sermon this morning?" Is that the question you should ask as you retire from God's house? Do you come here to judge God's servants? I know it is but a small thing unto us to be judged of man's judgment; for our judgment is of the Lord our God; to our own Master we shall stand or fall. But, O men! ye should ask a question more profitable unto yourselves than this. Ye should say, "Did not such-and-such a speech strike me? Did not that exactly consort with my condition? Was that not a rebuke that I deserve, a word of reproof or of exhortation? Let me take unto myself that which I have heard, and let me not judge the preacher, for he is God's messenger to my soul: I came up here to be judged of God's Word, and not to judge God's Word myself." I should earnestly exhort myself, and all of you, to examine ourselves whether we be in the faith. (Charles Spurgeon) Let us keep our eyes on God and examine ourselves. GiGi❤️ “Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.” (1 Corinthians 13:7) To love means to embark upon a difficult and arduous task because, “love bears all things.” Loving others is not for the faint of heart. Those who don’t enjoy being committed will find love an impossibility. Those who are looking for perfection will experience dissatisfaction and never achieve love. “The word ‘bear’ might as correctly have been translated ‘cover.’ You that have the Revised Version will find in the margin, ‘Love covereth all things.’ ‘Covereth’ is the meaning of the word in ordinary Greek, but Paul generally uses the word in the sense of ‘bear.’ Our translators, therefore, had to choose between the usual meaning and the Pauline usage, and they selected Paul's meaning, and put it down in the first place as ‘beareth,’ giving us in the margin the other sense of ‘covereth.’ The two ideas may be blended, if we understand it to mean that love bears all things in silence, concealing injuries as much as possible even from herself…I would, brothers and sisters, that we could all imitate the pearl oyster. A hurtful particle intrudes itself into its shell, and this vexes and grieves it. It cannot eject the evil, and what does it do but cover it with a precious substance extracted out of its own life, by which it turns the intruder into a pearl. Oh, that we could do so with the provocations we receive from others, so that pearls of patience, gentleness, long-suffering, and forgiveness might be bred within us by the thing that caused us harm.” (Charles Spurgeon) Love Covers All Things! GiGi❤️ ”Do not fret because of evildoers...” (Psalm 37: 1) David had extensive experience with evil doers. Goliath taught him what it was like to be charged by the wicked. Saul showed him what it was like to be chased by the jealous. Absalom demonstrated to him what it was like to be challenged from within by a person in his own family. What he seems to have discovered is that it is bad enough to fight the enemy on the outside. The last thing you want to do is to let that enemy get in your head. Psalm 37 sounds like David's response to someone who has become so overwhelmed by the wicked and so envious of evildoers that they have allowed those adversaries to get into and take over their thinking. Their fretting makes them virtually unable to function. When you allow your enemies to get in your head it: 1. Blinds you to the truth. Your focus on them keeps you from being able to see the truth even though it may be quite obvious before you. 2. Distorts your thinking. Your preoccupation with them makes it difficult for you to think straight or rationally. 3. Impairs your judgment. Your lack of clarity and accurate analysis causes you to make poor decisions because of the deficiency of the data upon which they are based. 4. Causes you to act on emotion. Your feelings and emotions take over and override that which is rational. Instead of allowing the enemy to get into your head, in his own words, David suggests that you should: “Trust in the Lord, and do good; Dwell in the land, and feed on His faithfulness. Delight yourself also in the Lord, And He shall give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord, Trust also in Him, And He shall bring it to pass. He shall bring forth your righteousness as the light, And your justice as the noonday. Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him; Do not fret because of him who prospers in his way, Because of the man who brings wicked schemes to pass. Cease from anger, and forsake wrath; Do not fret-it only causes harm.” (Psalm 37:3-8) Your adversaries may get in your way. Fine. Keep them in sight. Deal with them directly, but from a distance. Still, don't permit them close enough to get in your head. Pastor Benjamin Morris 🙏🏽 |
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