Walking With Jesus

Purifying Prayer

“Jesus also taught: ‘Beware of these teachers of religious law! For they like to parade around in flowing robes and receive respectful greetings as they walk in the marketplaces. And how they love the seats of honor in the synagogues and the head table at banquets. Yet they shamelessly cheat widows out of their property and then pretend to be pious by making long prayers in public. Because of this, they will be more severely punished.’” (Mark 12:38-40 NLT)

Prayer is more than saying words with a pious posture or language. Words without relationship are worthless. The purpose of prayer isn’t to get answers, it’s to create intimacy with the Father, to enable us to grow in our love for and usefulness to our Savior, and to bear His image more clearly.

The Pharisees had a great command of the language and knew how to pray impressive prayers, but to what end? Purifying prayer focuses on God, relies on God, and hungers for God’s fullness, believing that only God can create in us a pure heart.

In its purest form prayer isn’t about us, it’s a means to an end, but knowing what that end is can be elusive. Obviously, God’s will and plan is to enable us to be conformed to the image of Jesus, to the point that we live and breathe His will, not our own; however, things get fuzzy when we mix our will and desires with His.

And yes, of course, we want to lift our needs to the Lord and ask for specific things that are attacking us, but even then, there is a battle of wills. How so? Let’s say that my child is deathly ill. Age is irrelevant, as no matter how old our child is, we don’t want to lose them. That sets the stage for the proverbial tug of war of our will with God’s.

All we can see is our child alive and well, so that occupies the major content of our prayers on their behalf. But what if God knows something that we don’t? (Imagine that 😊) James MacDonald wrote: “Prayer is purifying – as you pray, you learn to want not just right things, but right things for right reasons.”

What if the “right thing” in this context is for my child to die. How could that ever be? Honestly, I can’t imagine it, that’s why I’m using it as an illustration. I’ve sat with parents who have lost their child and, in my mind, there’s no greater loss imaginable. But the sad, hard reality is, children die. But why? Why would God allow that?

To God EVERY person is a child, and His desire is for everyone to become His child through new birth in and through Jesus, His Son. What if God in His foreknowledge and omniscience knew that our child was heading into such a catastrophic period it would test them so severely it would rob them of their will to love and serve Him? That it would result in them missing heaven?

My adult children aren’t walking with the Lord, so I pray every day for their safety and protection, giving them time to find their way to Jesus. But, if I’m honest, I would rather have lost them as small children knowing I’d see them in heaven, than have them grow up and die without a relationship with Jesus.

Purifying prayer is seeking God’s cleansing of our heart, mind, soul, and body, enabling us to see Jesus more clearly, hear His voice more strongly, and desire His will as if it were our own. We can’t and won’t have full understanding of the ways of God until we meet Him on the other side. That’s why the Bible calls it faith – “for we walk by faith, not by sight.” We can learn to pray in unselfish, childlike ways, that please God and give us purity of purpose as we pray for others.

Food for thought.

Blessings, Ed 😊

Welcome To Holland

by Emily Perl Kingsley

Reprinted by permission of the author.

*(My wife recently shared this brief poem with me, and it spoke to my heart in a special way. I hope it speaks to you and blesses you with insight and understanding as it did me. Enjoy and contemplate! I love this poem and the heart that created it. Blessings, Ed 😊)

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability – to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It’s like this……

When you’re going to have a baby, it’s like planning a fabulous vacation trip – to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It’s all very exciting.

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The flight attendant comes in and says, “Welcome to Holland.”

Photo by Tanathip Rattanatum on Pexels.com

“Holland?!?” you say. “What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I’m supposed to be in Italy. All my life I’ve dreamed of going to Italy.”

But there’s been a change in the flight plan. They’ve landed in Holland and there you must stay.

The important thing is that they haven’t taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It’s just a different place.

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.

It’s just a different place. It’s slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you’ve been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around…. and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills….and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.

But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy… and they’re all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say “Yes, that’s where I was supposed to go. That’s what I had planned.”

And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away… because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.

But… if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn’t get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things … about Holland.

Former Things

“Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged.” (1 Corinthians 13:4-5 NLT)

Do you believe women are part elephant? And, no, I’m not referring to the size of their clothes, but the size of their memory. I’ve concluded its worthless to argue with my wife. It seems she can remember every detail of everything we’ve ever done and, unfortunately, everything I haven’t done or did wrong.

When it comes to my failures and shortcomings, I’d really prefer to “let the past be past,” but I’ve learned that’s not always best, especially when the “past” keeps repeating itself. Some former things need to be dealt with, especially if they continue to create tension between you and someone you love.

Depending on the nature of the repeat behavior and how serious it is in terms of its effect on the relationship, sometimes it’s as simple as sitting down together and learning to listen to one another. If that’s not an answer that will work in your situation, consider seeking counsel from someone else whose opinion you both trust, not necessarily a professional.

Something we tend to forget is there are at least two dimensions to “former things” – former good things and former bad things. Likely because of our fallen nature we tend to focus on the bad, the things that separate us from one another; however, especially in marriage or virtually any long-term relationship, there should be, and hopefully are, many enjoyable things from which to draw memories.

Arguments or disagreements often dredge up things from the past that should already have been forgotten, as Isaiah 43:18-19 reminds us: “But forget all that – it is nothing compared to what I am going to do. For I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness. I will create rivers in the dry wasteland.”

The “old things” to which Isaiah refers is the time God opened the waters and allowed the freshly freed slaves of Egypt to walk on dry ground with walls of water on each side of them, then drowned the Egyptian army by collapsing those walls on top of them.

How God has worked in our lives may not have been as dramatic, but, if we’re willing to take the time, we can surely find ways that God has intersected our lives in significant ways, ways that when pondered, can turn our hearts toward Him.

There are times in my life that when remembered, may seem to me that God was cruel or uncaring. “Why didn’t He heal that relationship?” “Why did He let my loved one die?” “Why didn’t He let me have that job I so wanted?” On and on it goes as we second guess God’s decision in those critical moments.

George Sweeting wrote: “Divine love is kind even when misunderstood. Love knows how to take sorrow and heartache victoriously.” There have been lessons I’ve learned in difficult circumstances, not only about God, but about myself, that I could have learned in no other way. For one, I’ve learned to hear God’s voice, to discern His “whisper” during the howling storm.

I’ve also learned that God never wastes a problem, so whatever you may be going through in this season of your life, hear the Psalmist’s words reminding us to: “Be still, and know that I am God!”

“Former things,” both positive and negative, can give rise to growth and increased closeness to the Father if we’ll let them.

Food for thought.

Blessings, Ed 😊

Telescope or Microscope?

“Soon the people began to complain about their hardship, and the Lord heard everything they said.” (Numbers 11:1 NLT)

Have you ever wondered how you would have responded to eating the same thing for every meal for 40 years? Apparently, the children of Israel didn’t like it, and they began to complain. What about living with the same spouse for 40 years? Or dealing with the same disease for 40 years? Or working the same job for 40 years? Doesn’t it largely depend on how you view it?

Remember, the Israelites were in bondage to Egypt before they were delivered miraculously by the Lord, and His chosen instrument Moses. They had a vision of being in their “Promised land,” a land flowing with “milk and honey,” a land of plenty where they would no longer be slaves. How quickly they lost sight of that promise.

A similar thing can happen to us in our walk with the Lord. We sign up for “forgiveness of sin and a home in heaven,” but we don’t like the “desert” we have to cross to get there. When we lose sight of the big picture and begin to scrutinize the day to day grind it’s easy to get discouraged. But it’s what we do in the “desert” that defines the person we are and how effectively God can use us in the interim between now and then.

Grumbling is contagious and can poison our ability to understand why we’re where we are in our journey and why God is allowing us to be there. With the Lord EVERYTHING has a purpose, even the disappointing, and sometimes heartbreaking events that have the potential to cripple us.

The Prince of Preachers, Charles H. Spurgeon, asked the question – “Why must I go about mourning?” and in response wrote: “Dear believer, can you answer the above question? Can you find any reason why you are so often mourning instead of rejoicing? Why do you allow your mind to dwell on gloomy thoughts? Who told you that night will never end in day? Who told you that the winter of your discontent would continue from frost to frost and from snow, ice, and hail to even deeper snow and stronger storms of despair?

Don’t you know that day dawns after night, showers displace drought, and spring and summer follow winter? Then, have hope! Hope forever, for God will not fail you!”

Did God not keep His promise to the children of Israel? Of course, He did! But not to the grumblers! They all died in the wilderness on a 40-year journey that could have taken only a couple of weeks. Are you stuck in your faith because you’re trying to micro-manage God? Are you so persistently peering through your “microscope” at the way things are, you’ve forgotten the promises God has made to you and the plans that are unfolding under your nose, but you’re missing? The only way to see the breathtaking vista at the top is to climb the mountain.

In Mark chapter 8 Jesus is explaining to the disciples that He will be tortured and murdered, but Peter takes Him aside and reprimands Him for saying such things. Do you remember how Jesus responded? “Get away from Me, Satan! He said, ‘You are seeing things merely from a human point of view, not from God’s.’”

Peter was seeing things through the “microscope” of his own understanding, while Jesus was urging the disciples, and us, to see through the “telescope” of His omniscience. When things are hard, as they surely will be at times, take a step back and see your circumstances through the lens of eternity and God’s eternal promises. It will clarify a lot if you let it.

Blessings, Ed 😊

The Path of Least Resistance

“Jesus also said, ‘The Kingdom of God is like a farmer who scatters seed on the ground. Night and day, while he’s asleep or awake, the seed sprouts and grows, but he does not understand how it happens.’” (Mark 4:26-27 NLT)

On some levels the Christian life is a paradox. When we yield our lives and allegiance to Jesus by opening our heart and mind to His presence and power, there is a sense in which we have no part in what then happens. We can’t make the “seed” of our new faith “grow,” yet, in some miraculous and unexplainable way, it does. How is that even possible? And what are its practical implications?

And yes, of course, there is a part we must play. In some ways it’s like trying out for a sports team. When I was in Junior High, I tried out for the basketball team. I played every day after school for hours with my friends. I was only 5’10”, but I was skinny and could jump pretty high. I was a decent shot and could handle the ball better than average.

But when I was in a “real” game, with people screaming and scrutinizing our every move, I got so nervous I could hardly move. Obviously, I would have no future in basketball if I couldn’t get over my nervousness.

It’s similar in our walk with Jesus. One on one with Jesus it’s a no-brainer, but throw in our arch enemy, Satan, and we have an important decision to make. Who will we follow? Which path will we choose because we MUST choose!

Development as a child of God takes time and effort, and there’s sometimes a thin line between our part and God’s part. We can read the Bible, pray, attend meetings, do all the “right” things, but still not grow in our faith, but why? Because there is a third element we often fail to consider – our own desires! Do we really want to grow in Christlikeness?

It would be, and ultimately is, a lot easier when our desires equal and become God’s desires; however, as a new believer we can be so strongly pulled away from God and His plans for us by our desire to do what we want, not what God wants. We want to follow the path of least resistance, which is to follow our sinful nature. So, what do we do? Are we on our own? Is there no power available to enable us to do God’s will?

The bottom line is this: does God give us power to overcome our sinful desires and turn from them or not? Our sinful desires vary, but the strength of their pull on our lives is common to every would-be Christ follower. Gay or straight is irrelevant, as is male or female. We’re all pulled in ungodly directions by the forces of evil that reside in us.

Sex is a powerful tool in the enemy’s hand, but so are drugs, alcohol, pride, possessions, position, or power. What is it for you? What is the greatest deterrent in your life and mine that holds us back from being everything we say we want to be for Jesus? Could it be a lack of self-worth? Are you constantly seeking to validate your existence? Looking for “love” in all the wrong places?

At some point, if we’re going to be a Jesus follower, we must decide – is Jesus enough? Can His love and the power of His Spirit deliver and keep us or not? And if the answer is “no,” then we’re looking at the wrong side of the equation. He is MORE than able and in Him “overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us.”

Here’s the bottom line: The path of least resistance is following the dictates of our own sinful feelings and desires, but if we decide we want to be delivered from our sin, Jesus is the only One who can deliver us.

Put your trust in Him and commit everything you are to everything He is, and He’ll heal and help you; otherwise, there is no hope. Jesus IS our only eternal hope!

Food for thought.

Blessings, Ed 😊

Game to Win or Opportunity to Love?

“And why worry about a speck in your friend’s eye when you have a log in your own? How can you think of saying to your friend, ‘Let me help you get rid of that speck in your eye,’ when you can’t see past the log in your own eye: Hypocrite! First get rid of the log in your own eye; then you will see well enough to deal with the speck in your friend’s eye.” (Matthew 7:3-5 NLT)

Recently I received an “overdue” bill notice with an additional amount added to my payment. I was furious! I immediately called the company and began to rant and let them know how unhappy I was because “How can I pay a bill I didn’t know I owed!” Pretty convincing argument, right? Wrong! They HAD sent me a notice that I apparently ignored and filed away. The very soft-spoken company rep never changed her calm demeanor as I apologized and told her “I stand corrected, I’m sorry for the way I spoke to you.”

If only I could come to terms with my own “logs” in my eye when it’s my wife I’m harassing. Bruce Goff, a Family Life contributor, wrote: “An argument with your spouse is not a game to win. It’s an opportunity to love. One way we can love is by addressing our own blind spots.”

A disadvantage to growing older is our short-term memory is getting shorter and shorter, but I’m hounded by remembrances from years ago when I did the same kinds of things. Failing to see our own blind spots isn’t an issue of age so much as an issue of selfishness and pride.

Sometimes I get bent out of shape when my wife asks if I could run the sweeper or swiffer the floor. “What! Again? It’s only been 3 months!” I’m exaggerating a little bit, but what’s wrong with that picture? My mind immediately goes to ME! My time, energy, effort to please HER! But isn’t that the point?

What if my attitude was more “HER” focused and not so much “ME” focused? What if I shifted my thinking to realize what a privilege I have to be married to such an incredible woman? Why does she even have to ask? Bruce Goff concluded his article by asking: “So maybe next time you have an ‘exciting verbal exchange’ with your spouse, try, ‘Let me make sure I’m understanding you correctly …’”

The sad reality is, it’s not only our spouse with whom we have these “exciting verbal exchanges.” How many times have we been rude or short with someone on the phone or who comes to our door? Are we so quick to forget they are people with families and feelings too? Are we so forgetful that we fail to realize who WE are in Christ?

We’re a grain of sand on the beaches of the world, yet Jesus took notice of us. The King of the Universe, Creator, Sustainer, Ruler of all that is, seen and unseen, stoops to take notice of you and me! Why? Because He created us with value and worth, not because of who we are, but because of who we can become in Him!

How can we have any credibility with anyone when we’re so full of ourselves? How can we ever hope to influence someone positively for Jesus when we treat them like we’re the devil, seeing them as dirt under our fingernails?

Interactions with others must be seen as divine appointments, not a game to be played, but an opportunity to be Jesus to them, loving them like Jesus would. Think of all the people in the Bible that everyone discarded – the blind, lame, leprous, adulterous outcasts whom the Pharisees counted as “scum,” yet Jesus healed and made whole for His holy name’s sake. Let’s allow the Lord to help us get the “log” out of our eyes so we can see more clearly to get the “specks” out of another’s eye.

Food for thought.

Blessings, Ed 😊

When our “Tummy” Hurts

“Then Jesus said to His disciples, ‘I tell you the truth, it is very hard for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. I’ll say it again, – it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of God!’ The disciples were astounded. ‘Then who in the world can be saved?’ they asked.” (Matthew 19:23-25 NLT)

Family Life writer Justin Talbert wrote: “’Daddy’ moaned my sick 4-year-old from bed. ‘My tummy hurts. I need a hundred cookies. It will fix me.’ I started to laugh … Until I realized I use the same logic. In some sense, I am (we all are) spiritually sick and hungry. That’s why we go looking for satisfaction. For a cure. But when we don’t look to Christ, things get frightening real quick. We step into the realm of sin. And here’s something I’ve learned all too well: sin brings about personal ruin. By ‘sin,’ I mean any rebellion against God. And by ‘personal ruin,’ I mean … personal ruin!”

In the verses above Jesus has just had a conversation with a very wealthy young man who wants to have eternal life. He’s concluded that his wealth can’t purchase heaven for him, so he comes to Jesus, hoping to find a cure for his spiritual “tummy ache.” Because Jesus understood that the young man’s money had him, he didn’t have his money, Jesus asked him to sell all his possessions, give the money to the poor, then come and follow Him. The young man decided he liked the “sickness” more than the cure.

Because most of us, especially in America, are “rich” beyond many people of the world’s ability to comprehend, we miss the connection between us and the young rich man. Yep, we want Jesus, but we also want to hang on to our “stuff.” It took losing everything I had to bring me to an acute awareness that nothing – and I mean that literally – nothing this world offers can compare with loving, serving, and walking closely with Jesus.

Yes, I still have more “stuff” than I’ll ever need, but it doesn’t have me. My wife and I are in the process of sorting out what we really need and giving away what we no longer need. There’s a cleansing effect that has on our souls. You’ve likely heard the adage “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure.” I saw that on the faces of the people who came to pick up the things we were “selling” for pennies on the dollar the last time we moved.

We had tools, furniture, clothing, and numerous other things that (don’t tell my wife) I ended up giving away, not because I’m a great guy (I’m not), I’m just a person who has grown to love Jesus and others more than I love stuff.

Sin is pleasure for a season, so when we’re hurting and need a quick fix, we’re so prone to turn to our sin of choice, whether it comes in a bottle or can, in pill form, something we can view on the internet, or someone we can call. In whatever form our sin comes, it might seem fun for a short time, but it can’t satisfy our soul. Only Jesus can do that.

Do you find it odd that even for those of us who profess faith in Christ, we can be so repulsed by someone else’s sin, but so “comforted” by our own. As long as we’re in these bodies of clay, we’ll have to deal with our allegiance to sin. But here’s the wonderful news: We have a Savior, Christ Jesus our Lord, who doesn’t simply forgive us, He cleanses us and casts our sin into the sea of forgetfulness, never to be remembered against us again.

Yes, of course, we still have the capacity to sin, but on the basis of more than 60 years of following Jesus, nothing, absolutely nothing, this world can offer compares to intimacy with Jesus and walking in harmony with Him.

Sin – it’s just not worth the price you pay to enjoy it.

Food for thought.

Blessings, Ed 😊

When It Gets Personal!

“And how will anyone go and tell them without being sent? That is why the Scriptures say: ‘How beautiful are the feet of messengers who bring good news!’” (Romans 10:15 NLT)

In yesterday’s post we looked at how vitally important it is to share our faith in Christ with those in our spheres of influence. Many faithful believers believe their life will give expression to their salvation and faith in Jesus, and it does! But our lifestyle won’t answer the questions people who are lost are asking.

A few weeks ago, I invited a neighbor who grew up under Hindu teaching, to a men’s breakfast at our church. He’s only in his 40’s, but having had a stroke, his cognitive ability is limited. I’ve given him a Bible, showed him where to start reading, and followed up with him to see if he has questions, but progress is very slow.

On the ride home I asked him if he had any questions about what he’d heard at breakfast, but he had none. I’ve spoken with him before about Jesus, but I tried to break it down into simple statements. I told Him that Jesus was God in human form, that He came to earth to give visibility to the invisible God. That He was born as a man, but never sinned. “Never?” he asked.

The point is, take it slow, but steady with your friends and loved ones. We can’t really know what someone is thinking or believing unless we take the time and make the effort to ask and listen to them. I’ve often found that what I thought someone thought or believed wasn’t even close to what they actually believed.

The Lord has also given me insight to understand that people are a lot more open to speak with me than I thought. It’s ironic that we have more and simpler ways to communicate today, but people are much lonelier than ever before. The suicide rates are the highest in history, reaching more than fifty thousand in America alone last year.

While people need Jesus more than ever before, we’re less likely to share Him. My friend expressed sincere interest as he listened in the car and the Lord has prompted me to set a time with his mom, with whom he lives, and share the Lord with both of them. Will they listen and find hope in Jesus? I pray they will, but I know this – they likely never will if I don’t give them opportunity!

Who in your spheres of influence is the Lord laying on your heart? When the Scripture says: “And how will anyone go and tell them without being sent?” that doesn’t necessarily have reference to another person or organization. It can mean the Holy Spirit can and will choose you to share Christ’s love with someone. It can be someone you know – a family member or friend – or a complete stranger.

A word of caution: If you choose to write something rather than speaking in person, write out what you want to say, set it aside for a day or two, then reread it to make sure you’re expressing exactly what the Lord is saying. I go over these blog articles many times before I post them and still miss things I should have changed or said differently.

The point is, we must be about our Father’s business! We must be making efforts every day to reach out to those who are “clinging to the tail of the plane,” waiting to be rescued. The greatest treasure we can ever invest in heaven are the ones we’re privileged to lead to Jesus, realizing we’re simply the “glove,” Jesus is the “Hand” that leads the way and changes their life. We’re the instrument, not the sculpter.

Blessings, Ed 😊

The Sixth Man

“Then the man said, ‘Let me go, for the dawn is breaking!’ But Jacob said, ‘I will not let you go unless you bless me.’” (Genesis 33:26 NLT)

In a recent devotional Ron Hutchcraft recounted a tragic scene. He wrote: “When I fly into Washington D.C., I sort of flash back to an unforgettable scene. It’s been quite a while, but I can’t help but think of it as I see that same bridge. It actually happened way back in 1982 in January. It was when Air Florida’s flight 90 took off in Washington. It raked the 14th Street Bridge; plunged into the freezing waters of the Potomac River. I can still remember that image of the tail section sticking up out of the river and six survivors clinging to that plane.

And there was that rescue helicopter circling overhead, lowering a lifeline to those survivors. And there was this one middle-aged man who was unidentified in the news reports. He kept pushing the lifeline away and passing it to the other five passengers. Now, five people had been rescued. When the chopper went back for that sixth man, he’d slipped beneath the water. The pilot said later, ‘I have never seen one man with that much commitment.’”

Would you have been that sixth man? Or would you have been scrambling to get the lifeline for yourself? I’m quite confident that most, if not all, who read this blog would want to be the sixth man, but we dismiss the idea because we weren’t there on that freezing January day. Or we make other excuses: “I’m too old, I couldn’t have held on!” “I’m afraid of water, I would have had to get out as quickly as possible!” Or you can fill in your own excuse.

Think with me for a moment. Isn’t Jesus our “Lifeline” to heaven? It’s not like we have to make a choice – “us or them!” Jesus has already made that decision for us. In Revelation 22:17 the Bible says: “The Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come.’ Let anyone who hears this say, ‘Come.’ Let anyone who desires drink freely from the water of life.”

If your spouse, child, or grandchild was clinging with you waiting to be saved, wouldn’t you most assuredly have passed the lifeline to them before taking it yourself? Yet, here we are in the comfort and security of our homes going about our daily lives, often giving little or no thought to the people we love who aren’t ready to go to heaven.

Every day I cry out to God on behalf of my loved ones and friends who are lost and destined to an eternal misery unless someone warns them and pleads with them to come to the Savior. I know some of you well and I know your heart for your loved ones, and I applaud your efforts to point them to Jesus.

But I also know some who are reading these words rarely if ever give the lostness of your friends and loved ones a thought. You feel secure in your faith but believe it’s their responsibility to call out to God for themselves. And, yes, of course it is. But the words of Paul in Romans 10:14 ring in my heart: “But how can they call on Him to save them unless they believe in Him? And how can they believe in Him if they have never heard about Him? And how can they hear about Him unless someone tells them?”

And some may say some version of: “But they were in church every Sunday they were growing up!” But did they listen? Did they ever really grasp what was being said about salvation in Christ alone by faith alone? Isn’t it worth writing them a detailed letter or having a conversation to determine what they do or don’t know and understand?

Let’s look at this further in tomorrow’s post.

Blessings, Ed 😊

Encouragement

“For instance, there was Joseph, the one the apostles nicknamed Barnabas (which means ‘Son of Encouragement’).” (Acts 4:36 NLT)

Barnabas is arguably the greatest encourager in the New Testament, save Jesus Himself. It’s interesting in the verse above the word translated “Encouragement,” used in reference to Barnabus, is the same word Jesus used in John 15:26 to describe the Holy Spirit. Jesus said: “But I will send you the Advocate – the Spirit of truth.”

Encouragement is no small thing and can take many forms. For example, some of the definitions Strong’s uses are: “consolation, exhortation, comfort and intreaty.” But rather than spend a lot of space writing about what it means to be an encourager, I’d like to address the reasons we need encouragement in the first place.

What discourages you? We all have “triggers” or “buttons,” call them what you will, that launch us upward and onward, or drag us down and set us back. Being subject to depression, it sometimes doesn’t take much to push me down, but for me a fast track to an emotional tailspin is doing something for someone you think will be an encouragement to them, but it turns out to be just the opposite.

I’m reminded of Joseph Bayly’s book The View From a Hearse. Having lost three children to death, he was quite familiar with funeral homes. One thing he said that has stuck with me was that there would be those who would come to “comfort” him, yet they would talk on and on and he thought they’d never leave. Then there were others who would come and sit quietly with him, and he wished they’d never leave.

Bayly wrote: “Tears are a universal language. One need not understand words to comprehend their meaning. They communicate far more deeply than verbalization ever could. And it is a language that everyone speaks, sometime, somewhere. The pain of illness, disease, war, rejection, desertion, financial reversal, death, and more, leaves a person suffering, stunned, questioning “Why? Why me? Why now? Why this?” It leaves them drowning in a sea of perplexity.”

Charles Swindoll wrote: “Discouraged people don’t need critics. They hurt enough already…. They need encouragement.” Pain, heartache, loss, uncertainties related to health and many other things can be discouraging, but rather than “answers,” often what we most need is a comforter, not a criticizer; someone to sit with us, hold us, pray for us, not try to figure us out or even “understand” us.

Where are you today? What is the Lord leading you to do on behalf of someone you know who is discouraged? A call? A note? An invitation to a meal? A walk together in a park? May I be honest? When I’m down I’m a lousy conversationalist. The last thing I need is someone asking me “What’s wrong?” “What can I do?” “Do you need anything?”

Sometimes I just need to be left alone, but other times I want to be wanted without explanation. Quietness can be a solace, even with someone else present. Recently I sat with a friend for a couple of hours in mostly silence after he lost a loved one to cancer. Presence is an indispensable part of relationships.

Think of the presence of God in times of trial, heartache, and uncertainty. Words can’t describe the sense of peace and satisfaction He brings with His holy presence. Never underestimate the value of your presence with someone who needs to be encouraged.

Food for thought.

Blessings, Ed 😊