Category: Sister Judy (Page 36 of 276)

I was reading today from John’s gospel, and John was closest to Jesus when He was on earth. He called himself, “the one whom Jesus loved.” ((John 13:23) We can also add our names to that ourselves, for He loved us enough to die for us! It’s one thing to know that in our minds but does our heart really grab hold of that? If we receive His love, then we will want to naturally share Him with others, but we have to know His love first in our own hearts. We can’t give away something we have not received ourselves.

 Andrew was one of the first disciples who heard John the Baptist tell who Jesus was and you know what he did? It says in John 1:41, “Andrew at once found his brother Simon and told him, ‘We have found the Messiah (which means ‘Christ’). Andrew brought him to Jesus.” The next day Jesus found Philip who then found Nathanael and of course the list goes on and on. When we find Jesus, we want to share Him with all who will listen. Let us not keep the good news to ourselves but as the song goes, “Go tell it on the mountains, over the hills and everywhere! Go tell it on the mountain that Jesus Christ is born.”

During wilderness times, the Lord may be trying to get our attention and bring us to a deeper level of relationship with Him. So how we respond is important and we need to listen and to obey. Of course, we have only to look back at the children of Israel who were in the wilderness for 40 years as they were being readied to go into the Promise Land. Wow! I don’t have that many years left! It says in Deut. 8:2, that “He did this in order to humble you and test you. He wanted to know whether or not you would wholeheartedly obey His commands.” It is important for all of us to be open as to how the Lord would teach us and test us and be responsive to how He wants to accomplish this. We may be tempted to compromise, quit or take shortcuts but then we will miss letting the wilderness work what the Lord wants to do in us.

To make the most of this Wilderness time, we need time to be alone with the Lord, be in the Word and ask Him to speak to us as we keep our eyes on Him. What is He trying to remind us of to help us stand against the enemy?  May we be willing and open that the Lord can awaken us and plant deep truths in us, helping us to rely solely on Him as He guides us through this time. If we do, we will find that He will transform our wilderness into a beautiful fruitful place.

I read what author Eugene Peterson had to say about these verses as they are not opposites that are contradictory but rather what real life is all about as God puts together. Everything that happens is part of God’s time so then it is the right time, whether it be now to cry and then later to laugh, He is with us in both times of sorrow and joy. Now if you are like me, I would prefer to have the good times rather than times of suffering, but God is with us in each of those times. If we leave Him out of either one of those times, we miss the closeness of His presence and what He may be teaching us.

Let us not exclude certain times in our lives for they may be significant in our growth and maturity. We need both. God is with us in times of health or times of suffering. Lately I have had to pay more attention to my health and getting treatment each week. I can say I am learning things I was not aware of before and have greater empathy for others who have chronic conditions and live in pain. God is also with us when we are working as well in our leisure and if we look forward so much to the time we won’t have to work, we miss what He is teaching us daily in our work. May we be in the season God has us in right this minute and grow closer to Him.

God isn’t someone we can talk Him into things and twist His arm to force Him to do our will. But He is so worthy of our trust for He is all-knowing, all-wise and sees the end from the beginning. We see such a small portion of the whole and dare we tell Him to do things our way! I’m sure we have all had times when we were young and our parents forbade us from doing certain things. We may have thought they were uncaring and even mean at the time, but later, we realize how they spared us from heartache later. How many times I have thanked the Lord for the breakups I had with guys before meeting Al, for I could have missed God’s best to be my husband.

We can pray however, with tenacity and persistence, but always with trust! God you know better than I do so I want your will! We can ask the Lord to help us accept when His will is different than our own or when He seems silent. At those times, it is helpful to spend time in quiet in His presence and give our situations or place the person we are concerned about before the Lord. Then accept whatever His answer is and surrender to Him, just like Jesus did in the garden of Gethsemane to His Father’s will that He would die for us. We place it all in the Lord’s hands in trustful surrender.

I was reading on crosswalk.com about Professor of psychology, Robert Emmons, who has done research on how gratitude affects our lives. He said that when we express our gratitude, we reap benefits like a lower blood pressure, better sleep, more joy and pleasure, more compassion, stronger immune system, and less loneliness. He said just writing down a list of what we are grateful for seems to help us be more optimistic and to feel better. Even in our workplaces, gratitude helps workers to be more effective in their jobs and get along better with coworkers. Grateful people are also healthier with less visits to the Doctor.

All these reasons are well in good but let us thank the Lord because He is so worthy of praise and thanks. Let us daily be people of gratitude and thanksgiving that our hearts may be changing to be more like the Lord. I will close by a prayer of Pastor Mark Roberts,
“Gracious God, you deserve our thanks because of your inestimable goodness to us. Our giving of thanks recognizes your grace and honors your goodness. Plus, it’s just plain polite.
Yes, in your goodness, you have made us so that when we express thanks we also benefit. There’s no way we can ever out-give you, Lord. Even when we thank you, we are blessed.
May my life be filled with gratitude, not just this week but every week. To you be all the glory, Amen.”