Through Rivers of Difficulty, God is With You

 

Luke 12:6-7(NLT)
“6 What is the price of five sparrows--two copper coins? Yet God does not forget a single one of them. 7 And the very hairs on your head are all numbered. So don't be afraid; you are more valuable to God than a whole flock of sparrows.”

Pam and Jesse have been married for thirty-five years. They have three grown children and two grandchildren. While visiting her mother in Florida for a few days, she received a phone call that her husband had suddenly passed away of a heart attack. Not more than two months prior, they’d celebrated his sixtieth birthday. Pam initially froze from the shock of the news. She had just spoken with her husband that morning, and she just couldn’t process what had happened, but as the hours passed, something completely unexpected happened. Pam felt almost a sense of relief, like a weight had been lifted from her shoulders. 

Jesse was a very intelligent and resourceful man. He was also proud, stubborn, unaffectionate, and always had to be right. An electrician by trade, he was masterful at repairing and building just about anything. He always wanted more out of life and resented his parents for not helping him go to college after high school to become an engineer. Throughout their marriage, he had taken the brunt of his disappointments and frustrations out on Pam. From the very beginning, he turned to alcohol to cope with stressful situations, but things got worse after the children were born. He was verbally and physically abusive, and his two sons grew up disliking their father because of it. Alcoholism and abuse had been the norm in their home, but for Jesse, marital counseling was out of the question, and so was divorce. Pam felt that she had spent the last thirty-five years holding her breath in the prison that Jesse had made for them all. When he died, she felt she was finally able to come up for air.

Ephesians 5:28-29(ESV) tells us, “In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies.  He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church.” Jessie didn’t do a decent job of loving himself, so Pam really didn’t stand a chance. He couldn’t love Pam as the Word teaches in Ephesians 5:28-29, because he didn’t allow God’s Word and love to saturate his heart. He tried to mask his resentment and anger with alcohol, and after he turned 50, his body began to betray him with numerous health issues.

Pam said she blamed herself for not mustering up the courage to leave Jesse years ago, but she didn’t want her children to grow up without their father. She also didn’t think she could make it on her own. She was sometimes angry with God that things had turned out the way they did, but she hadn’t considered the reality that life is full of choices, and sometimes we repeatedly make the wrong ones. At fifty-seven, she’s beginning to understand that whether it’s when you’re twenty-five or fifty-five, life will push us all to confront how we see and value our own selves. 

2Timothy 1:7(NLT) tells us, “For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.” This is what we have received as God’s children! Through the Holy Spirit, we have received power, love, and self-discipline or self-control. We are empowered to live with authority and dominion over our own lives, but many of us are not taught the truth of 2Timothy 1:7. We make mistakes because of our insecurities and self-doubt, and the enemy continually hurls situations and circumstances that keep us down and separated from the mind and heart required to exercise power, love, and self-discipline.

Jesus Christ tells us in Luke 12:6-7 that God knows the number of hairs on our heads. He knows everything there is to know about us, and He also knows what He has given us. Ephesians 1:3(NLT) demonstrates God’s overwhelming generosity towards us. It says, “All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms because we are united with Christ.” We are pressed down, shaken together, and packed to overflowing, and God tells us this in His Word. He wants us to know how richly He’s blessed us, and He leaves it totally to us to reach out and grab all that He’s provided.

God told His people in Isaiah 43:2(NLT), “When you go through deep waters, I will be with you.
When you go through rivers of difficulty, you will not drown. When you walk through the fire of oppression, you will not be burned up; the flames will not consume you.” He will do this and so much more for those who love and honor Him. Like many of us, it took Pam several years to recognize this. God had not let her down, because it is impossible for Him to disappoint us. He would not place us in a position where we have to wait until someone dies to experience His freedom. We can live in His peace and liberty this very moment if we will trust Him. He will bring us through the rivers of difficulty and not let us drown. We will witness this continually if we have faith in His strength, love, and power, and trust in all that He has given us in Christ.■

English Standard Version (ESV)
The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

 “Through Rivers of Difficulty, God is With You”, written by Kim for https://rescuefromdomesticviolence.blogspot.com© 2023. All rights reserved. All praise and honor to God through Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.

There Is a Season for Everything

Ecclesiastes 3:1(NLT)
“For everything there is a season, a time for every activity under heaven.”

By God’s perfect and wondrous design, we know that just as there are seasons in weather, there are seasons in life. As expected, a new season will follow a passing season, and there is a continual rhythm to their coming and going. We all experience this world differently, with experiences and encounters as varied as the billions of individuals that inhabit this planet, but the one constant for all of us is that, like the seasons, life will change. Life is dynamic. It’s full of ups and downs, and of course, it’s full of surprises. Whether by choice or force, it will bring change front and center for our acceptance or rejection. We can be sure that if we reject it, that season will cycle back and do so with stronger winds and harsher storms, reminding us that it is better to greet change than to ignore it.

Frustration, disappointment, and a broken heart are just a few of the consequences that land in our laps because we’ve failed to recognize when it’s time to grow, change, and go higher. With our Great Big Wonderful God, there is never regression, but always progression and elevation. The past is something none of us can recapture. We can’t go back and relive one second of our pasts. By divine design, we can only move forward, and God reminds us of this in Isaiah 43:18-19(ESV) when He said, “18 Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. 19 Behold, I am doing a new thing;”

In every season, our Heavenly Father demonstrates His unfailing love towards us. He is not a boring God as some believe. He is amazing beyond the definition of the word, and He is very happy being His extraordinarily omnipotent, omniscient, magnificent, loving, and gloriously holy self. He is love, and His delight is to share with us all that He is! This is the main objective of any change that life brings our way; to see God greater and to love greater through Him. We may not see it that way now, but if we patiently endure in the Lord, we most certainly will change our view on this matter.

1Corinthians 13:13(ESV) says, “So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” Again, God is love, and as His children, He wants us to increase in His love continually. We cannot increase and expand our lives through pain, shame, bitterness, or regret. As we study His Word and pray often, we will grow in Christ by taking on his nature, and we will be able to love others with real love, the kind of love that truly ministers to their hearts. Jesus Christ tells us in Mark 12:30-31 that the greatest commandment is to love God with all our hearts, minds, souls, and strength, and the second is to love our brothers and sisters in Christ as ourselves. There are no greater commandments that these, and they are all about God’s love.

Loving God, others, and ourselves greater through the example of Jesus Christ is always the reason for the different seasons of life. I recently heard about a couple that didn’t consider this truth. They have been married twenty-three years, but their relationship has been starved of real love for so long that now they see each other only as roommates. Counseling is out of the question they feel, and they both believe that this new season is one of moving on and living different lives, but is it?

The only guarantees in life are God, His Word, and His love. So, whatever it is you’re going through, don’t hold on to the hurt, pain, and frustration. Instead, seek God and grow in His love. Nothing remains the same, and most of us recognize that seasons are temporary. So, a crisis of any kind is never permanent, but here’s the thing; many of us will make permanent decisions that change the situation without realizing that the season was meant to change us. Changing our hearts was the target and we miss this.

Genesis 8:22(NLT) tells us, “As long as the earth remains, there will be planting and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night.” Seasons are going to change. Summer, fall, winter, and spring will come and go, and no matter our age, we will face these seasons. Be determined that you will not miss what God has for you, and be ready to learn the lessons life brings, because they are always about His love. Remember that our powerful Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ is your foundation. He’s our solid Rock, and with him, you will always have the courage and faith to greet each season with His love and light.■

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

English Standard Version (ESV)
The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.

 “There Is a Season for Everything”, written by Kim for https://rescuefromdomesticviolence.blogspot.com© 2023. All rights reserved. All praise and honor to God through Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.

Give It Up

 

When a person has a lot of pride and arrogance, they will always find a way to boost themselves above others. It isn’t uncommon for an arrogant person to think that he or she knows it all. They must be right all the time and will belittle or devalue the opinions and knowledge of others to look superior. There’s a big difference between arrogance and confidence, and an arrogant person doesn’t understand this. Confidence comes from an appreciation of the abilities and qualities that God has given. It's an assurance of one’s self that isn’t plagued with doubt and uncertainty and is proven by experience. Arrogance is devoid of gratitude and self-assurance. It is the need to hide behind and push a lie about one’s own ability and qualities at all cost.

Many abusers are arrogant and make victims of those who might expose their shortcomings or pose a challenge to their high opinion of themselves. Their attitude of superiority is often overbearing and leaves no room for anyone other than themselves. The abuser will not face the truth about this, and sometimes the person being abused will not face it either. We don’t want to deal with the reality that the significant person in our lives is arrogant, and they are not treating us well because of it.

The put downs, feeling less than, and having to always be on guard can exhaust us, but we are not without help. The web that arrogance weaves isn’t pretty. It’s tangled and feels hard to dismantle, but we can through the strength of Jesus Christ. He is our hope, and we can access his power and help through prayer, reading and meditating on God’s Word, and confessing what God says over our situations. We can renew our minds by thinking thoughts that are aligned with faith. This requires us to do what God says in Philippians 4:8(NLT), which is to “Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.” This is the way to begin the process of dismantling the web of arrogance that tries to trap us. We need to be ferocious about God’s peace and power, and we can stake a claim with all that we are to move within them confidently.

People hold on to an arrogant mindset because they believe it serves them. It doesn’t. It injures our souls and that is why we must give it up. Arrogance drains and depletes an individual of grace and mobility. It’s a downer on our lives. Romans 12:3(NLT) warns, “Because of the privilege and authority God has given me, I give each of you this warning: Don't think you are better than you really are. Be honest in your evaluation of yourselves, measuring yourselves by the faith God has given us.” God doesn’t like arrogance, and as we pray for His help, we must understand this. Romans 12:3 tells us the attitude and heart that God requires, and it is that none of us should think we are better than we really are.

Honestly, there have been times for all of us when we have violated this. We have had arrogant thoughts and attitudes, and we must ask God to forgive us and be committed to root it out of our hearts. Our Heaven Father requires us to humble ourselves and make the necessary adjustment in our own thinking and behaving to demonstrate the humility of Christ.

1Corinthians 4:20(NLT) tells us, “For the Kingdom of God is not just a lot of talk; it is living by God's power.” As God’s children, we are not spiritual weaklings. We are filled with His Spirit and through the Spirit, we can live with power! One of the things that prevents us from fully walking in the Spirit’s power, though, is wrong believing about the nature and goodness of God. Sometimes we attribute characteristics and actions to Him, when it is the devil who does evil against us. So, the wrong belief about who God is and what He will do, we have to give it up and release it from our minds and hearts.

God doesn’t want any person to be abused. Many people have been taught or led to believe that God is angry with us because of our mistakes. Some believe that He punishes us with pain and suffering, and this is not true. It’s not who God is. 1John 4:16(NLT) tells us, “We know how much God loves us, and we have put our trust in his love. God is love, and all who live in love live in God, and God lives in them.” God is love. He is holy, pure, perfect, all-knowing, and all-powerful. There isn’t anything that He cannot do, but He only does those things that are within the boundaries of His love. 1John 1:5(NLT) tells us, “God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.” This is God’s truth! This is who He is! He doesn’t punish people; He wants our joy to be full because we belong to Him. He’s our hope, and He will never let us down! Because of Jesus Christ and what God accomplished through him, we can live in God, and as we do, we keep growing and becoming the version of ourselves that God desires us to be.

Either because we feel powerless and weak or we just don’t want to deal with the person staring back at us, most of us find it very difficult to think that we are our greatest asset, and that through Jesus Christ, life can get better. We’re in shock that our life’s choices and decisions have betrayed us to such a devastating degree, but although things feel impossible at times, they are not. You must make a faith move and give up those things that hold you back, because they keep your mind stuck in the past. A victorious strategy is to invite the love of God into our situations and make this a habit pattern. Pray, speak and think thoughts that lift you up and invite God’s love to have greater room in our life. Arrogance has its roots in believing the wrong things about God and ourselves. Make a change, and you will discover that God will reward even the smallest step you take to release arrogance from your life.■

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

“Give It Up”, written by Kim for https://rescuefromdomesticviolence.blogspot.com© 2023. All rights reserved. All praise and honor to God through Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.