Exhausted

…he pursued… exhausted
Judges 8:12, 15

Gideon and his men pursued their enemies led by Zeba and Zalmunna and though Gideon requested bread from towns along the way, he and his men received none. They pursued, exhausted, yet they were triumphant and displayed that at times we will accomplish what we must only in a state of fatigue.

We like to be well-rested and fed and at the top of our game, but this is not the only condition in which meaningful victories will be won. History is made by weary people who perceive their goals as more important than their performance and keep going, at least for a time, until the opportunities have yielded their potential.

Paul knew the experience of exhaustion in accomplishment.
2 Corinthians 4:8 We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; 9 persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.

He knew what it was to come to the end of his resources and yet continue pursuing, continue fighting. He knew what it cost to win.

February can bring many people into this state of depletion. It is a time to find appropriate rest and enjoyment, but it is also a time to continue the fight for faith and hope and joy, commodities too precious to neglect.

May we continue to pursue, though perhaps exhausted and anticipate victory granted by God.

Engaged

After dating for a little better than five months, Tina and I are happy to announce our engagement. We have not set an exact date yet but are aiming for the end of June or the beginning of July. It is an amazing thing for the two of us, both widows, to experience the kind of work that God does. It is He who says, “I will turn their mourning into gladness; I will give them comfort and joy instead of sorrow.” Jeremiah 31:13

It is good to have his word as our guide.

1Timothy 5:14
I counsel younger widows to marry…

Genesis 2:18
The LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone…

1Corinthians 7:2
Each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband.

1Corinthians 7:39
A wife is bound to her husband as long as he lives. If her husband dies, she is free to marry anyone she wishes, but only if he loves the Lord.

We are grateful for His guidance and His provision and are happy for the encouragement of so many. Thanks to everyone who has increased our joy by sharing it.

"unlovableness"

Thank-you for getting this. That is my point. "unovableness" is a lie of the Devil planted early on in a child’s life and may become so familiar that it is difficult to imagine ever living without it. We may even come to embrace it, using it as a self-pitying crutch to reject the love of God. We may in fact use it to refuse to live under his loving constraint and guidance and grace. God does love you and me. We are lovable. We are loved. You must choose to either accept His love or reject it and be responsible for that choice. There is no excuse in saying, "I am unlovable". That doesn’t even exist.

Loved

From the depths of my being, at the core of my heart, from my earliest childhood memories, I have found it impossible to believe that I am loved by anyone let alone God.

This didn’t stem from a lack of affection from parents or friends but results from an impenetrable gate leading to my heart that deflects displays of love because I don’t deserve them.

I am unlovable. I am too bad, too ugly, too me. I think this is a lie. It must be. I think it is the cause of joyless anxiety. I think it feeds on every negative that ever occurs and that they strengthen the belief that I am not loved, that God really doesn’t care, that my belief was right all along.

This is a daily fight for me, to believe that I am loved, to allow that belief to fill me with joy and security. I need God’s word every day to remind me that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

There is a love that does not depend on my goodness or accomplishments. It just comes from God because he is love and because he wants to love us and just because he does. He does. I don’t know why, but then, there are a lot of things I don’t know.

God Suffers

I am going to write. I amn not going to correct grammar spelling or theology. I am not going to use the backspace key. This is what I think. God suffers. We get wond u in the concept that he is the cause of suffering but he is also the cause of his own suffering. He is “longsufferin” Every injustice every agnostic, atheistic moment cuts just as deep as the whip or the nnails though we can’t get to him physically now. Every cult every idol , the death ov every evil person in which he takes no pleasure cause him to suffer. We are in this together longing for complete joy together. He is no above our suffering but immersed in it. It is a facet of our fellowship. He is righteous. He is love . there is bno other plan that could have expressed his nature. Thi is the plan and it must be so. God suffers. He hates this just as much as we do at times. He weeps. One day we will laugh together.

From Havoc To Heaven

Isa 54:16 "See, it is I who created the blacksmith who fans the coals into flame and forges a weapon fit for its work. And it is I who have created the destroyer to work havoc.

God purposes and intends that there be “havoc” and frustration…

Ro 8:20 For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it…

The created order intentionally contains death, mourning, crying and pain. (Rev 21:4)

Jesus was subjected to it

Ro 6:9 …death no longer has mastery over him.

For a time it did.

For us it does and it will serve us for eternity. We will always enjoy paradise from the vantage point of those who have suffered the deprivation that is a taste of hell. So many have said, if we could just experience heaven and hell for a minute each, we would make a clear choice between the two, but that is what this life is: moments of sheer exuberance and joy and others of the unfulfilled longings of hell.
Every day is an opportunity to make a choice or solidify the one we have made.

This pain serves us daily now, clarifying our choice of Christ. Though it includes earthly disappointments, those disappointments will serve us for all time and eternity. We will never be tempted as Lucifer and his angles were, to abandon heaven for something better. We will have tasted Godlessness and hell and spit it eternally from our mouths. It is this experience that will cause us to cling to heaven gratefully cheerfully and those are good emotions to envision.

Has this world been so kind to you that you should leave with regret?
There are better things ahead than any we leave behind--C.S. Lewis

Glory to God in Chronic Sin

As frustrating as chronic illness can be, it seems to me that there can come a measure of acceptance and a recognition of its capacity to drive us to God and keep us close to him. There can even be a measure of respect and admiration for the perseverance that is demonstrated in one who suffers outwardly.

What seems worse than chronic illness is chronic sin, habitual sin, what we call “besetting” sin, which robs us of joy and self-respect. It can come in many forms: pride, lust, greed, gluttony, anger… And there are none of the perks that go along with chronic illness. It causes us to loathe ourselves or the one whose sin is exposed.

The reality though is that all of us will suffer in one way or another. All of us will take sin to our graves. We may wonder, even become exasperated and ask why the God who commands purity refuses to grant it. Lately I have spoken with several people who at the base of their beings have desires that lead them into what the Bible labels as sexual sin and yet they feel powerless to change it. They fear that only death will take away what must be labeled a sinful desire. (Romans 1:24, 1Peter 4:11)

Though we may never come to the place where we no longer desire what is sinful, it is possible to fully and finally hate that specific evil, even an evil that is an inseparable part of ourselves. And therein lies a spiritual victory. Though we may not be able to flee a tendency or desire or kill it so that it no longer raises its ugly head, we can come to hate it and hate that part of ourselves.

It is the hating of wickedness that God loves. It may be part of the reason why he allows besetting sins. In this state of need, we may humbly come to the place where we know intimately and even predictably a part of our heart that is still inhabited by the enemy, a part of our soul that rebelliously refuses to submit, a hiding place for darkness, a self-deception, a love-affair brewing that we may wish so much weren’t there that it is difficult to admit that it is. But time and again we must confront it and be taught to despise it to the glory of God. It is this Christ-like passion that we can purse, even when we cannot be completely free from a desire that God labels sinful.

Ps 45:7 You love righteousness and hate wickedness; therefore God, your God, has set you above your companions by anointing you with the oil of joy.

Hebrews 1:8 tell us that these are the words of the father spoken over the divine son. The Father loves Jesus because Jesus hates evil. We can too. May those sins that we may never conquer serve us, at least to cause us to hate them and so be loved by God for this Christ-like zeal.

May our hearts produce authentic words that sound like this: “I hate my sin” and may God love us for it.