Tuesday, July 4, 2017

"With Somebody"


"With Somebody"      
   
    Many paths lie before us as we begin our days, calling us to blessings, challenges, and everyday necessities and responsibilities.  Even more importantly, how we will conduct our journeys also beckons, or rather, will we go with God, or rather live as if we must navigate the pathways of life as by ourselves?

   "I will be with thee" promised the Lord to Israel, whose response to such a magnanimous promise of grace waxed and waned (Isaiah 43:2).  God's earthly people often perceived themselves to be alone, even as King David himself cried out in bewilderment: "Why standest Thou afar off, o Lord?!  Why hidest Thyself in times of trouble?!" (Psalm 10:1).  The same David affirmed in another Psalm that "God is… a very present help in trouble" (Psalm 46:1).  Which was it?  What was the truth of the matter?  "Very present," or "afar off?"  We know the answer, even as did our brother of old.  However, we also face the two primary paths of perception on a day by day, and sometimes even moment by moment basis.  We can walk as if we are alone, or we can live as if the promise of God forever holds true of His trusting sons and daughter in Christ: "I will dwell in them and walk in them" (II Corinthians 6:16).

    The choice is always ours.  The fact of God's presence eternally abides in born again believers.  "I am with you always… I will never leave thee nor forsake thee" (Matthew 28:20; Hebrews 13:5).  The awareness and experience of such grace, however, awaits our chosen confidence in the Word of God.  The aforementioned pathways that lie before us require our Lord's presence, leadership, and enabling.  He promises to fulfill His role.  They also require our faith if we are to fulfill our role.  This is one reason that we do well to prayerfully read the Scriptures as the day begins.  "Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God" (Romans 10:17).  Again, we can live as if we are by ourselves.  Or we can live with Somebody, the Somebody who constitutes the very Life of our lives.  Our Lord will in fact be with us.  His promise of "I will be with thee" cannot be broken.  Will we believe the promise in a consistent and growing reception of Truth?  This most important Path lies before us as each day begins.  How we venture upon all the other pathways will be governed by our response of awareness and faith, or ignorance and unbelief.  The Spirit of God beckons with the most glorious of assurances, the blessedness of a life lived with Somebody

"This is the way. Walk ye in it."
(Isaiah 30:21)
"Jesus saith unto him, I am the way."
(John 14:6)

Weekly Memory Verse 
    O LORD, be gracious unto us; we have waited for Thee: be Thou their arm every morning, our salvation also in the time of trouble.
(Isaiah 33:2)
   
    
   

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