The Saturday Series - 17 - "Confident"

(Friends:  Most Saturdays for the duration of this year, I plan on sharing a message that relates to the character and nature of God, and our response thereunto.  I hope you will find it helpful, and as always, thanks for allowing us to send the devotionals to you.  Glen).

The Saturday Series - 17

"Confident"     

  

  

  Our Lord is completely confident in who He is and what He can do.

   "Behold, I am the LORD, the God of all flesh: is there any thing too hard for Me?" (Jeremiah 32:27).

   Only One exists for whom self confidence is appropriate.  Others can be aware and assured regarding their abilities, but only if they know themselves to be conduits of Another's capacities.  The Apostle Paul, for example, knew he could "do all things" in accordance with God's glory and will.  He also knew, however, the strength whereby such capacity was possible - "through Christ" (Philippians 4:13).  God, conversely, requires no supply from outside Himself to accomplish His purposes.  "Of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever" (Romans 11:36).  Self determining, self motivating, self governing, and self actualizing - this is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.  And He knows it.

   We should rejoice that sublime character accompanies such confidence.   If our Lord were not love, the awareness of His own abilities would lead Him to arrogant and boisterous actions for His own benefit regardless of the needs of others.  Just the opposite is the case with the true and living God.  He knows what He can do, He desires to do it in humility and quiet strength, and He acts in such a manner that most of His works are unknown to even those closest to Him.  As Scripture says about the family of the Lord Jesus Christ during His earthly lifetime, "And neither did His brethren believe in Him" (John 7:5).  A confident Christ completely aware that He "must be about My Father's business" grew up so quietly that His brothers failed to realize that God in the flesh dwelt in their presence  (Luke 2:49).  Confidence with character describes our blessed Lord, a unity of Divine traits that should lead us to knees and faces to offer grateful praise.

   Our confidence in God directly correlates with our knowledge of His confidence in Himself.  If we ever open the Bible and find a passage wherein the Lord wrings His hands and drips with nervous sweat, we will be justified in our own insecurities.  However, since no such passage exists in Scripture, we must instead embrace our own confidence - in God and in our capacity to face life through Him with much assurance.  "We are more than conquerors through Him that loved us" (Romans 8:37).   Like Paul, we do all things through Christ.  God's abilities reside within us through the indwelling Holy Spirit.  Thus, if He can, we can, as led, motivated, enabled by Him.  "It is God which worketh in you both to will and do of His good pleasure" (Philippians 2:13).  Knowing that our Lord knows He can fulfill His promises leads us to trust Him without reserve, and to go forth confidently in His confidence…

"The Lord shall be thy confidence."

(Proverbs 3:26)

"For thus saith the Lord GOD, the Holy One of Israel; In returning and rest shall ye be saved; in quietness and in confidence shall be your strength."

(Isaiah 30:15)

Weekly Memory Verse 

    The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly."

(John 10:10)   

"A Foolish Liberty"

"A Foolish Liberty"     

  

  

    I recently began reading a book written by a man who hiked the Appalachian Trail after a sad loss in his life.  A professing believer, the man set out on the Trail to deal with his pain and to strengthen his relationship with God.   Having spent a good bit of time on the AT, the book intrigued me as the author references places and experiences with which I have become quite familiar.

   I have put the book down, however, and don't suspect to pick it back up.  In the first hundred pages, the author records speaking to God several times in a disrespectful manner.  He calls the episodes "temper tantrums," and on each occasion concludes that while his shouting at the Lord and telling Him what to do is not the best way to express himself, the Lord nevertheless understands and accommodates his anguished cries.  He seems to echo what I once heard another gentleman say about such outbursts, "The Lord can take it!"

   Yes, He can.  However, we cannot.  Allowing ourselves to express anger and bitterness toward the Lord does something in our hearts that yields no benefit, and much harm.  We may feel better after doing so, but in the long term, we do ourselves significant spiritual damage.  Job's experience confirms this.  Few have suffered as did our brother of old, and we do well to remember that Job passed the main test of his trial.  He never cursed God to His face, as Satan told the Lord he could lead Job to do (Job 1:11; .  However, Job complained bitterly to and about God in the midst of his trial.  "Know now that God hath overthrown me, and hath compassed me with His net. Behold, I cry out of wrong, but I am not heard: I cry aloud, but there is no judgment" (Job 19:6-7).  Certainly we understand the temptation Job faced, and we sympathize with his pain.  However, we cannot condone it.  The Lord roundly rebuked Job for his loose tongue.  A careful reading of Job 38-41 reveals God chiding His child for Job's presumption and disrespect.  "Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind, and said, Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without knowledge?" (Job 38:1-2).

    God's way in our lives involves not only the pleasant, but also the painful.  We presently require challenge if we are to grow in the grace and knowledge of the Savior who lived a life of much difficulty and suffering.  We will frequently not understand, and our spiritual enemies will tempt us to bitterness toward the Lord, including crying out against Him.  By the grace of God, we must overcome these temptations.  Allowing ourselves to speak disrespectfully to our Heavenly Father alters our view of Him and ourselves.  We forget the truth that God is God, and we are not.  We deny how much grace He has bestowed, and how unworthy we are of the smallest Divine favor.  We fail to rightly fear Him.  And we set ourselves up for a compromised faith in the future that can deceive us into believing further deceptions about God and ourselves.  "I complained and my spirit was overwhelmed" (Psalm 77:3).

   Certainly we can ask the Lord for help and understanding when we hurt.  We can express the pain we feel.  He cares, He understands, and He knows the pricks of the thorny paths we travel.  We nevertheless must not embrace the bitterness toward God offered by devilish influences, nor must we express it.  Granting ourselves such foolish liberty envelops our soul with a shroud of deception and discouragement.  Job repented much for his waywardness.  God mercifully forgave, cleansed, and restored him (Job 42:6; 12).   He will do the same with us if we have succumbed to such temptation, and if we realize that while the Lord can take expressions of bitterness directed toward Him, we cannot handle the consequences of such darkness passing through us.

"Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth."

(Ephesians 4:29)

"Set a watch, O LORD, before my mouth; keep the door of my lips."

(Psalm 141:3)

Weekly Memory Verse 

     The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly."

(John 10:10)

"Of String Trimmers and Hemostats"

"Of String Trimmers and Hemostats"     

  

  

    The following is a true story (the only kind I hope to tell).  It also correlates perfectly with yesterday's message about God's detailed involvement in our lives.

    Yesterday morning, as I placed a load of clothes in the washing machine, I felt something in a pocket of one of Frances's work uniforms.  Fishing my hand into the pocket, I brought forth a pair of hemostats, the plier-like tools that no God-fearing, respectable nurse will be caught without.  They use them in ways that the rest of us doubtless know nothing about.  I brought the tool to Frances.   "Wow!" she responded.  "I've been looking for those.  I thought I must have left them in a patient's room" (sure was glad she didn't say "in a patient" :)  ).  I left the tool on the dresser for Frances to put up when she had time.

    Fast forward to several hours later.  I had time to do a little yard work, and went outside with the American male's favorite power device - my trusty and beloved string trimmer!  You can do so much (so much destruction!) with those devices.  And then you can look back to see your handiwork after the job is done.  I didn't have long to work, so I got started and was going along fine until the trimmer just stopped.  I thought my battery had died, and went inside to get another freshly charged unit.  When I installed it on the device, however, the trimmer still didn't work.  I checked the unit closely, and discovered I had somehow picked upon a very thin piece of plastic that had wrapped itself around the driveshaft of the trimmer.  This kept the string cartridge from turning.  A little flap of the plastic protruded.  I pulled on it, and it broke.  Looking more closely into the trimmer, I realized that the remainder of the plastic was wrapped so deeply in the machine that I seemingly had no hope other than to take the trimmer head apart.  I really didn't want to do this, and could not see how I might proceed if I had wanted to make the attempt.  A repair shop came to mind, but realized that a repair bill would likely be nearly as much as simply replacing the unit.  "Oh well" I thought to myself, "I'll probably just have to bite the bullet and get a new one."

   Then it hit me.  "Wait a minute.  What about Frances's hemostat I found this morning?!"  Her tool was a particularly small version, and the thought occurred to me that it might reach into the very belly of the beast (the trimmer, that is).  "If I poke around that driveshaft, I might be able to find and get hold of that plastic strip."  I proceeded into the house, and straight to the dresser where I had laid the hemostat earlier.  I asked Frances if I could borrow it, explaining my dilemma.  She obliged, and I'll make the conclusion of this brief: in less than a minute, I had cleared the clog with those hemostats.  The trimmer worked fine thereafter, and I looked at the results of my labors with even more satisfaction than usual.  Oh yes, I also dutifully returned the hemostat to their owner!

    Some coincidence, huh?  On the very day I would need Frances's very small version of a hemostat, I find them in her uniform.  They were the perfect - and only - tool we own that would have come close to solving the problem.  A string trimmer and a hemostat.   Who would have ever thought that two such different devices would unite to so vividly amplify the Lord's minutely detailed working in our lives?  Moreover, for this to happen on the very day in which I wrote about the subject?  I suppose that some might still call it coincidence.   I'll call it coordination by the One who "worketh all things after the counsel of His own will" (Ephesians 1:11).  I'm sure you all have countess stories of God's working in your own lives and circumstances.  We forget too many of them so I wanted to share this with you to remind you of your own occasions of seeing God's precisely revealed faithfulness.  I also want to chronicle this latest event in my own life.  Some would say that the stars aligned just right to so bless me.  Ha!  The truth of the matter is that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit perfectly aligned to reveal the detailed involvement of God, in a matter of string trimmers and hemostats.

"The works of the LORD are great, sought out of all them that have pleasure therein."

(Psalm 111:2)

Weekly Memory Verse 

     The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly."

(John 10:10)

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