Monday, December 28, 2020

WHAT IS LACKING IN OUR LIVES!

 


 

 

I’ve discovered that I need to drink more water. If I don’t, I am prone to get a lot of headaches, especially during the night. But it is just not a question of headaches. We tend to need more water for many reasons. I, therefore, try to always have a glass of water at my side.
 
However, there is another commodity that we continually need by our side. Without it we suffer and fail to develop properly. The Bible demands that it must be the staple of our diet:
  
·       Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers. (Psalm 1:1–3 (ESV)
 
The servant of God who is nourished by the Word prospers. Jesus also embraced this truth. In His parable of the Seeds and the Sower, He concluded:

·       “As for what was sown on good soil, this is the one who hears the word and understands it. He indeed bears fruit and yields, in one case a hundredfold, in another sixty, and in another thirty.” (Matthew 13:23)
 
The fearful Joshua was about to take the reigns from Moses to lead Israel in the conquest of the Promised Land. At this time, God revealed to him what we be the necessary ingredient of his success:
 
·       Only be strong and very courageous, being careful to do according to all the law that Moses my servant commanded you. Do not turn from it to the right hand or to the left, that you may have good success wherever you go. This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success. (Joshua 1:7–8)
 
Joshua had been fearing this transition, so God informed him that his courage and success would be derived from meditating on the Word “day and night.” It had to be foremost in his thinking and doing. Therefore, it was necessary to understand it to apply it. This could only come from a steady diet of meditation upon this Word.
 
We are continually assaulted by doubts, confusion, fears, and temptations, each vying for our spirit (Galatians 5:17). How to resist them? Only with the armor of God:
 
·       In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one; and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. (Ephesians 6:16–17)
 
We cannot say, “I have the Spirit to guide me. Therefore, I do not need the Word.” Instead, to trust in the strength and guidance of the Spirit requires us to use the sword of the Spirit – the Word of God.”
 
When we are assaulted by fears, these should turn us to the only solution for our fears, to God through his Word and its:
 
·       When I am afraid, I put my trust in you. In God, whose word I praise, in God I trust; I shall not be afraid. What can flesh do to me? (Psalm 56:3–4)
 
To trust in God is to put our trust in the promises of His Word. The Word is also the test of truth (2 Corinthians 10:4-5). It gives us the correct lens to interpret life, our experiences, and the faith to resist the accusations of our enemy. Too often, we think that bad things are happening to us because God doesn’t love us enough. Instead, the Scriptures inform us that our suffering proves the opposite:
 
·       For the Lord disciplines the one he loves and chastises every son whom he receives…For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. (Hebrews 12:6,11)
 
There are so many truths we must learn from the Scriptures so that we can confidently endure. We tend to grieve over our weaknesses, failures, and inadequacies if we fail to understand that our lives are no longer our own:
 
·       I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. (Galatians 2:20)
 
Since Christ is now at the helm of our lives, we no longer need to obsess about our weaknesses. Instead, our weaknesses are our strengths:

·       But he [God] said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:9–10)
 
These many truths set us free and enable us to accept ourselves and others. Why am I writing these things? Because I am convinced that our diets do not contain enough of the food of the Word. We need to have this Word guarding our thinking, speaking, actions, and even the Words we write on social media:
 
·       so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, (Ephesians 4:14–15)

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