Burdens

I work in customer service and it can be really good but some days may also be really hard.  The normal day includes a balanced mixture of both.  But the other day, it was just a rough morning and I was struggling to keep a good attitude.  The essence of my job is 2 fold: I am to help people but also people call me with their problems.

I don't always feel like handling other people's problems though.  I've got my own problems to handle.  It is not always enjoyable to be loaded down with one problem after another but that's part of the job.

I was having one of those mornings this week.  The type of morning where each call was a complex issue and the person calling just wanted someone to fix it and fix it now.  They don't care about my problems, they just want to me to fix their problem.  My patience was wearing thin and I began to feel frustration bubble up inside.  I tried taking deep breaths but I could tell, it was continuing to build. 

Then the Lord brought these verses to mind...

"Casting all your care upon Him, for He careth for you."  1 Peter 5:7

"Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest."  Matthew 11:28

I was dumbfounded. 

It's hard for me to comprehend the fact that God wants our burdens and our cares.  I am so unlike Christ in that aspect.  It's hard to want to take somebody's burden or problem.  But Christ, He flat out asks us, pleads for us to give our burdens to Him and trust Him with them.

Oh how relieving it is to have someone that I can go to with all my burdens, all my worries and thoughts and desires and cares!  He wants them all.  He wants the good and the bad.  He want the simple and the complex. 

I am so thankful to have a God that loves me enough to take my burdens and carry them so I don't have to.

Truly Thankful

Well, here we are.  Thanksgiving Day.  So much for my blog-a-day challenge this month.  But I do have plenty to be thankful for and today as we gather together with friends and family and enjoy the food that has been planned, prepped and prepared, my mind is filled with what to truly be thankful for this year.

I've spent the last few weeks reading over so many verses in the Bible about thanks, thanksgiving and being thankful.  The Bible has more than enough to say about being thankful, it's all over that Book, from beginning to end.  God knows man and knows that we have to constantly be reminded to be thankful.

"This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come.  For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy." 

2 Timothy 3:1-2

Thankfulness breeds certain characteristics in a person, so does unthankfulness.  I want the results of a thankful person, a thankful Christian.

I could write a whole long list of all the "things" I am thankful for today.  For my salvation, my family, my great church, my great Pastor and his family, all the wonderful friends God has blessed me with, my health, my job and so on.  But instead of continuing that list, I am going to focus today's post on the source of all those things I am blessed with.

First and foremost, I am thankful for my God.

My God is alive!  He has overcome death and Hell and He is victorious!  He is the One, True God.  He is the One who existed before all else existed.  By Him were all things created and created for His pleasure.

Millions of people have faith and millions and billions of people believe but unfortunately, many put their faith and belief in a man who is in the grave or many put their faith in a church or religion.  But my God and Savior, Jesus Christ, He is real!  He is alive and here are just a few of His attributes that I am most thankful for...

 - I am thankful for God's love.

"But God commendeth his love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."  Romans 5:8

There are days when I struggle to understand why God would love me.  I mean, "what is man, that thou art mindful of him?" (Psalm 8:4).  Why would a just and holy God who is in need of nothing, why would He love me?  I don't always understand it but boy, am I thankful for it! 

"Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He first loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins."  1 John 4:10

He doesn't love me because of what I do for Him or because I love Him.  He loved me first.  He loved me while I was yet a filthy sinner who rejected Him.  He loved me when I rejected His love.  But His love, man, it was there from the beginning and it doesn't have an end.  It doesn't have an end!  I'll never run out of His love for me!  It has no limits!  There is no love that is greater than his love!

"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."  John 15:13

- I am thankful for God's forgiveness.

"If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."  1 John 1:9

His cleansing is unlike anything else.  I know my sins, I know my thoughts, my actions, my motives and my intentions and I understand how unholy they are but yet, for some reason, he not only forgives but cleanses me.  He forgives and cleanses of not just some but all!  ALL!  

- I am thankful that God listens.

"And this is the confidence that we have in him, that if we ask any thing according to his will, he heareth us:" 1 John 5:14

There are so many people who plan their day around a "call to prayer" that occurs five times a day.  But they pray to a god that is dead, who is lying in a grave and who cannot do anything about their prayers or even hear them.  But me, I can pray to a God who is alive!  A God who can do something about my prayers and who actually hears me!  

I am so thankful that I can go to Him and just talk.  I can pour my heart out before Him and even though I cannot see Him (yet!)  I know He is there and more than that, I know He hears me.  I know because His word tells me.  

I listen to people talk all day.  I have learned that many times, people just want someone who will listen, someone who will take an interest in them and what they have to say.  I know I want that, I desire that and that is why I am so inexpressibly thankful that I can take my cares, my dreams, my desires, my pains and heartaches, my decisions, anything...I can take it all to Him and He'll listen.  Wow.  That amazes me.

"Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you." 1 Peter 5:7

- I am thankful for God's presence.

"Have not I commanded thee? Be strong and of a good courage; be not dismayed; for the Lord thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest."  Joshua 1:9

A couple of weeks ago in Sunday school, I taught on the fiery furnace (honestly, one of my favorites).  I love that story because I love to picture the scene.  The King orders the furnace to be turned up and they bind of the 3 men and throw them in.  Then they see 4 men standing in the flames and the "fourth is as the Son of Man".  Wooo!  Gives me goosebumps to think on that!

I know that no matter if I am going through a trial or if I am on the mountaintop of triumph, God is there.  Always.  

Well, those are just a few of the many attributes of God that I am thankful for.  I will post more in the next couple of days but today, I think that is enough for me to focus on and to ponder and to thank God for.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

"Give thanks unto the Lord, call upon his name, make known his deeds among the people.  Sing unto him, sing psalms unto him, talk ye of all his wondrous works.  Glory ye in his holy name: let the heart of them rejoice that seek the Lord.  Seek the Lord and his strength, seek his face continually."  

1 Chronicles 16: 8-11

Thankfulness Challenge: Day 3

"Have not I commanded thee? Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee withersoever thou goest." 

Joshua 1:9

I'm thankful for a God who is there.  

For the past few weeks in my Sunday school class, we've been learning about the life of Daniel.  My favorite story is the fiery furnace, when God Himself stood in the midst of the fire and flames with Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego. 

Tomorrow, we will finish up the story of Daniel and the lion's den.  I'm just amazed at the fascinating things God has done.  I'm thankful that the same God who stood in the fire and flames and protected Daniel from the lions is the same God that I get to put my trust in.  He's the same God that stands in the flames of my trials with me.  He protects me and keeps me safe and I am nowhere near facing the same kind of trials and conflicts or persecution that Daniel and his friends faced. 

I'm thankful for a God who is there.  He's there when I need Him.  He's there even when I don't think I need Him.  He's there to cheer me, there to comfort me.  He's there to guide and direct me.  He's there, providing for me and protecting me.  I don't have to ask Him to be there, He's just always there.  He's that "friend that sticketh closer than a brother."  

Amazing.

Thanksgiving Challenge: Day 2

"As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him: rooted and built in him and stablished in the faith, as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving."

Colossians 2:6-7

I just got home so I know I am cutting it close with this post but tonight I am thankful for Friday night Bible study.  

When I was in high school, I attended a home Bible study with some friends of mine and I loved it!  I like having plans every Friday.  I like having another opportunity to study God's Word and be around God's people.  

A couple of years ago, we decided to start a home Bible study at my brother's house.  As soon as I heard about it, I knew I wanted to be involved.  

We are now into our 3rd year (I think) and it's going strong!  It's great to look back and see how it's grown and changed and developed.  We studied the foundational doctrines of Christianity, the Tabernacle and other religions.  This fall, my brother started teaching the book of Colossians and once again, I am getting so much out of it!

I thought of the verses above, which we went over tonight, particularly the "as ye have been taught" part of verse 7.

That's the main reason why anybody shows up every Friday.  We all want to be taught something.  Something that will help us.  Something from the Bible, not man's opinion or thought but truth. 

I'm thankful for my brother being willing to study and then teach us and be a guide to us as we study the Bible.  I have been able to observe and learn from him for years now but it has just been within the past year or so that I really started to notice something...he is a teacher.  God has developed that within him and that excites me.  It excites me to see God's work in and through him and to see it in action and to see the fruit of that.  He's doing what God wants to him to do and that's the best thing any Christian can do.

I'm thankful for his wife, who prepares and opens her house each week to our group and makes it a warm, inviting, comfortable and fun environment.

I'm thankful for what I get out of Bible study.  Not only do I get a vast amount of stuff from God's Word that helps deepen my love for the Book and for God and helps and instructs me, but I get so much more.  I get Christian fellowship each week.  I get an opportunity to pray with and for these people.  I get the opportunity to "sharpen" and be "sharpened".  

It's a great way to end my week and start my weekend.  I'm very thankful tonight for our Bible study and everyone who comes.  It's a highlight of my week.

Monthly Challenge: Be thankful!

Well, the first thing I did this morning when I got to work was flip the month on my calendar.  November.  It's finally here!

I love November.  I love the weather, crisp and cool.  I love the smell of November, mulled cider candles burning (or brewing cider on the stove!).  I love the sound of November, the crunch of leaves under my feet.  I love the sight of November, usually the first real snowfall comes this month.  I love the taste of November, thanksgiving meal!

Which brings me to my point: thanksgiving.  The blessed day we have set aside to think upon all the things we are most thankful for and all the wonderful food we consume that day.  I don't know about you but I can't fit all my gratitude into just one day.  I like to try to be thankful everyday, especially during the month of November.  For the past few years, I have kept a list of what I am thankful for and add something new each day of the month.

This year, I'm gonna share that list with you!

I want to focus not just on the things God has blessed me with, which is a lot, but I also want to take some time this month to focus on some of the characteristics of God that I am most thankful for.  Please join me and I encourage you to make your own list!  You'll see just how much God gives to us and it'll help you take time each day to be thankful for something.

So today is November 1st.  I think I'm going to start this month off with being thankful for my salvation.  Last month I had the privilege to share my salvation testimony.  What a blessing!  It had been a long time since I had shared my full testimony with someone.  It was great.

It made me think back though to how I was before I got saved.  I was such a different person.  Different, desires, different attitude, different language, different perspective, different goals.

"Therefore, if any many be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new."  2 Corinthians 5:17

I am so thankful for the new things He has given me.  He gave me a new life, a new mind, a new home in eternity, new desires, new things to say.  I'm also thankful that the old things are passed away and gone!  Woo hoo!  Man, I love that!  He didn't have to do that, but He did.  Because He's God and He can do that stuff.

So I'm thankful for my salvation.  I'm thankful that I accepted His free gift for me and that He took my place and paid my debt of sin so that I wouldn't have to.  Amazing!

I'm looking forward to this month!  There's so much to be thankful for...I'm just getting started!

Happy November!

My debt

I was struggling last week.  I have a tendency to go through streaks of contentment.  Last week, I had an emotional weak moment, or day actually.

It wasn't pretty.

I've been asking God to give me some of that "peace that passes all understanding" because frankly, I am tired of this fleeting contentment that seems to come and go from time to time.

So yesterday I was praying and talking with God about this whole contentment/peace thing and He gave me a thought: God doesn't owe me anything.

I know that it is not ground-breaking or profound but I needed the reminder and the Lord really struck a cord in me with it.  It was one of those thoughts that God plants in your mind and then continues to stir it around until it can settle and sink in.

It's a true statement though.  God doesn't owe me anything.  However, I think Christians (trust me, myself included) can often convince ourselves that He does in fact owe us something.  We can convince ourselves that since we have trusted Him and are now saved, we are entitled to His blessings.  We can begin to think that the more we do for Him, the more we deserve from Him.  We can begin to believe that He owes us a spouse, a child, health, wealth, happiness, a nice home, a nice car, comfort or even peace.

HA!

He showed me how absolutely ridiculous that is!  

He doesn't owe us anything!

He gave us everything 2,000 years ago when He freely laid his life down for me and shed His blood for me and paid my debt of sin.  He overcame death and Hell for me.  What more could I expect or even ask from Him?! 

God continued to stir that thought last night.  My pastor was preaching about why Christ's return will be glorious and the fact that when we get to Heaven, we will have perfect, immortal bodies, made like Him.  The point he was trying to get across was that God gives us his very best, which is so true.  In response to that, we ought to give Him our very best.

That fit right in with the thought that God doesn't owe me anything but rather, in reality, I owe Him.

I owe God everything. 

I owe him my time, not the very end of my day after everything else has been done but I owe Him the very first part of my day.  I can't be selfish with my time.  If He wants me to give it to others, then I have to obey that.  It's not my time anyways, every moment, every day, every week and year have been given to me by God and He can bring it to an end whenever He wants.

I owe him my thoughts.  Last week in Bible study, we read Proverbs 16:3, "Commit thy works unto the Lord and thy thoughts shall be established."  That verse really struck me.  Every action begins in the mind.  We contemplate what we are going to do.  I best not be day dreaming or filling my mind with thoughts of this world or of temporal things.  I need to focus and think on things of God. 

I owe him my service.  I shouldn't have a bad attitude about any opportunity I have to service God or to serve His people. 

I owe him my heart.  The whole thing.  I need to keep my heart pure and protected and I want Him to have it.  There are plenty of things in the world vying for it and for my affections, my attention, my thoughts but I need to set my affections on things above because "where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." (Luke 12:34)

I owe him my life.  In my last post I talked about the one purpose we have in life is to please God, since that is the whole reason why we were even created, for his pleasure (Revelation 4:11).  He gave his life for me, the least I could do is attempt to return the favor.

"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man ay down his life for his friends."  John 15:13

I owe him my all.  It may not be much, but I owe him everything I've got.  Any gifts, any talents, any time I have has been given to me by Him and it is only reasonable for me to offer that back to Him.  I owe it to Him.

"He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy and to walk humbly with thy God?"  Micah 6:8 

God doesn't owe me anything.  I owe Him everything.

One purpose

"Thou are worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created."  Revelation 4:11

"For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure."  - Philippians 2:13

"Then Peter and the other apostles answered and said, We ought to obey God rather than men."  Acts 5:29

The entire reason I was created was to bring Him pleasure.  To please Him.  The top priority is not to make money, not to do good, it's not even to be happy.  The top priority is to please Him.

It has to remain my top priority.  Every year, every month, every week, every day, every hour, every moment, I need to be focused on doing what He wants me to do.  I need to be focused on doing what He created me to do.  I need to focus on pleasing Him and Him alone.

I struggle with that.  Not that I don't strive to please Him, because I do.  I pray every day to see the opportunities He brings me to please Him.  But I struggle with keeping the focus on pleasing Him first and foremost.

I am a people-pleaser.  I enjoy making people happy.  (honestly, who doesn't?) But it's not right and its not a good thing when I aim to please people before I aim to please my Savior.

God has been teaching me that lately.  He's been making verses pop out at me, like the 3 verses above.  He's been showing me situations in my life recently when I made it a greater priority to please people before pleasing Him.

It's shameful to look back on my actions in the past few months and see myself doing that.  Shameful but needful.

For the past month or so, verses about "serving God rather than serving men" have been leaping off the page.  God is trying to drill into my think head and my stony heart that I need to not be so focused and consumed with what others think - the only thing that matters is what He thinks.

He knows how much I struggle with that.  I had some big decisions to make recently and I feel as though I asked anyone and everyone for their opinion.  I just wanted someone to tell me what to do.  I don't make decisions very well.  I flip-flop.  I can't commit.  I think "road A" is the right decision and an hour later, after rolling it around and around my mind, "road B" seems to be the clear choice.

Ugh.

I hate that about myself.  It drives me nuts.

But the first person I took it to was the Lord and I made the decision I felt He wanted me to make.  Even though I know some may disagree with it.  Even though some may think it was the easy choice (which by the way, it wasn't) or the safe choice, it's what I believe God wanted and I hope He is pleased.

What I want - doesn't matter.  What other people think is right for me - doesn't matter.  He created me.  He loves me.  He gave his life for me.  He has a plan and a will for my life and that is what I desire more than anything.  My greatest desire is to do what He created me to do.

"Thou are worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created."  Revelation 4:11