Day: March 6, 2016

There is nothing that wastes the body like worry, and one who has any faith in God should be ashamed to worry about anything whatsoever. Mahatma Gandhi

This past week has been a winner. Satan was working overtime, at least in my life. I had a lot of anxiety and troubling thoughts go through my mind. I have prayed over those things, and that is all between God and me. However, the lesson that I learned from it is what has brought me peace. I know I did the right things, as it was all in my service to God. I cannot tell you about the peace that came over me after reading His word. There were two major events this past week. The first was in my private life and the other in my work life. It was the word of God that delivered to me the message that I am going to share here. I praise God for it, and beg that the spirit guide me through.

Matthew 6- ²⁵ “Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? ²⁶ Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? ²⁷ Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature? ²⁸ “So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; ²⁹ and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. ³⁰ Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?

About the picture;

I was out hunting for Turkey once and snapped this photo with my phone. I was laying in a hole, and turned my head and saw this little guy hard at work. I wondered what this spider was thinking as we were both doing the same thing, looking for food. I was willing to work for it, and obviously so was he. I came to the conclusion that he probably wasn’t thinking about much at all. He is doing what God designed him to do, he is never going to run out of that silk to make the web, and God is going to send some insects into that web for provisions, just as God promised He would do. Nope, that little guy probably wasn’t worried about too much of anything. Unlike me, who was worrying about whether or not I was going to see a turkey.

John Calvin says, “By these words it is far from being our Lord’s intention to encourage us to indolence and sluggishness. All that he means is, that, though other means fail, the providence of God is alone sufficient for us, for it supplies the animals abundantly with every thing that they need.”

So I start off this week knowing I have a big Friday meeting. Not that many people were attending, but ‘big’ in the importance of the topic. I had limited contact with my boss, and one helper (she was and awesome helper by the way). The topic of the meeting was not something that I like to do. I know it is a weakness of mine, and I feel that I am very bad at it. It is not something I ever professed to be good at, but as a part of my job, I have to do it. As Friday neared, my anxiety increased.

Worry is a thin stream of fear trickling through the mind. If encouraged, it cuts a channel into which all other thoughts are drained- Arthur Somers Rache

 

At the same time, I am dealing with a couple issues in my private life. First, my dad saw a doctor and was told that he has a medical issue that is known to be a cancerous condition, so he needs to go see a specialist and have tests done. Then satan rears his ugly head in the relationship of some church goers. Lies, evil speaking, contention, resistance to righteous correction, and flat out meanness abounded every single day this week. I was grateful for Wednesday night prayer service, but I was even more grateful for the Holy Spirit that leads me daily. I am even more grateful for the word of God that comforts me and teaches me. I am grateful for Matthew 6.

When you look at the animals in nature, do you ever wonder if they worry? According to this scripture, they do not. God takes care of them. I believe they don’t even have the capacity to worry. They simply do what they were designed to do, and don’t think of anything else. Once again, it is man that messes that up. If God takes care to dress the field, feed the birds, and bring beauty to the flower, what is it that makes us feel like He will not take care of us. Well, what are the last five words of verse 30. “O you of little faith”. We make ourselves feel that way because of our lack of faith. How do we get to the point where we lack faith? We take our eyes off of God.

Matthew 6- ³³ But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.

God has stated over and over that he knows what we need. So there I sit, allowing the thoughts of how I hate this piece of my job, and how I believe I stink at it consume me instead of just turning it over to God. I am worried about how I will present, and what will I say. I shut the rest of the job out on Friday to focus on the coffee, water, snacks, hand-out materials, and so on. Instead of seeking the kingdom of God, I focus on the “in front of my face”. One would think that this lesson pressed upon my heart would be sufficient here. The spirit kept on pressing.

KEY VERSE

Matthew 10- ³⁴ “Do not think that I came to bring peace on earth. I did not come to bring peace but a sword.

So why is a verse that tells me Jesus did not come here to bring peace being pressed on my mind by the spirit when peace is what I am looking for? God did not send Jesus to this world to fix anything. He did not send Jesus to make anything right, as a matter of forced behavior. He sent Jesus to teach us how to be right, how to fix our own lives through that teaching. The sword that is mentioned here is the gospel. And the gospel cuts through the darkness separating the obedient from the disobedient. Jesus did not come to lump everyone together and makes us all followers against our will, so that we could all be the same. He came to tell the truth, which is His gospel, and for you and me to use it in our own lives. Does it make sense that free will could be the greatest gift and the greatest curse? Instead of lumping us together the sword of the gospel separates us according to our faith or lack thereof. The world tells me to worry about that meeting, and pay attention to all these worldly things. The Gospel says accept Christ as the head of your life and let God worry about these things. So peace comes, but only by accepting Christ.

John Gill says, “By the “sword” may be meant the Gospel, which is the means of dividing and separating the people of Christ from the men of the world, and from their principles and practices, and one relation from another; as also of divisions, discords, and persecutions arising from it: not that it was the intention and design of Christ, in coming into the world, to foment and encourage such things; but this, through the malice and wickedness of men, was eventually the effect and consequence of his coming where, instead of a “sword”, it is “division”; because the sword divides asunder, as does the sword of the Spirit, the word of God.”

 

Matthew 10- ³⁵ For I have come to ‘set a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law’; ³⁶ and ‘a man’s enemies will be those of his own household.³⁷ He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. ³⁸ And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. ³⁹ He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for My sake will find it.

To further illustrate this point Jesus tells us that our focus on Him should look so singular, that our affection towards our loved ones should look like we do not love each other at all. Now Jesus doesn’t expect children to hate their parents and parents to hate the children. He expects you to love Him so much more that these. This is an illustration of what looking above looks like. That there is nothing, not our wives, husbands, children, parents, no person that comes before God, and that the next person in line does not even come close. Picking up your cross is an illustration of denying yourself. Not only should your love for God be so great that it looks like you do not love anyone else, but also that you do not love yourself. When Jesus took up his cross, it was the burden for being God. It was not something he wanted to do and only had to deny being God to be able to put the cross back down. Picking up the cross and following Christ is the illustration of you saying, “I am a child of Jesus Christ, and I deny my flesh and all my desires of this world to follow Him.” God comes first. When you have that, you have a “God centered” worship.

John Trapp writes, “God will have us to hold him to be better to us than ten sons: and to bestow all our love upon him, as most worthy. What he gives us back again, we may bestow upon others; loving our friends in God, and our enemies for God. But the love of Christ must constrain us to part with all, though never so dear and near unto us, for his sake.”

Half way through the day on Friday I prayed over this meeting. I turned it all over to God. It was a great meeting. I was supposed to have more than one helper, but God sent only one. God knows what he is doing. She was the only helper I needed and she was awesome. I am hopeful for the future endeavors with these people and the mission of this meeting. With regard to the other attacks, I examined the things I said and the purpose for which I said them, regarding the person in the church. I believe the words were right, I believe the correction was stern, but with love. I believe that no matter how it was received I believe I was in the service of the LORD. ‘Man centered’ worshippers rarely want to hear correction, no matter how you deliver it. I planted the seed, the rest is up to God. I am confident that I put God first in that too. My hands and mind are no match for cancer. That is turned over already!

“Every tomorrow has two handles. We can take hold of it with the handle of anxiety or the handle of faith.” Henry Ward Beecher

If you stand in the mirror, what will the reflection tell you about your relationship with God, and what are you going to do about it? May the peace of God be abundantly heaped upon you and your home, straight from the cross to the Christian!