Psalm 23

I have read Psalm 23 a large number of times, partly because it’s the most common psalm that is on display in stores and in businesses that put it up, but also because it is commonly used in devotionals that I read. Personally, I feel like I have read it so many times that I have not fully taken in all of the true meaning of the words. I decided that this time I would read it slowly, line by line, instead of just in one big excerpt.

The Lord is my shepherd, I have all that I need. With God in my life, He is the provider, and I have what I need to survive. I may not have everything that I want, but I have nice clothes to wear, food to eat, and a home to live in. Sheep do not worry about their needs; the shepherd takes care of them. Therefore, I should do the same.

He lets me rest in green meadows; he leads me beside peaceful streams. God lets us rest. He is not a slave driver, expecting us to work our entire day away in order to please Him. He calls us into times of rest, not days of extreme busyness. If I am going through my day with no time to stop and rest, I need to stop and reorganize my priorities.

He renews my strength. Not only does God let us rest, but He gives us new strength when we need it and ask for it. There have been days where I felt like I couldn’t drag myself out of bed, but once I asked God for strength, I managed to get moving and within ten minutes I was moving at a normal speed (I am only a morning person if morning starts after the sun is up).

He guides me along right paths, bringing honor to his name. God did not just drop us into this world to fend for ourselves. He will guide us if we ask for His help – that’s the key. We have to acknowledge that we need His help, and seek His guidance in our decisions. The path He guides us down will bring honor to His name. If we are going down a path that dishonors God, it is not one He is guiding us down.

Even when I walk through the darkest valley, I will not be afraid, for you are close beside me. Your rod and your staff protect me and comfort me. Most people will try to be there for us when we are going through a hard time. Some people will stick through for just a short time after the worst seems to be over (think: the week after a funeral, the first month after a job loss) but then go back to their regular lives and not think of our struggles very often. A small number of people will stick through the entire struggle with us (our spouse, parent, closest friend, etc). But God is there all of the time…everywhere we are. He never gets tired of hearing about our hurts, our problems, our struggles. For this reason, we should not be afraid. We have a God who will never leave us.

You prepare a feast for me in the presence of my enemies. You honor me by anointing my head with oil. My cup overflows with blessings.  Never mind the “glass half empty or half full” concept. God overflows our cup with blessings. We need to acknowledge the blessings that we have: we know the big ones (our families, friends, church, health, home, etc), but there are also those that are not immediately obvious to most people – the intangible things. We are blessed to be able to learn new things, to see the changing seasons, to have the opportunity to meet new people, to keep up with people through social networks and cell phones (do you realize what smartphone owners can do now with their phones, the same tasks used to require a landline phone to be plugged into a bulky computer in the home?)

Surely your goodness and unfailing love will pursue me all the days of my life, and I will live in the house of the Lord forever.  Every day we are on this earth, God is pursuing us with His goodness and unfailing love. Even when we’ve messed up, or just don’t feel like pursuing God…He is still pursuing us. He loves us. I don’t know about other people, but I know I misused the word ‘forever’ a lot in my middle and high school years. Think about the phrase, ‘BFF’. All of those years, I called about seven or eight girls my best friends, and we wrote ‘BFF’ on our notes we passed in school. None of those girls are still my best friends…therefore, ‘forever’ only lasted as long as school did. We all grew up and changed and went in different directions. But God does not change: ‘forever’ in this verse really means forever. We will be with God forever. Our time with God will never end.

That is breathtaking.

Direct Contact

You know those moments where a truth that you’ve always known about God for years just suddenly comes alive? I have always known that when we pray, we talk directly to God, but a few days ago I was reading John 16:20-26, and these verses suddenly jumped out to me:

In that day, you will ask in my name. I am not saying that I will ask the Father on your behalf. No, the Father himself loves you because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God. John 16:26-27

This is BIG. We talk to God directly…there is no go-between. We don’t have to talk to someone that is “qualified” to communicate with God. We don’t have to know every single word of the Bible to be able to talk to God. No college degree is required. God loves us because we love Jesus and believe that Jesus is God’s Son. We can talk to God because we believe in the salvation that comes through Christ.

Isn’t that encouraging? We don’t have to word our prayers exactly right…we just need to get into the habit of continuously talking to God. Praise Him for who He is, thank Him for all that He’s done and all that He is teaching us, ask Him for guidance, and cry out to Him when we are faced with challenges and problems that seem to be bigger than us. After all, our God is bigger than anything that we would have to face.

One step at a time

There are a number of Bible stories that almost everyone is familiar with, no matter which church you grew up in. One of the well known stories of the New Testament is where Jesus turned water into wine at a wedding. I had read this story so many times before that it would have been very easy to just skim over the words without really picking up on anything, but I had previously decided that I was going to read the book of John and find at least one piece of truth in each chapter that I could apply to my daily life. So, I prayed for God to reveal something new to me, and He did.

The truth that stood out to me while reading the story of Jesus turning water into wine is the fact that Jesus did not tell them what would happen; He simply gave them steps to follow. 

John 2:7-8: Jesus said to the servants, “Fill the jars with water”; so they filled them to the brim. Then he told them, “Now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet.”

I know if I needed wine (or tea, or any other drink) and all Jesus told me to do was fill a bunch of jars with water, I would have the attitude of wondering why on earth I’m wasting time with water when I needed to go out and get the drink that I need. That, however, is the training of society: that we must go through the system of buying what we need. As followers of Christ, we should trust Jesus by doing what He says…one step at a time. Here are some areas where I struggle with following one step at a time:

-          When I have a project at work, I like to see an outline so I know exactly what direction I will be going in.

-          When I am driving somewhere new, I like to have the directions from beginning to end right by me. I don’t like driving somewhere with a person telling me turn by turn where to go.

-          When I am going to a meeting, I like to know what is going to be the general purpose and  outline of the meeting.

-          When signing up for something new (for example, registering for college courses) I want to know the process that I will be going through.

Although the fact that we must follow Jesus one step at a time is not new to me, seeing it in scripture reinforces the truth and makes it easier to reference back to whenever I am in a situation where I cannot see the full path ahead of me. I am in one of those situations now, and I have been for over a year, but I trust that God is my Provider and I continue to follow His lead every day. We are all where we are right now because there is a greater purpose for us to fulfill. Some of us may see what we are influencing around us; others may never see it while we are on this earth; but we should all know that there is something bigger happening around us.

Go deeper

I had a amazing experience yesterday, the kind that only God could bring me into. Before I went to church in the evening to volunteer at Next Level (the area in our church where people who have accepted Christ come to be prayed over and receive a Bible), I spent a couple hours reading through devotionals and my Bible, and the last 10 minutes I spent on my knees in silence, ready to hear from God. The phrase “young girl” just kept going through my head, but I wasn’t sure if it was just my own mind thinking up those words. However, I kept my heart open and prayed for God to speak through me. We ended up having a few people come to our table last night, and sure enough…the very last was a young girl. I took the initiative to talk to her and I led everyone in prayer over her, just letting the Holy Spirit speak through me. It was an incredible moment to finally step out of myself and fully give the Holy Spirit control.

I feel like the time I spent in God’s word yesterday afternoon opened up my heart to be able to hear from God. I will be honest here...I go almost all week just barely reading over a devotional before I go on to the other things in my day. I have email devotionals that come to my inbox all day, and I read them when I receive them and pray whatever prayer is included, but I seldom spend much time contemplating over anything or letting the message truly sink into my heart. The Holy Spirit is convicting me that I really need to make this more of a priority, but I know that I cannot do it without God’s help. That being said, here is my challenge:

• I will start by making it a habit on Saturday or Sunday afternoon to spend at least one hour reading my Bible and going through my devotionals in a more concentrated setting than just briefly reading over everything.
• The next step is to spend at least one hour 3 days a week…probably Tuesday, Thursday, and then one of the weekend days.
• Final step is to spend at least 30 minutes reading the Bible and going through devotionals on a daily basis.

I desire to be closer to God, and to spend more time in His Word learning from what He has to say, instead of what the world says.

Opposition

I want to post some words of encouragement for anyone who is doing what God has lead them to do and facing any level of opposition. Ever since my husband and I got engaged and really started getting into what God is planning for us, we have faced a lot of opposition when we have things that we are trying to do. This was our first week of our church eGroup (our church's name for a small group, for those who do not attend Elevation), and we were still in the process of moving all week. After some setbacks with vehicles (camry severely needing a wheel bearing replaced, a punctured tire on the Mazda, and a van we borrowed dying in our driveway) I got very easily frustrated and upset.

Today, I had taken the Camry in for the repair. I received bad news about three hours later, when I finally checked my voicemail on my cell phone and found out that there was more repair work that needed to be done, and it just about doubled the cost. I just closed my office door for privacy, got on my knees, and cried to God that I just didn't have that money. I've been promising myself my entire life (ok...since high school when I was in a financial class) that I was not going to live paycheck to paycheck, but these unexpected expenses are leading me down that road. I have a person at work that as soon as something goes wrong, I go to them and start to complain about what's happened, so I can receive some sympathy. I am praying for God to help me on this, to lead me to always turn to Jesus and then stop there. We are currently in a series at church on Hebrews 12, and Hebrews 12:2 says "Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith".  I need to remember to focus on Jesus, especially when faced with problems that life brings.

While some things that happen can be direct hurdles in the way of we are trying to do for God (such as us moving into the house in time to start our small group, without beind frantic), the devil may not always seem to be obviously trying to stop you...he just wants you to become discouraged, aggravated, and impatient, therefore making you less effective for God. Don't give him that victory.

I will close with this: a magazine we just received had an excerpt from Pastor Steven Furtick's blog, and this is what it said, "The circumstances, struggles and attacks you face are not the ultimate determining factor of the kind of life you live. How you use them is. And there isn't a single situation in your life that can't be used for your good and God's glory."

Never Once

"Never once did we ever walk alone, never once did you leave us on our own, you are faithful, God you are faithful"

Those are some of the lyrics to a worship song from Matt Redman that we have been singing recently at church, and it is such a powerful song. As I was doing my devotional from The Message//Remix:Solo today, my thoughts went to these lyrics. I was reading Joshua 1:1-9, and verse 9 in The Message says: "Don't be timid; don't get discouraged. God, your God, is with you every step you take.

We are not alone, no matter where we go and what we face each day. Whether we feel happy, sad, irritated, nervous, hurt, lonely, or overwhelmed by what is going on around us, remembering that God is with us brings peace that lasts longer than peace we could receive from any other source.

New Things Ahead

There are so many things coming up in the month of September that I am absolutely excited for. The biggest thing, however, is the leadership conference on the 8th. I cannot wait to attend this event, especially now that Chris and I have been officially approved to lead our eGroup on the book Not A Fan. It is going to be such a fun and challenging experience.

One quote from the book says this: "Following Jesus isn't something you can do at night where no one notices. It's a twenty-four-hour-a-day commitment that will intefere with your life". I have experienced this so much in the past month...lately I have felt a constant need for more of God lately. More and more of my conversations at work are faith-related. My desire to read the Bible or a Christian Inspiration book has outweighed my desire for some of the other things I used to do in my free time. I do still watch TV, browse the internet, etc, but the time I spend doing these things has greatly decreased. I want to be the true follower of Jesus that I am meant to be. I want to remember to ask for guidance from the Holy Spirit on a minute-to-minute basis. And I want to learn how to sit in silence and wait on God. That is my biggest challenge. Just a couple nights ago, I tried this for the first time in a while, sitting for ten minutes. In those ten minutes, I felt very aware of the music that the crickets make at night. With the tv or radio on, you can easily miss it, but when you eliminate all of the distractions you realize how soothing the sounds of nature are.

Pastor Steven announce this past week that Elevation will be having a 12-night revival starting in January. I have never been to a revival in my life, but I am super excited to find out how to be a part of this one. 12 nights of worshiping Jesus and listening to preachers pouring into us so we can pour into the people in our lives sounds good to me!