One of my favorite verses
Jeremiah 31:35-37Thus says the LORD, who gives the sun for light by day and the fixed order of the moon and the stars for light by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar-- the LORD of hosts is his name: "If this fixed order departs from before me, declares the LORD, then shall the offspring of Israel cease from being a nation before me forever."
Thus says the LORD: "If the heavens above can be measured, and the foundations of the earth below can be explored, then I will cast off all the offspring of Israel for all that they have done, declares the LORD."
Wow! God is faithful.
These verses don't set limits on God's faithfulness. They give us vivid illustrations of just how great God's faithfulness is. It's not like these verses are saying "when you finally figure out all these things then I'll forget about you all and my promises." Rather, it is saying, "My faithfulness is so great that you cannot understand its full extent. Observe how the sun and the stars move faithfully in a preordained pattern and know that I am more faithful. Look at the stars above and the earth below to see how great they are and know that I am even greater."
Are these not beautiful illustrations? Understanding that we cannot know His faithfulness as it really is, God blessed us by giving us this wonderful imagery of it.
"If the heavens above can be measured..."
What can I say? God is
very faithful.
Prayer
A while back, my brother invited me to attend a private prayer group that he had attended which was mostly made up of older men from out church at the time. Something I came away with, other than inspired confidence in the prayers and the faith of the older men, was a desire to understand to a greater extent the importance and power of prayer.
A little later, I picked up a small book called A Call to Prayer (available in full here) written by JC Ryle. This urgent call to every Christian to come regularly to God in prayer inspired me further to explore this gift to men.
So, this past summer, I decided to make a point of learning more about prayer and training myself to pray more often.
Here's the highlights of my learning. Many of these may not seem like things that are new things but to me they have been gold.
The very act of prayer and not merely God's answer to it is a precious act.
After this summer, I am so aware the there is so much value in the attitude that prayer indicates. I’ve found, through experience, and through certain books that the very act of coming to God and submitting your desires to him builds trust in God to do as He pleases with the issues surrounding those desires. This trust in God yields a contentment from God to be satisfied with God’s plan no matter what his answer is.
“Apart from the answer, prayer is itself a benediction. To pray is to cast off your burdens, it is to tear away your rags, it is to shake off your diseases, it is to be filled with spiritual vigour, it is to reach the highest point of Christian health. God give us to be in the holy art of arguing with God in prayer.”
~CH Spurgeon
God answers prayer
You guys don’t need a paragraph to know that God answers prayer. Just remember those times that He has answered prayer and you’ll know that He does do it. But I am reminded again every time He answers a prayer as He has done often this past year.
"Because God is the living God, He can hear; because He is a loving God, He will hear; because He is our covenant God, He has bound Himself to hear us."
~CH Spurgeon
Praying for the desires of your heart keeps your desires in check.
I’ve found so much blessing in this fact. As the year has progressed, I’ve found myself praying more and more (all credit to God) and now I see that it is a thin line to be crossed for me to desire something and then to pray for it. It is good for me to ask God for the desires of my heart. But I’ve also found this is good because in the act of asking for my desires, I am submitting my desires to the scrutiny of God’s standards and I can more easily detect those desires of mine that are not in line with God’s word.
The power of prayer to fight temptation
This quote pretty much says it all for me.
“If we do not abide in prayer, we will abide in temptation. Let this be one aspect of our daily intercession: "God, preserve my soul, and keep my heart and all its ways so that I will not be entangled." When this is true in our lives, a passing temptation will not overcome us. We will remain free while others lie in bondage.”
~John Owen
So all this leaves me with one baffling question. Given the innumerable benefits of eternal value and the ease which God makes prayer available, why don’t I pray more than I do?
New Year reflections
So what. This is a bit later than most of those New Year projected plans for change. Who cares?
I hate resolutions. So here's what I've got for 07.
Ways in which I've seen God's grace in my life over 06:
- God gave me immense faith and contentment for our move to Frederick. It was early last year that we decided that we would go. Before the decision was made, I was content in my heart to let the decision fall to my parents and I was happy to support them either way.
- God gave me a burden to make prayer a high priority. I've learned a lot about prayer. Through that, I've grown closer to God. I've also noticed that my ungratified desires are now rarely complaints and more often prayers.
- Since the move, I’ve grown much closer to my family in all ways. My brothers are my best friends by far. And my parents are… um my favorite parents.
- God has helped me to look outwardly and to seek to reach out to people who look less comfortable in a context.
- My brand new bible already has two whole books (Judges and Ruth) underlined in my colored pencils. (Meaning that since Christmas day I’ve read those books.) And I’m almost done with 1 Samuel.
- I’m not sure exactly why, but my brother (whose opinion I highly value) called me a very mature Christian. I take that as an evidence of God’s grace.
Ways that I want to grow or things that I want to do over 07
- I want to more independently be seeking my parents’ wisdom.
- I want to finish my read through of the bible.
- I want to pursue God to see in what ways I am spiritually gifted and work to utilize them for God’s service.
- I am going to work out regularly.
- I want to become wise and mature in everything I do in every context that I’m in.
- I want to be a perpetual encouragement to everyone who is around me.
- I want to be more aware of God’s grace in people’s lives than their need for growth.
Kickoff
Hmm. It seems some of my friends have found this blog without me ever inviting them to view it. Ah well. This was supposed to be more like personal memoirs but you guys are welcome to view it if you want.
Anyhow, I’ve been going through the Old Testament recently from start to finish. I just finished Judges. So far, here are my reflections on the read through.
Biblical masculinity is much more than I thought it was.
The Israelites had just violated one of God’s Ten Commandments and made an abomination of Him and worshipped it at Mt. Sinai. God’s anger was kindled by this. He intended to destroy the whole Israelite nation and make Moses into a great nation as he had promised Abraham before him.
Moses’ response to this was completely selfless and completely self-sacrificing.
Exo 32:11 But Moses implored the LORD his God and said, "O LORD, why does your wrath burn hot against your people, whom you have brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand?
Exo 32:12 Why should the Egyptians say, 'With evil intent did he bring them out, to kill them in the mountains and to consume them from the face of the earth'? Turn from your burning anger and relent from this disaster against your people.
Exo 32:13 Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, to whom you swore by your own self, and said to them, 'I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have promised I will give to your offspring, and they shall inherit it forever.'"
…
Exo 32:31 So Moses returned to the LORD and said, "Alas, this people have sinned a great sin. They have made for themselves gods of gold.
Exo 32:32 But now, if you will forgive their sin--but if not, please blot me out of your book that you have written."
*shudders*. This is what a godly man is supposed to do? Moses decided to reject his own personal glory of being the father of a nation so that God’s glory would be most glorious. Much more than this, Moses was willing to bear the consequence of the evil that his people had committed. I cannot help but seeing Christ in this. Just as Moses was willing to take the penalty for the sins of God’s people, so Christ was willing to sacrifice himself as a substitute for our sins.
That is who biblical masculinity is modeled after: Jesus Christ. It means I am to be completely self-sacrificing for God’s glory and the good of his people. Would I be willing to take consequences for something that I didn’t do? Am I even able to be that kind of man?
“Be strong and Courageous.”
These exact words were repeated four times in the first chapter of Joshua. I can’t remember a time when these words have meant so much as now. I’m standing on the edge of manhood and am faced with decisions which could define where the rest of my life is going to go. What am I going to do in college? How am I going to get enough money for college? How am I going to get enough money to raise a family? All these questions are things that I need to be thinking about now.
These decisions require a lot of courage for me (I don’t know if this relates to anyone who may be reading this). I need the courage to make the decisions and the strength to carry them out.
My sin is underrated.
*sigh*. Yep. No matter how much I make of it, I know that I can’t come close to it’s real implications before God.
After reading Exodus, Numbers, and most of Deuteronomy, it was hard to imagine that Moses would ever be denied a blessing by God. But sure enough Moses’ sin of disbelief caused God to deny him the blessing of setting foot in the Promised Land.
In the book of Judges I am reminded that my sin will never go away. Even after Israel had experienced God’s mercy through a deliverer from their enemies, their sin persisted. My temptation is to think that once God shows mercy to me I will never forget it and the sin will lose all is charm. I tend to think that sin is somehow absent from my life.
If I were honest with myself, I wonder how many times I would say that I sin per day. Five times? Twenty times? A hundred times? Do I just live in sin?
I confess that I make way to light of my sin and that I daily forget its presence and its power.
Reading the Old Testament truly gives me a better context for the gospel both historical and spiritual. Israel continues to sin before God and one has to wonder ‘when will this come to an end?’ It begs the question, “When will sin be destroyed? When will God’s salvation come?”
Thank God I know the answer to those questions.
