Resting and waiting upon the Lord (Part 1)

Posted on September 14, 2017 by | Comments Off on Resting and waiting upon the Lord (Part 1)

restingResting and waiting upon the Lord. Sometimes the smartest thing we can do is to stop, wait, and rest. It is while we are resting when God can truly become the Lord in our life. It is easy to carry on a life full of worry and restlessness instead of allowing our Lord to truly reign in our life. But this is opposite of what the Bible tells us to do. Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently for him: fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way, because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass (Psalms 37:7). This is an easy verse to read. It is a hard verse to put into practice.

A three-part verse

This verse lends itself to be divided into three parts. The first part is what I will focus on for this particular entry. It reads, Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for him… The picture above is of my now six-year-old daughter. For the longest time we made her take time after her busy day of Kindergarten to rest. One particular afternoon she refused to rest until I made her lay quietly on the couch. The agreement was, since she was not tired, that she had to simply lay still and quiet for fifteen minutes. Within five minutes of our agreement, she fell asleep.

I almost forgot I took this picture of her until I was cleaning out the synchronized camera folder. It seemed to be the perfect image to share with this post. Just as I had to force my daughter to rest, there are times we also need rest. And there are times the Lord will put us in a place where all we can do is rest.

Resting in the Lord and waiting patiently on Him

Within the scriptures there are several places where the idea of resting and waiting are tied together. The idea is simply there are times when we need to take a step back. It is a matter of our faith and trust in the Lord which is being tested. The question we must ask ourselves is “do I love and trust Jesus enough to let Him lead me in handling this situation?” The prophet Jeremiah wrote, Thus saith the LORD, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk therein (Jeremiah 6:16).

Within this verse, we see the Lord giving Jeremiah instruction that His people are to stay firm in the old path. We know this old path is the plan that God put into place back in the Garden of Eden – that we should love Him with all our being and love others as we love ourselves. The Lord also tells us if we follow His plan we will find rest for our souls – something I know that I need desperately at times. We all have days when nothing goes right. The trouble we face on those days can eat at our very soul. We cannot find the rest our souls need because we are not willing to let the Lord to do the work He desires to do.

He is to be our rest and expectation

David understood this more than most people will ever understand it. He wrote in Psalms: My soul, wait thou only upon God; for my expectation is from him. He only is my rock and my salvation: he is my defence; I shall not be moved (Psalms 62:5-6). By the time David is writing this psalm, he has reached the stage of life where he has learned he can depend upon the Lord. This is why we read, my expectation is from him. David has put his complete trust and confidence in the Lord. He expected the Lord to intercede in any difficulty he faced.

David also acknowledged that the Lord was his rock and salvation – and this is what we, as Christians, must also understand. Our salvation is not about what we can do. It is about what Jesus has done. When we come to understand the fullness of salvation that Jesus offers us it will bring us to a place of rest we’ve never known before. If we trust Jesus’ offer for salvation, then what exists where we cannot put our complete trust in Him?

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Bible study: looking at the scriptures for guidance

Posted on July 11, 2017 by | Comments Off on Bible study: looking at the scriptures for guidance

Bible study Bible study. Just those two words mean so many different things to Christians everywhere. For some, this is what happens at the mid-week service or maybe even Sunday evening. Others prefer studying the Bible on Sunday morning as the preacher reads it. Both of these groups rarely read the Bible outside a church setting. Therefore, within their life, their Christian faith remains weak. Little spiritual change has happened since they received Christ as their Savior. Bible study is an ongoing process for God’s children to learn directly from the Holy Spirit.

The New Testament Principle

For those who have read my sharing from the beginning, you know that 2006 was when I received Jesus as my Savior. It was not John 3:16 or Ephesians 2:8 that drew me to the Lord. It was this verse written by the apostle Paul: Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth (2 Timothy 2:15). Being in graduate school, I prided myself in my ability to study documents relating to foreign policy. The Lord challenged my pride by bringing me to a point where I wanted to study the Bible for myself. It was through serious Biblical inquiry – Bible study – where the Lord led me to salvation.

What Bible study is not

This sounds pretty funny for the topic the Lord has laid on my heart. But before I share the importance of Bible study, I feel led to share what Bible study isn’t. Bible study is not a function of the church. Yes, we have men’s and women’s Bible studies, mid-week Bible studies, and so forth. But these are not where the bulk of learning is to come from. The bulk of our learning about the Lord Jesus Christ happens in our own daily personal devotions and Bible study.

Bible studies cannot be clouded by other tasks. It’s not something we do as we are waiting on our doctor or for the mechanic to finish. It isn’t to be something we do to pass the time while waiting. Bible study is just that – studying the Bible as you would study materials that are job related or as a school subject is studied. The focus shouldn’t be the songs

What Bible study should be

In Paul’s second letter to Timothy, he is writing that Timothy needs to personally study the scriptures. At that time, the only scriptures that were written down and easily accessible were select books of the Old Testament and the letters he had written for the apostle Paul. This guidance was not written in a letter to the Christians in Corinth or Ephesus, but to a young man named Timotheus. Paul’s desire was for Timothy to know the scriptures as well as any tradesman knows his craft. Imagine the difference Christians could make in their homes and communities if they knew their faith as well as they know what their employer expects while they are on the job!

Compare personal Bible study to the method used to teach a musical instrument. Yes, the technique is taught in the weekly lesson. The instructor uses the weekly appointment to fine-tune the techniques, to introduce more challenging content, and to measure progress of the student. But it is the daily practice at home where knowledge and talents are developed. This is the perfect picture of what our Bible studies are to be. We participate in the studies at church as a means to fine-tune our faith. But it is in our daily Bible reading where we are taught about our faith.

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Step back, pray, and allow the Lord to work

Posted on June 30, 2017 by | Comments Off on Step back, pray, and allow the Lord to work
step back

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Step back. Over the last few months it seems life has been going at a frantic pace. I quit exercising and watching my diet. I quit revising one of my college courses I teach. There were other things that I simply either lost interest in or just didn’t have the desire to do. My personal Bible study, although still a part of my life, didn’t yield the fruit it once did. I was going through a real spiritual battle. But instead of taking a step back and seeking the Lord’s will, I decided to handle things on my own.

We pray for guidance…

Like many people, during this ordeal I was praying for the Lord to guide me in the direction I was sure He wanted me to go. It’s easy to think that the direction we are heading in is the direction the Lord wants us to go. We gain confidence as small obstacles are overcome and we continue on our way. We give lip service to the prayers about helping us to understand God’s will. At times, we do not want to see the Lord guiding us in any way other than the way we want to go. But the question remains: do we really want the Lord’s guidance? We often approach the Lord with what we want to do and not asking what He wants us to do.

But we don’t step back…

Often we do ask the Lord for guidance but instead of waiting to see what He does want, we find ourselves continuing on the same path. In Proverbs, we often read In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths (Proverbs 3:6), but do we really acknowledge Him? The work, acknowledge, according to the Miriam-Webster Online Dictionary: to recognize the rights, authority, or status of; to disclose knowledge of or agreement with; to express gratitude or obligation for. In other words, it’s not just saying “the Lord is my God” while still holding on to your own plan or idea. It is saying “the Lord is my God and I recognize His authority in my life.”

It’s often difficult to do especially if you’re like me. I don’t like uncertainty and I don’t like waiting. In fact, one of the hardest things for me to do is to take vacations or days off from work. But sometimes that is exactly what the Lord wants us to do. He wants us to take the time to step back and let Him do a work in our lives. Sometimes that work is to set us on another path. Even David experienced this: He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings (Psalms 40:2).

We waste our time…

Earlier this week, I found a passage that describes what I feel like I’ve done for the past three years: Now therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts; Consider your ways. Ye have sown much, and bring in little; ye eat, but ye have not enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it into a bag with holes. Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Consider your ways (Haggai 1:5-7). It is easy to find ourselves in a place where we feel we are not making any traction in our lives. And it is these times where we become the most spiritually vulnerable.

For me, it become easy to take on new projects to occupy my time. And since most of those projects were church focused, I made excuses that I was doing what the Lord wanted me to do. Even though I was doing things that benefited the church, I was not in a place to receive any sort of spiritual blessing from it because it was not being done out of obedience. Looking back, I was doing those things more for myself than for any other reason. In other words, I was wasting my time, even though it was beneficial to my church, on things that has no eternal value.

We use our own understanding…

While in graduate school, I remember a discussion we had during an environmental policy class. A fellow student was arguing with the professor over what one of the laws we were discussing in class. What did the law mean  actually meant and what its purpose was. Rightly so, the professor told the student that it is important to understand what the courts have said about the law and even the best of intentions can be wrong if we act on what we think the law means. This is exactly what the Lord tells us to do: Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding (Proverbs 3:5).

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