As For You

2 Chronicles 15:7

"But as for you, be strong and do not give up, for your work will be rewarded."

Perhaps people around you are falling like flies. Wherever you turn you see heartache and discouragement. The good fight seems too hard; the journey ahead too long; the mountain in your way too big. The hurt in your heart cripples you and you're too exhausted to try again. You want to give up and lie down.

Jesus knows fully what you face and what you feel. And this is what the Lord says to you:
"But as for you [regardless of the people around you], be strong and do not give up, for your work will be rewarded."

In the next verse it says that when Asa heard these words, he took courage. I pray that you too find courage in the God who sees all things, and always rewards perfectly.

The Lord is with you. Be strong and do not give up.

Consecrate

2 Chronicles 5:11

"All the priests who were there had consecrated themselves, regardless of their divisions."

From the Chief High Priest to the new little rookie, ALL consecrated themselves. It wasn't about rank or status, but about each of them serving Yahweh, their Almighty God.

The word consecrate means to make holy, to set apart. It means living for God alone, dedicating your life to him. It requires you to be different to those around you, to sometimes say no when the world screams yes.

This scripture shows us that consecration is not just for the big cheese or the most important people. We, all together, are a royal priesthood [1 Peter 2:9] and are ALL called to consecrate ourselves to Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit [1 Peter 1:13-16].

Regardless of where you find yourself, you can live a life that is holy and pleasing to God [Romans 12:1-2]. And it can start right now.

Unchanging

Psalm 89:34

"I will not violate my covenant or alter what my lips have uttered." 

In the midst of an ever-changing, uncertain world of hypocrisy and broken promises, there is a God who is constant, unchanging, faithful and true. 

He is Jesus.

The Overflow

Proverbs 10:11

"The mouth of the righteous is a fountain of life, 

but violence overwhelms the mouth of the wicked."

Think back to the things that have come out of your mouth today. Would you categorize those words as life-giving? I imagine that words of life are encouraging, kind, building-up, loving and truthful. Is your mouth a fountain of life? Or do you spurt forth waves of violence and trouble and dissatisfaction? 

Jesus said in Matthew 12:34 that the mouth speaks from the overflow of the heart. That violence or life that is coming out of your mouth is a reflection of the darkness or light that is filling your heart.

So when you catch yourself saying something unhelpful, stop and ask Jesus to fill you with his life [John 4:14] so that it can flow out of you into others.

Because his words are life, life to the full.

It's A Trap!

Proverbs 10:9

“The man of integrity walks securely, but he who takes crooked paths will be found out.”

Integrity is a choice. It is made in the daily little decisions we make, the things we say no to, the things we do even when we don’t want to.

Integrity is hard. It is often the harder of the options in the choices we make. The crooked path seems more exciting and adventurous. It’s the kind of pretty road that you would Instagram.

It’s a trap!  That road leads to places you do not want to go. It’s a pretty looking road riddled with land mines called consequences that will blow up in your face when you least expect it [Proverbs 7:21-27]

Integrity isn't easy, but it is a safe road because we walk with the King of kings and the Lion of Judah.

Integrity is a road that leads to Jesus. If the people around us follow us down that road, they too will find Jesus.

It is the best road to walk because it leads to life.

Whatever You Do

Ephesians 1:1

“Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God…”

What is your role in God’s will right now? For Paul at that time it was to be an apostle. But we can’t all be apostles. So what will you be?

A student? Teacher? Mother? Leader? I don’t know what it is that God has for you to be right now in your life, you can fill in that gap. But I do know two things:

1.       Whatever it is be it for Jesus. Be a ______ of Christ Jesus; a ______ that belongs to and lives for Him.

2.       Be that thing with all your heart. God is not a fan of half-heartedness. You don’t necessarily have to be the best in all you do, but I do believe you’re called to give your best in everything you do: studying, friendship, work, whatever.

Colossians 3:23-24

“Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men. It is the Lord you are serving.” 

Established

Psalm 87:5

“The Most High himself will establish her.”

I recently sat in a presentation done by my new employer where they told us trainee accountants that they will make us successful. If we give our time [and overtime] to them, they will make something of us and set us up for our futures.

To an extent this is true. Working for one of the top accounting firms in the world will do wonders for establishing my career. How much more than will I be established by living for the Creator of the world?

See the world tells me that my value and identity lies in:

-          My employer

-          My degree and my grades

-          My provincial colours

-          Who I know

-          What people think of me

-          Anything and everything but God

But the truth is it is God who is building me. He is the Master Builder. He has designed my successes and my story. He has written my journey. He has given me value and my identity is in him.

It is God Most High who establishes me. There’s no one who could do it better.

Not A Tame Lion

This week as I've been praying for some literal miracles in my friends’ lives I keep thinking of the story of Lazarus being raised from the dead in John 11. Although the story is all about one of Jesus’ biggest miracles, it really is about so much more than that. It’s about how Jesus loves and feels, it’s about trusting God, and about Jesus doing the unexpected.

It’s back in the day when Jesus walked the earth, and he’s healing people left, right and centre. So when a good friend of Jesus, Lazarus, is sick, his family tell Jesus. Jesus loves Laz. He will rush to him and heal him, obviously.

But no, that’s not what happens. “When he heard that Lazarus was sick, he stayed where he was two more days.” And Lazarus dies. What?! Imagine being his family there and then. That’s definitely not how it should go! He said he loved Laz?! What is Jesus doing; how can he even justify that?!

Here is what I think Jesus’ response to that is: “Just wait, people. I haven’t done what you wanted because I am going to do something so much better and greater. Trust me. Healing now would have been cool, but I’m gonna raise him from the dead: the coolest! Your way ends up with one guy being healed which is nice, but my way results in redemption, in many many people being brought to spiritual life. Trust me.”

And he does what he promised. Lazarus is alive again. Martha and Mary learn to trust Jesus, even through their disappointment, God’s glory is shown and many people believe in Jesus and are saved. Win win win win! So much good out of a dark and dead situation.

Jesus didn’t do what the people wanted or expected because he knew the bigger picture and saw the end. He was always in control, always working for the good of those who loved him and whom he loved.

Copy paste this into your own life. If God isn’t healing or sorting out things you face right now, I believe it’s for a bigger purpose. I believe that we can trust him to move and heal and change things when the time is perfectly right. Ask Jesus to teach you trust and patience and faith through this time of death. Ask him to bring redemption to the people around you through your story. Run to him in your disappointment like Martha, knowing that he loves you, and trust him to bring his life in his time.

Like the great quote about Aslan: “He is not a tame lion, but he is good.” Our Jesus is unpredictable, doing wild and unexpected things, but boy is he good.

He can’t be tamed or told what to do, but you can trust him. He always loves us and he is always good.

Crave

Hope is a funny thing. Like a craving, it's such an internal thing, yet it affects all the external stuff too. My hopes, though no one know what they are, affect my friendships, my choices, my conversations and often the expressions on my face.

And I think that that internality [not a word, but let's go with it] is what causes so much disappointment between people. It's something I've written about before, that when our hopes are not met we are left heartsick.

Like if you didn't know that I was really hoping you'd give me a hug, I probably won't get the hug so you defer my hope. If you didn't know that I hoped you'd be here, it's likely you won't be so there goes my hope again. Silly examples, but do you get what I'm saying? Hopes are being crushed daily; hopes that no one even knew existed.

Also, my hopes are different to your hopes. If you could read my mind and see my hopes, you'd probably be surprised and perplexed by them. In fact, they tend to surprise even me. But something that I so love about Jesus is that He knows the secrets of my heart [Psalm 44:21]. He knows the desires of my heart [Psalm 37:4]. My hopes don't surprise Jesus. He's not perplexed by what I desire. He knows me [Psalm 139].

And not only does He know all my hopes, but Jesus is the fulfillment of every hope.
When I hope for love, He is love [1 John 4:16].
When I hope that someone will listen, God hears my cry [Isaiah 65:24].
When I hope for my future, God has already planned it for me [Jeremiah 29:11].
When I hope that I can face the day, Jesus gives me courage for He has overcome [John 16:33].
When I have no hope left, He is my hope [Colossians 1:27].

Hope is what we crave.
Hope is what Jesus gave.

Friendship 201

A couple years ago I wrote a short and sweet post called Friendship 101. 

Thought it was time to take it to the next level, looking at what Jesus says friendship should be. 

Firstly and most importantly, Exodus 20:3-6 “You shall have no other god before me.”

Putting your friend before Jesus in your life will never end well [it’s a real thing. I know this from experience]. No friendship will ever be good for you if it is more important to you than your relationship with Jesus. That’s because no one can be everything to us that Jesus is; no one but Him can fill the gap. Boy, but when Jesus has filled your heart and is the foundation of your love for people, you will find such sweet friendships, crazy cool gifts from Him.

James 5:16 “Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.”

This is not confessions like in a booth with some guy you’ve never met; this is about being real with each other. You don’t have to tell every second person your deepest fears and struggles, but you do need one or two Jesus-loving accountability buddies [and in general do be real with people]. Keeping your struggles to yourself is like shaking a Coke bottle: eventually it’s gonna explode and it’ll be messy. But when you take the lid off and share it, a lot of that pressure and tension is released. God says there is healing and wholeness in sharing our lives with Him and with a friend. Friends that you can pray with are the best! Be that friend.

James 1:19 “Be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry.”

It’s not about solving all of your friend’s problems; it’s about walking with them through the storm, fighting beside them and praying with them. Listen to them and love them, even when you don’t understand.

Proverbs 27:6 “You can trust a friend that corrects you.”

Ephesians 4:15 “Speak the truth in love.”

God gives us friends to sharpen us, to help us stick to His road. Sometimes our vision gets clouded and we lose sight of what is good and important and we need someone outside of us to clean our windows so we can see again. Sometimes that cleaning can hurt a little and not be nice to hear, but boy do we need it! Don’t try and run over the people cleaning your windscreen. Rather listen to them, pray about it, and change what is needed. Know His truth so you can speak it in love. A friend who sharpens you is a gift from Jesus. Be that friend.

Colossians 3:13 “Forgive as Jesus forgave you.”

1 Corinthians 13:5 “Love keeps no record of wrongs.”

If you have a list of bad things people have done to you, where they have failed you, please go and burn it right now. If it’s a mental list, ask the Holy Spirit to wipe it from your memory. Unforgiveness kills more than shark and bear attacks put together, and probably hurts more too. It strangles your soul, destroys your friendship and leaves no room for God’s forgiveness to give you life. To quote Frozen, “let it go, let it go..”, but please don’t turn your back and slam the door. Pray for that person. Ask Jesus to use you to love them. He will.

Real life story: A friend disappointed me. I wanted to write them off and ignore them to “make them pay”. Instead Jesus grabbed my attention and I felt to pray for my friend. Not prayers about how they had made me sad, but prayers for their life and family and things they were dealing with. So I did. The next time I saw them, as I looked at them I felt such an insane amount of love for them [had it been a musical I would have broken into song right there]. Not because I’m a special, loving person, but because God’s love for that person and His forgiveness for me overwhelmed me as I let go of the hurt and let Jesus in.

If Jesus can do that in me, He can do it in you too. Let it go and let Him love you. Then love people like He loves you.

There is so much to say about friendship, but before this turns into a book, let me just leave you with this thought:

“Greater love has no man than this: to lay down his life for his friend.”

Snakes & The Cross

Numbers 21:7-9

The people came to Moses and said, “We sinned when we spoke against the LORD and against you. Pray that the LORD will take the snakes away from us.” So Moses prayed for the people.

The LORD said to Moses, “Make a snake and put it up on a pole; anyone who is bitten can look at it and live.” So Moses made a bronze snake and put it up on a pole. Then when anyone was bitten by a snake and looked at the bronze snake, they lived.

The Israelites sinned against God, and the consequence of that was that God put poisonous snakes among them. They obviously weren’t stoked, it made them realise what they had done and who God was, and they cried out to God to take away the snakes.

God heard their cry, but didn’t answer them in the way that they asked, God didn’t take away the snakes, and in fact He said that they would be bitten by the snakes. But what He did do is give them a lifeline, a way to live through the snake bites. All they had to do was look to the bronze snake on the pole and they lived.

The same goes for us. We have sinned, and always will sin against God. And for our sin there are consequences, things that aren’t generally great. We often cry out to God to take the consequences away. He hears us, and in Exodus 2:23-25, it says that God hears our cry and is moved with compassion.

Yet He does not take the snakes of our sin away, instead He gives us a way out. He offers us life amidst the poison of death that will bite us. All we have to do is look to Jesus [Hebrews 12:1-3], God’s Son, and the Cross, and we’ll live.

Heartsick

Proverbs 13:12

“Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.”

People tend to disappoint; it’s just what we do best. Most things seem to disappoint actually. I have found lately that I have exceedingly high expectations for everything and everyone, and that hope is too often deferred and I'm let down. It makes my heart feel sick. There are things that I so deeply long for, that nothing and no one can satisfy. The false hope the world offers us will continually fall short and fail us. Even in the best job, the greatest friend, the highest marks, the most beautiful marriage, we are heartsick, and have no hope without Jesus.

But inside of Jesus we have this hope, Christ the hope of glory, as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure [Hebrews 6:19]. All our longings will be fulfilled, our expectations lived up to and our hearts at peace. We will become trees of life, entirely satisfied and secure in Jesus our hope.