Tag: Christian

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Victory

People will hurt you.  You will hurt people.  Living in a fallen world, this is a guarantee and a reality we all must live with.  It is in those times when our true characters are seen.  Yep, mine, yours, theirs…all our characters will be tested at some point.  We will all have to face the sad truth that even those who love us dearly will harm us in one way or the other.

Let’s look at David.  His King who was also his father-in-law spent many years trying to kill David.  King Saul was a troubled man who spent a lot of his efforts and resources as king to take David out.  One day, David was hiding in a cave and King Saul came into the very cave David was hiding to relieve himself:

He came to the places where the sheep were kept on the way. There was a cave there, and Saul went in to get rid of his body waste. Now David and his men were sitting farther back in the cave. David’s men said to David, “See, this is the day the Lord told you, ‘See, I am about to give the one who hates you into your hand. You will do to him what you think is best.’” Then David got up and cut off a piece of Saul’s clothing in secret.  After this, David felt guilty in his heart because he had cut off a piece of Saul’s clothing.  So he said to his men, “May the Lord not let me put out my hand against my leader, for he is the Lord’s chosen one.”  David stopped his men with these words. He did not let them go against Saul. So Saul stood up and left the cave, and went on his way.

After this David got up and went out of the cave and called to Saul, saying, “My lord the king!” When Saul looked behind him, David put his face to the ground, showing much respect.  David said to Saul, “Why do you listen to the words of men who say, ‘David wants to hurt you’?  See, your eyes have seen how the Lord gave you to me today in the cave. Some told me to kill you, but I had pity on you. I said, ‘I will not put out my hand against my leader, for he is the Lord’s chosen one.’  Now, my father, see the piece of your clothing in my hand. I cut off the piece of your clothing but did not kill you. So know and understand that I have no desire to do wrong to you. I have not sinned against you, yet you come wanting to kill me.

1 Samuel 24:3-11

David was a man after God’s own heart – therefore he understood that, in order to win, he must not raise his hand against anyone, even when they are doing him wrong.  We must love our neighbor – just as Christ commanded in Matthew 22:36-40.  (Also see Matthew 5:44).  This is an easy thing to say, but so much harder to do.

What would happen if you were put in the same situation as David was, but with someone who has done you wrong?  Would you be able to not bring harm to them?  Or would you do something to “make them pay?”

Let me tell you a secret – if you leave the battle up to God, you will get your victory!  The story of David would have gone very different if he had not left the revenge up to God.  He would not be the revered King of Israel he became.  He is still revered today as a great King of Israel because he went the way he did.  Paul writes in Romans 12:19: “Dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the Scriptures say, ‘I will take revenge; I will pay them back,’ says the Lord.” Some things need to be left to God to handle because we were never meant to carry them ourselves.

Let it go, y’all.  Let God handle it.  Why?  Because David got his Kingdom, got his Temple, and is still revered today.  Live in freedom from bitterness, anger, and strife.  Let God do what only He can do.  Don’t try to step in and do things your way.  You (and I) will only mess things up.

Our freedom is worth too much to lose it over someone else’s actions.  Live in peace with each other and we all win.

Pray this with me: Father, thank you for another day I get to see and for the sacrifice of Your Son so that  I may live in freedom and in peace.  Lord, search my heart and show me areas of my life that I’ve tried to fight battles that weren’t mine to fight, but Yours.  Help me learn to lay these things down at your feet so that I may live in the very freedom that Christ paid for on Calvary.  Fight my battles, my Father, so that we all win.  I ask you to bless my enemies and all those who despise me.  Show them your love.  I thank you for all of this.  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Be blessed everyone!

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Normally Not-Normal

I recently took a personality test and got the same Myers Briggs result – INFJ. Per the results, I am a part of around 1% of the population. In no way am I “normal.” This was a hard fact for me to swallow most if my life until recently. I just wanted to be like everyone else, but that is not the way it is designed. We are to be His light. How can we do that if everyone is alike?

To give those who suffer from feeling out of place, remember this scripture:

Oh yes, you shaped me first inside, then out; you formed me in my mother’s womb. I thank you, High God—you’re breathtaking! Body and soul, I am marvelously made! I worship in adoration—what a creation! You know me inside and out, you know every bone in my body; You know exactly how I was made, bit by bit, how I was sculpted from nothing into something. Like an open book, you watched me grow from conception to birth; all the stages of my life were spread out before you, The days of my life all prepared before I’d even lived one day. (‭Psalm‬ ‭139‬:‭13-16‬ MSG)

God made you the way you are for a reason. Don’t discredit it. Pray that God gives you His eyes so you may see who you are in Him rather than who you are in the world.

Is it always easy for me to accept me as me? No, but God continues to remind me that He loves me more than I can fathom. The same goes for you.

Be blessed.

Not Normal

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While You Are Waiting: Being Bold Volume 2

Waiting is a hard thing to do. There are times we may wait for years before we see the things God has laid out for us. In this interim, we must deal with our surroundings in a way that it doesn’t detract from our future. In other words, we must not become stagnant, bitter and angry. How do we do that? We stay humble. The definition of being humble is “not proud; not thinking of (or showing) yourself as better than other people.” Humility is a subject that is talked about a lot in churches. It also is mentioned many times in the Bible – 3751 to be exact. I know that this subject has been spoken on a lot, but because it is so important and, dare I say, because it is one of the hardest things for us to master, let’s dig into it and find out how we can remain humble in a season of waiting.

Being bold is not just about waiting – it is about everything that we do. Thus, we must let it permeate every part of us- which includes how we treat others around us. Training oneself to put yourself last takes some conscious decisions. It is not easy. There are some key people in our lives that we need to deliberately be humble to. Some, it will be easy to put them first, but others, not so much. God does care about our feelings. He knows our heart (Psalm 139:1-4) and understands why, when we interact with some people, humility is not our first thought. He does not want us to hurt, but He wants us to live our lives for Him, thus loving others (1 John 3:16). In doing so, we will see His hand and know His victory (Deut. 20:4; 1 Peter 5:5).

The first in the group of people we must humble ourselves to is those who lead us. Whether you are someone who volunteers here and there at your church or someone who sits on the Pastoral staff, we all have leaders. 1 Thessalonians 5:12-13 says that we must show respect and wholehearted love to our leaders because of their work. We must show those who have to make the hard decisions honor. King David showed King Saul great respect despite the fact that David was the anointed King and Saul was not doing a good job ruling the kingdom. It didn’t matter – the man that was after God’s own heart knew that he needed to honor the man in power as long as he held that position (1 Sam. 24).

In turn, the next group of people who we must show honor and humility to are those who serve us in our ministries. Whether you are a top ministry leader or a lower tier leader in a church, you have people who work for your cause. In any of these cases, consider yourself blessed. Why? 1 Peter 5:2-4 talks about how we need to care for the flock that God entrusted to us – not to get anything out of it, but because we are serving others. In doing this, our reward will be great in Heaven. So we should be just like Jesus in John 13 and kneel before our people and be the example for those who are watching us. Thus, we are planting seeds and building other ministries with even minute acts of kindness.

The third group of people that every Christian should be humble to is those who look up to us in our journey. We all have a story and we all have a past. Anyone in ministry has a story that will reach someone. As you walk your journey, there will be people who look up to you – who admire where you have come from and want to see themselves in that stage of journey at some point in their own future. Philippians 2:3 states “Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves.” In the business of life, we forget that we need to make time for those around us. Remember to take time for those who may really need us in our lives.

Alongside the ones above, we now move onto the more unpleasant people in our lives. There are a group of people who, in our season of waiting, we will see get the chances that we so desire. Regardless of how upset this may make us, we must still be humble. If it is God who did this, then there is an opportunity in the future that He has planned that we cannot yet see (Prov. 3:5-, Jer. 29:11). If it is the evil one who is orchestrating this, then we need to get angry with him – for trying to hurt us and for using those in our lives to try to destroy us. To truly get back at him, celebrate those around us in their success. This way God wins!

Finally, we must be humble to those who try to purposely, even deviously take us out. This is the hardest type of humility by far. When we are waiting to be elevated, knowing that there is more to this life and then we encounter someone who is making this climb even so much harder. It Is our first instinct to try to do the same to them – take them out before they do us. We must remember that God is always faithful (Psalm 36:5) so we should trust that His plan will go forth regardless. It is our duty to not retaliate. Romans 12:17-19 says to never take revenge and never try to pay back evil with evil. We must live in honor and in peace. Let the Lord fight our battles. How bold do you say that is?

Being bold is not easy. There are many things on this journey that could trip us up, but there is one thing we all need to remember: “He must become greater and greater, and I must become less and less” John 3:30.

Blessings.

This is a statue at my university, Dallas Baptist University. It captures Jesus washing a disciple's feet.
This is a statue at my university, Dallas Baptist University. It captures Jesus washing a disciple’s feet.