Helping to Build

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basics, battles, body of Christ, building, burdens, calling, Christian encouragement, christian journey, christian walk, Christianity, covering each other, encouragement, family, fitly joined, focus, guarding, guarding each other, having each others back, helping each other, our swords at the ready, protecting each other, protection, standing together, wall building

Nehemiah 4:6 says, “So we built the wall and the whole wall was joined together to half its height, for the people had a mind to work.”

I love the book of Nehemiah. There is so much goodness in it. The leadership of Nehemiah, the teamwork of the people, the enemies getting stronger but God’s people steadily plodding to build the wall anyway. All the prayers and encouragement of the leaders, the strategy…I love it all.

When I came across Nehemiah 4:6 the other day, I of course, focused on “for the people had a mind to work”. After all, that’s usually what pastors I have been around would preach about. The other day though I was asked to look at how smart Nehemiah was to build all the wall to its half way point. My devotional leader Kelly Minter said, “So instead of completing the sections that were easily coming along and leaving the more difficult chunks for later, they decided to get the whole wall to the halfway mark. This may have meant leaving certain portions that were well-along in order to fill the gaps that were leaving vulnerable holes. It was better for the whole wall to be shored up, even though incomplete, than to have fully built sections here and there while others lie disconnected. This feels like divine wisdom to me.”

It felt like divine wisdom to me as well and I couldn’t help but think about our churches. Each church has people who are great at “wall building”. They just seem to be able to pray and trust and have the kind of faith that everyone desires. They build great walls of protection around their loved ones by prayer and standing firmly on God’s Word. Through years of pressing in to Jesus they have faithfully built their section of the wall.

Others are more vulnerable. They haven’t gone through as much faith testing. They’ve trusted in other things until they have finally realized that only God can sustain. They forget to pray first when an attack comes. Their wall still has gaping holes where the Enemy can easily penetrate.

Nehemiah 4:6 tells us the smart thing to do is to come together and help each other build the whole wall until all sections are joined. We may not understand why their section isn’t further along, but we are still called to help. The people of Jerusalem knew that they were still vulnerable if any section was still crumbling. Just because their section was finished, they knew that in order for everyone to be safe all the walls needed to become one, big wall.  That’s just being smart. That’s wisdom. How many times have we heard that we are only as strong as our weakest link? It’s true and it’s true that our church is only as strong as the wall of protection around it.

There are many people in our churches who need help building. Many people are still too vulnerable to attacks. Their foundation is barely started and they need help. Sometimes, it’s just a matter of teaching. People need to know the basics of building a strong foundation through prayer and Bible study and they need a side by side mentor that helps teach them the building process.

Others once had a magnificent wall, but sin, tragedy, or just the pounding of life has reduced it to a crumpled mess. We need to be faithful to help those dear ones clear that rubble away and rebuild. Christian counseling may be needed, forgiveness is often required and the clearing away of lifestyle choices can often help the rubble to be gone and the rebuilding to occur. This often takes time and effort. A fresh build is much more exciting  than the clearing away of old debris, but it often takes rebuilding the old before the whole wall can be strong once again.

Then there are those who are building for all they are worth who need our protection. This is especially close to my heart right now because we have some friends who are being hit from every side imaginable. It’s not quite Job, but it’s getting there quickly. We need to be especially vigilant with these precious wall builders. Our wall is doing okay in the moment, our wall is standing strong, but our sweet brothers and sisters are being beat to death by the Enemy. They are trying to build, they are trying to learn, they are trying to keep the faith, but the fiery darts keep hitting their backs as they are trying to build.

Nehemiah 4 goes on to tell us that in order for the wall to be built and joined together, guards had to be stationed. Some would build and some would guard. Those building had their sword at the ready as well, but they knew someone else was guarding, so they were able to focus on building and not be as disctracted. They were encouraged to keep building because their fellow wall builders were taking the time to protect them. That is so beautiful to me.

That’s what we need to do for each other. Who in our churches needs to be guarded? Who can you hold your sword up for today? I’ll admit I look at my half built wall and think, “I still have so much work to do.” The sad fact is we will always have work to do. Our walls will never be finished completely, but God has called us to protect each other, to help everyone get their wall to the halfway point, to join all our walls together and become less vulnerable from attacks by the Enemy as a whole church fitly joined together (Ephesians 4:16).

That’s a wonderful picture isn’t it? Building and guarding. Building and guarding. Building and guarding. Loving each other like the family we are. Praying together as a true army and lifting our swords not just for ourselves, but even more readily for those around us. Let’s take the example in Nehemiah and make it true today. Let’s build, help, protect and love as we are called knowing that the vulnerable places in our brothers and sisters are our own. Knowing that buiding together is the only way our churches will be strong. Knowing that without the Master Builder we would all be lost. Knowing that our walls will never be perfect, but that fellow believers are raising their swords for our protection and we are raising our sword for theirs. May it be, Lord. May it be.

My Story          Seeking Hearts Ministries

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When God Doesn’t do what you Want

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I’ve said for some time now that there is a certain crisis of faith that comes to every human when deciding whether they believe God can do what He says He can do. Can He really save me? Can He really heal? Can He really drop manna from the sky? And then, there is the crisis of faith that comes when you know without a doubt that God can move mountains, but He’s just not doing it for you. I mean, what is more frustrating than knowing that someone, anyone, can help, they’re just choosing not to? When that happens, a whole new crisis of faith occurs. Your mountain is looming large and you know your God can move it, but He’s choosing not to and you are left floundering with questions. Is my God really good? Can my God really be trusted? Does He really have a plan for my good? Do I really matter to Him?

I’m not going to pretend to know all the answers to why God is allowing certain things in your life. I’m not even going to pretend to know why He is allowing certain things in my life. I’m not going to pretend to have the answers as to why God would allow children to have cancer, rapists to go free, or even why food can’t be put on every table this week? But, I can tell you (and me) what to focus on when God doesn’t do what we want Him to do.

Let me start by assuring you that you do indeed have a good God. You have a God who does choose to move mountains for you. You have a God who wants you to look like Him and act like Him and love Him as He loves you. You have a never failing, never ceasing, never forsaking God who has a detailed plan for you since before the first molecule was on this earth. Know that because it’s true.

Lamentations 3:17-26 says, “My soul has been deprived of peace; I have forgotten what happiness is. Then I thought: My future is lost, as well as my hope from the LORD. Remember my affliction and my homelessness, the wormwood and the poison. I continually remember them and have become depressed. Yet I call this to mind, and therefore I have hope: Because of the LORD’s faithful love we do not perish, for His mercies never end. They are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness! I say: The LORD is my portion, therefore I will put my hope in Him. The LORD is good to those who wait for Him, to the person who seeks Him. It is good to wait quietly for deliverance from the LORD.” Verses 31-33 go on to say, “For the Lord will not reject us forever. Even if He causes suffering, He will show compassion according to His abundant, faithful love. For He does not enjoy bringing affliction or suffering on mankind.”

This passage is so great. We get to see the struggle that Jeremiah had with what was happening all around him and to him. He couldn’t understand it and he became depressed. He even admits in this passage that he lost his hope in the Lord. Then, he decided to remember who His God is. He decided to think about God’s faithfulness, His love and His mercies. He decided that The Lord was his portion for this life and his hope. He decided to rest in God knowing that His God would come through. God’s deliverance obviously wouldn’t look like Jeremiah thought it would. It obviously wouldn’t come at the time that Jeremiah thought that it should, but Jeremiah decided to look up, remember His God and trust. That’s the kind of faith I want, don’t you?

First John 1:5 tells us, “Now this is the message we have heard from Him and declare to you: God is light, and there is absolutely no darkness in Him.” You can trust that. Our God has no ulterior motives. He has no dark side. He is good. He is holy. He is true and He. Is. In. Love. With. You.

Song of Solomon 7:10 says, “I am my beloved’s, and his desire is toward me.” God’s desire is toward you. God wants to be with you. He wants to be so melded with you that all people see is Him being uniquely displayed through your personality, your giftings and your sweet face. He has fashioned you for such a time as this and will not stop pursuing you until every fiber of your being is His. He is obsessed with you. Hebrews 13:5 says He will never leave us and Zephaniah 3:17 says He sings over us.  That is not a God who fails. That is a God who loves. Believe that today. Know it with every fiber of your being. If you have to be like the father in Mark 9:24 who said, “I do believe!” and then, quickly added, “Help my unbelief,” so be it, but keep pressing in to your God. He can be trusted. He will come through. He will strengthen you for the task and He is worthy of every fragment of faith you place in Him. He has you, precious one. He has you. Rest in that today.

Seeking Hearts Ministries          My Story

 

 

 

 

Am I Desperate Enough?

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Psalm 63:1 says, “O God, Thou art my God; I shall seek Thee earnestly; my soul thirsts for Thee, my flesh yearns for Thee, in a dry and weary land where there is no water.”

I read this verse the other day and in the margin of my Bible I found that I had written these words from a long ago message – “rising in immediate pursuit”. These words were directly across from the word earnestly. As I looked at the original language of this verse, I found that earnestly can mean not only rising in immediate pursuit, but also “early, diligently, seeking, to look early or diligently for”. Every time I came across this word, it referenced not just a diligent seeking, but an early seeking.

I thought about the children of Israel in Exodus 16:21. Every morning on their journey through the wilderness they woke up and gathered manna for the day. It says, “And they gathered it morning by morning, every man as much as he should eat; but when the sun grew hot, it would melt.” If the Israelites did not gather in the morning, the manna for that day was gone. The day simply melted it away.

This makes me wonder how often I have left my daily bread laying in my study and tried to live through my day without the nourishment that the Lord has provided? How many times have I woke up only to decide that immediate pursuit was unnecessary? How often have I assumed that the same provision would be provided later in the day? If I were truly yearning for my Lord as the psalmist describes, wouldn’t I want the provision for the day to be immediate? If I realized what a dry and weary land I was being asked to wander through, wouldn’t I want to seek His sustenance quickly? As soon as possible?

More definitions of earnestly included: “look early, diligently for, look for dawn; do something betimes, enquire early, seek betimes, seek diligently early, in the morning…” Like I said, every time I looked, earnestly was connected with early. And not just early, but a seeking for the object , or person, over and over again, not just one time.

This is a great checkpoint for me. If I really want something, I wake up thinking about it. If I need something desperately, I don’t wait until I get around to it. If at all possible, I want it now! Christmas morning is a great example of this. I don’t know about you and your family, but my family wakes up earlier than the sun to rip open those presents. No waiting for us! That’s because we wake up earnestly seeking those gifts. We are continually thinking about them. We want them as soon as possible because we are excited about what they will provide for us. When we truly want something, we want it early. When we are excited and expectant about what God has for us, we get up early to seek it.

I also found it interesting that when I looked for other passages in the Bible with this same word, earnestly, it most often appeared in Job, the Psalms and Proverbs. These books tell us of two of the most desperate men in the Bible and the wisest. We need to be wise enough to be desperate for God. When we are desperate, we seek what we need as soon as possible.

Am I saying that if we don’t wake up immediately and seek our Lord that we are in sin? No. What I’m saying is that if we aren’t waking up desperate to be in God’s presence, desperate to spend alone time with Him as soon as possible we need to ask God to get us that way. The psalmist says, “my soul thirsts for Thee.” If my soul is not thirsty for God, I need to be asking why. The psalmist says, “my flesh yearns for Thee in a dry and weary land where there is no water.” If our flesh is not yearning for our Lord, we need to ask if we have forgotten that we are living in a dry and weary land. Have we forgotten that this is not our home? Our flesh yearns for more than what this world can offer because it knows only God can satisfy.

When we try to satiate our hunger and thirst in ways other than God, that’s when the real trouble begins. But, when we earnestly seek Him, as early as possible because we know we can’t make it without Him, we are refreshed, renewed and strengthened.

Jeremiah 29:13 says, “And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart.”  When we seek God, it’s never a waste of time. It’s never a waste of energy. He always comes through to sustain, nourish and guide us through our day.

Let’s earnestly seek Him today.

Seeking Hearts Ministries        My Story