August 3 – A Cry in Our Crisis (Psalm 74)

“Turn your steps toward these everlasting ruins, all this destruction the enemy has brought on the sanctuary.”
(Psalm 74:3)

IN WORD:
The scene is one of devastation. God’s temple has been destroyed by the enemies of His people. There seems to be no deliverance, no way around the catastrophe. It’s an utter disaster.
Such was the scene behind Psalm 74. But this psalm wasn’t only relevant those many centuries before Jesus; it is relevant to us. It offers us a picture of a soul desperate for God. No, the ruins are not physical, and the temple is not made of stone. The picture is relevant for us because we now know that the dwelling place of God in the Old Testament pointed to the hearts of His people in the New. And all of us, at some point or another in our lives, have probably felt the need to ask of God what Psalm 74:3 says. We want Him to visit the devastation that is us. We need Him to step into the ruins of our lives.
It is God’s mercy that brings us to that point, though it doesn’t feel like mercy at all. It feels cruel. God lets us run the way of our rebellion, and He lets our apathetic hearts lead us to pathetic consequences — conviction, despair, brokenness, and deep need. But it is all of grace. We cannot know Him unless we cry out for Him to visit our devastation. For that, we have to be brought to the point of crying out.

IN DEED:
Has your life ever looked like the scene of a disaster? If not your own, have you ever had to counsel a brother or sister whose life lay in ruins? We can know that the cry of Psalm 74 is a legitimate cry. It is a necessary point for us to get to, that painful point when the raw nerves of the soul are exposed and God’s comfort seems far away. Learn to see it as a necessary step of coming closer to Him. Do not let it discourage you. God will meet you there. He would not have let you fall if He’d had no plans to catch you.

“Our extremities are the Lord’s opportunities.”
-Charles Spurgeon-

August 2 – The Sovereign God (Job 42:1-6)

“I know that you can do all things; no plan of yours can be thwarted.”(Job 42:2)

IN WORD:
At the end of his trials, Job affirms God’s sovereignty. This is a knowledge at which we do not arrive easily. Faith and experience may bring us to it, but before we arrive at such a statement, we are plagued with numerous questions of doubt. Will this turn out for good? Will God show up or just leave me hanging? Has my sin caused me to miss out on God’s plan?
We know the right answers to these questions, but our trials invariably cause us to doubt the right answers. Circumstances can be awfully persuasive. We see negative things, and though we know the Word of God is more trustworthy than the vision of our eyes, we tend to put more faith in the latter. When God calls us to walk by faith and not by sight, He wants us to believe in the invisible more than the visible. He wants us to trust His Word. He wants the questions to be answered for us.
God’s will is not undone by our trials. It is not even undone by our sin. We may lose out on participating in it and enjoying it if we are persistently disobedient, but His purposes will be accomplished. No plan of His can be thwarted. We may take the long and painful way to fit into it, but God has accounted even for that. He has seen all things from the beginning. He knew ahead of time what your crisis would be and how you would respond to it. He has had a plan all along to bring you into a deep, deep faith.

IN DEED:
We may ask our questions of God, but we must know in the end: He can do all things and no plan of His can be thwarted. Job’s repentant confessions in chapter 42 were the most accurate he had yet uttered. God is God, and he knows what He is doing. He has a handle on our future. He calls us to participate in it willingly, but it is already well planned. Take heart in that, and know that God is sovereign.

“It has often been my delight to approach God, and adore Him as a sovereign God.” -Jonathan Edwards-

August 1 – Master of the Morning (Job 38:1-21)

“Have you ever given orders to the morning, or shown the dawn its place?”(Job 38:12)

IN WORD:
This is God’s question to the human ego. He has a way of reminding us of our limitations whenever we get too comfortable with our understanding. When things just don’t make sense to us, God reminds us that they don’t have to. We’re not in charge. Our understanding isn’t key to the operation of this creation. We can participate in it without being in control or knowing everything there is to know. In fact, we must. Control and omniscience are not options for us.
Why does God so frequently put us in our place? Because He has to. We repeatedly grow out of our dependence on Him and try to manage things on our own. We sometimes ask questions that implicitly accuse Him of being inept or unknowledgeable. We seek to control our world and master our resources. God has to remind us that we can’t. That’s His job. Our role is dependence and trust.
That shouldn’t make us feel too bad. Righteous Job had to be reminded as well. He got caught up in thinking his trials were all about him — what he had or had not done, or what he could do to get out of it. He didn’t realize that his trials were all about God and the true worth of worship. Job’s questions were presumptuous. Sometimes, so are ours.

IN DEED:
Do you have a tendency to want to control your environment? Do you feel out of control when your situation gets out of hand? That isn’t a problem. You were never in control anyway, no matter how much you thought you were. God is our Master. He commands the dawn and holds the vastness of the creation in His hand. He has put everything in its place. When our circumstances feel out of place, we are to go to Him. The answer is always there, and we cannot be impatient for it. The wisdom of God is entirely trustworthy. Wait for it. Believe in it. Rest in the knowledge that He will help you in His perfect timing. He will break into your trial like the dawning of the day.

“Immortal, invisible, God only wise, in light inaccessible, hid from our eyes.” -Walter Chalmers Smith-

July 31 – Punishment or Love? (Job 37)

“He brings the clouds to punish men, or to water His earth and show His love.”(Job 37:13)

IN WORD:
Elihu’s observation in Job 37:13 is perceptive. The clouds God brings into our lives could be judgment. They could also be mercy. Either way, our focus during trials needs to be less about God’s intent than our response.
Often, God’s actions have diverse effects on people. His presence can be soothing for one and extremely uncomfortable for another, depending on the prior relationship. His blessings can prompt the gratitude of one or cultivate the corruption of another. Again, it all depends on the prior relationship we have with our Creator. So it is with our trials. In some people, trials illustrate that their worship is genuine and draw them deeper into God. In others, trials drive them away. They will have nothing to do with a God who lets them suffer.
In adversity, that middle ground of indifference is taken away. When World War II ended, some people walked away from concentration camps with deeper faith, and some walked away with none.. What was the difference? Their prior relationship with God probably had something to do with it. The adversity only highlighted the difference between the genuine and the false. It removed the illusion of lukewarm faith, driving people either to hot or cold extremes.

IN DEED:
God will bring clouds into your life. Perhaps they are hovering now. Will they be your punishment? Or will they refresh you and show you His love? The answer may be less a matter of His intent than of your response. It all depends on how you choose to see them.
Let the clouds of adversity drive you into God’s presence. Let them stir a passion in your heart to know Him more deeply and to worship Him more authentically. Do not flee from them. Let them linger long enough to see His mercy fall from heaven in the end.

“God tries our faith so that we may try His faithfulness.”
-Anonymous-

July 30 – Implicit Trust (Job 13:13-19)

IN WORD:
When faith can look death in the face and say that God is good, it is true faith. It was not contingent on miracles and blessings, and it was not uprooted by trials. When Satan’s savagery intimidates and wounds, the truly faithful heart can say that God is faithful. It does not let superficial evidence impugn the steadfast character of the loving God.
This does not mean, however, that those with faith cannot ask questions. We cannot ask accusing questions — that would be sin — but we can ask God to show us His ways. We can ask if our pain is the result of our own sin or of some other divine purpose. We can ask God to show up in our trial and use it to reveal Himself in a deeper way.
Job certainly did. His great statement of faith — “Though he slay me, yet will I trust him” — was a preface to another declaration: “I will surely defend my ways to his face.” In other words, Job committed to hang on to faith regardless, but in the meantime he was going to ask some questions. Faith does not imply ignorance. It allows us to discover God.
A story is told of a doctor in the jungle who was forced to do surgery on his young son without anesthesia. Would the son look at his father’s scalpel with horror or with trust? That would depend on the relationship. In this story, though the pain was excruciating, the son lay still in compliant trust. He knew who his father was, and he knew his father’s love.

IN DEED:
Do you? Can you look at the Father’s scalpel with an implicit trust that He knows what He’s doing? Are you certain of the love that is behind your trial? Even if He appears to slay you, will you still trust in Him? Genuine faith will always come to that point. It may ask a lot of “whys” in the meantime, but it knows that the answers, whatever they are, are not going to destroy the faith. That is certain. Regardless of our crisis, God is trustworthy.

“Hope can see heaven through the thickest clouds.”
-Thomas Benton Brooks-

July 29 – In Your Trials (Job 1)

“In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing.”
(Job 1:22)

IN WORD:
When adversity strikes, our true spiritual maturity comes to the surface. Many of us can play the game of godliness, appearing to be mature while undisciplined attitudes rage within. But when adversity hits, all is exposed. Our true feeling about God come out in the questions we ask and the actions we take.
Job was a genuine saint. His faith surpassed that of all others of his time. Crisis came, and Job guarded his thoughts and his words. He did not sin by accusing God of doing him wrong.
Can we say the same? Often, when we’re in a crisis, we ask God, “Why are you doing this to me?” Sometimes it’s an honest question, but often it has undertones of accusation in it. We’re just sure we don’t deserve the trials that have come upon us, unaware that often trials have nothing to do with what we do or do not deserve. Our trials can be, as they were in Job’s case, an opportunity to demonstrate the validity of our worship. They can develop our character and help us grow closer to God. When we assume that our trial is an unfair judgment or repayment from God, we expose our true feelings about ourselves. It means we were in a quid pro quo relationship with Him based on rights rather than grace.

IN DEED:
Adversity tells us a lot about what we really believe. Perhaps that’s why God allows it to strike us from time to time. It answers the questions we need to have answered. It displays the accurate measure of our growth and the true nature of our relationship with God.
How do you react when you’re in a crisis? Is your first impulse to charge God with unfairness? Go back to the Cross and remember that His righteous judgment against us would have been fair. God gave us grace instead. The crisis means something else. Worship God in the midst of it, and let Him use your trials to draw you closer to Him.

“It is trial that proves one thing weak and another strong.”
-Henry Ward Beecher-

July 28 – Weak Strength (2 Corinthians 12:9-10)

“If you falter in times of trouble, how small is your strength!”
(Proverbs 24:10)

IN WORD:
Paul struggled with a thorn in the flesh. Three times he asked God to remove it, but the now-familiar answer was clear: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9). Paul heard straight from God’s mouth how to persevere in a trial. It is God’s strength that carries us through.
Jesus assured us that we would have trouble in this world (John 16:33). How negligent would our Father be if He knew this and did not prepare us for the tough times! We are not designed to cruise through this life with ease. We are built for endurance by the God who has planned an eternity for us. He knows trouble will come. He simply must prepare us to handle it in grace and His strength.
Newly manufactured products are often given a stress test. An extreme amount of pressure is applied to them — more than they will experience in regular use — so that their strength can be verified. God does the same for us, as painful as it is. But there’s a difference. He’s not testing us for our strength. He is testing us for our inclination to depend upon His strength. His power is the only power that can carry us through.
We would agree with the above proverb. We do falter in times of trouble, and our strength is small. But we have learned a secret. Small strength allows room for God’s power. It sends us in search of a Sustainer and a Deliverer, and there is no more worthwhile search. We will find Him if we are under no illusions about our own self-sufficiency.

IN DEED:
Are you going through a trial? It is more than a lesson in tolerance. It is for your endurance and it is a lesson in dependence. Know your weakness. Know your potential for faltering. Then know the power of your God. Blessed is the person who can say, “How small is my strength!” With the knowledge that there is a greater strength available. And blessed is the Giver of sufficient grace. Where we are weak, He is strong.

“When a man has no strength, if he leans on God, he becomes powerful.” -D.L. Moody-

July 27 – When God Tarries (1 Samuel 13:5-15)

“I thought, ‘Now the Philistines will come down against me. . .’ So I felt compelled to offer the burnt offering.”
(1 Samuel 13:12)

IN WORD:
Saul was vastly outmanned and out-armed, surrounded by vengeful Philistines. He waited for Samuel to come and make the offerings that would secure the Lord’s favor. But Samuel tarried. We don’t know why; we just know that the longer he delayed, the more desperate Saul became. The moment Samuel was officially late, Saul acted. He made the offering himself. He wasn’t a priest and had no authority; but someone had to do it. Israel was at stake.
Have you ever prayed desperately for God’s help, only to see the deadline pass with no reply? God sometimes tests us this way. Providence is slow in coming and we take matters into our own hands. We don’t mean to be disobedient; we just assume God hasn’t answered our prayers and wants us to help ourselves. He doesn’t. He’s waiting to see what’s more important to us: our obedience or our survival.
Would God really give us that difficult a test? Just ask Abraham, Esther, or Peter. And don’t forget Saul. Our obedience will be tested, usually in smaller degrees. But it always comes down to this: When things are really desperate, when our whole lives seem to depend on the next step, what will we do? Take it upon ourselves to intervene or continue to trust God?

IN DEED:
Life is filled with these little acts of impatience. We pray, but we don’t wait long enough for the answer. Like Samuel, God tarries too long. Our deadlines pass — not God’s, just ours. We think He has left us out to dry, that perhaps our prayers were not on target enough. But it’s our timetable that is not on target. The Bible is abundant and emphatic in its commands four us to “wait on God.”
Saul’s impatience cost him his throne. Like him, we don’t live in a waiting society. But God’s Kingdom is exactly that. He will try us to see how long we wait for Him. Hang on to faith; the answer will come, and it’s never too late.

“Patience is the companion of wisdom.” -St. Augustine-

July 26 – Deeper By the Day (1 Chronicles 29:14-19)

“I know, my God, that you test the heart and are pleased with integrity.”(1 Chronicles 29:17)

IN WORD:
So many people think biblical faith is about changing our behavior. Many of the Pharisees and experts of the Law in Jesus’ day were convinced that religion was an outward expression only. Our culture often makes the same mistake. Rules & regulations are substituted for a genuine change of heart. All the while, God points us back into His Word. There is nothing in it — nothing at all — to encourage a righteousness that is skin-deep.
Isn’t it easy for us to get caught in that trap? We know the truth, that the gospel is about getting a new heart. But we look for the outward evidence of our new heart — as we should — and allow that evidence to become the substance of our faith — which we shouldn’t. The outward works of righteousness are only the by-product of the inward work of faith. They must be a very intentional by-product, as we train ourselves to put feet on our faith. But they are by-products nonetheless. There is no requirement of God for our behavior that is not to begin down in the depths of our spirit.
God desires truth in our inmost parts. Do we? God wants to plant His wisdom deep within. Do we? Perhaps we have failed to realize the radical nature of the gospel. Perhaps we have sought guidance for our behavior without first seeking a change in our character. Perhaps we have wanted easy words to follow rather than a traumatic Word that changes us.

IN DEED:
God will not let us be content with that. His Spirit will continue to hound us as lovingly as He can hound; He will not stop His work in us until it has penetrated our core. He will not settle for appearances.
Do you settle for appearances? Are you content with superficial acts of faith while a sinful heart fights and wins the battle deep within? Adopt God’s desires. Never cease your prayers for change until the change runs deep. Always let God take you deeper than the day before.

“Spiritual growth consists most in the growth of the root, which is out of sight.” -Matthew Henry-

July 25 – A Matter of the Heart (1 Samuel 16:1-13)

“Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”(1 Samuel 16:7)

IN WORD:
David had 7 brothers. He was the youngest, and all the others looked stronger and abler than he did. Samuel the priest was a godly man, but he looked at the 8 sons of Jesse as everyone else did — with human eyes. He anticipated the anointing of God with earthly measurements, a mistake no one can afford to make but that everyone does. Samuel learned a divine principle on that day of selecting the new king: He learned that God’s anointing doesn’t follow human standards. It is held secret in His unfathomable wisdom until He is ready to reveal it.
Think of what that means in our churches. We define the anointing of God on a preacher by how well he relates to people and preaches a sermon. We define the anointing of God on a ministry by how impressive it has made its reputation. We define the anointing of God on each other by how we dress, how we part our hair, how socially smooth we are, or how talented and knowledgeable we appear to be. And all the while, the wisdom of God is peering into each person’s heart, looking beyond talent, appearance, gifts, intellect, resources, and everything else. Character is the key. Obedience and submission are the cornerstones of His anointing. He will bless people we least expect Him to bless and shelve people we least expect Him to shelve, all because He’s looking in places we can barely see.

IN DEED:
That doesn’t mean that gifts, talents, intellect, resources, and even appearance are irrelevant. It simply means that not one of those things can fulfill the will of God in a person if the heart is not right.
That should say 2 profound things to us: (1) We can’t judge people by the standards we normally use, and (2) we can’t be disciples based on the gifts we think He has given us. In both cases, popular opinion is irrelevant. The piercing eye of God is not fooled. The quality of anyone’s discipleship, at all times, depends on the condition of the heart.

“The first and great work of a Christian is about his heart.”
-Jonathan Edwards-