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I recently read an excellent devotional by Nicky Gumbel who has worked with the Alpha program. He pointed out there has been a shift in our culture so that the battle today is not as much about God as it is about Jesus. He reported many will say that they believe in God and are even open to the idea of the Holy Spirit. But increasingly, Jesus has become the stumbling-block. They say things like, ‘I don’t get the Jesus bit.’ It is not logical to them. It reminded me of how Satan put such a subtle spin on God’s love and commands that Adam and Eve doubted God was truly good. This led them to reject His Word and authority. This deceptive tool has continued to mislead humanity through the millenniums. Why? Because far too often it works.

I received a response from a misled man who read one of my blogs. He saw God as autocratic and cruel by demanding suffering from humans (including Jesus). In my lifetime, I have seen how the atrocities of sin against God’s laws for living the best life possible have dramatically shifted. So many, including many church goers, sin is now synonymous with a mistake or not the best choice. It is not reasonable to them that God’s Word would define sin being so bad it requires the death penalty. This redefinition has deluded thousands! The Bible clearly teaches, the person who sins is the one who will die. Ezekiel 18:20 (NLT2) For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 6:23 (NLT2) Indeed, nearly everything is purified with blood according to the law, and apart from the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness. Hebrews 9:22 (LEB)

Jesus, God’s Son, was born as a human so humanity could identify with God. Satan has nefariously taken this identification factor and spun it around so that today young people so identify with the humanity of Jesus that they totally miss His deity. By redefining sin to be nothing more than a casual bad choice of the moment, a spiritually blinded person does not get the fact Jesus had to die on the cross for their sin! This is clear in how few experience godly sorrow which alone can result in changing the direction of their life. For the kind of sorrow God wants us to experience leads us away from sin and results in salvation. There’s no regret for that kind of sorrow. But worldly sorrow, which lacks repentance, results in spiritual death. 2 Corinthians 7:10 (NLT2)

Sad to say, I suspect this delusion is due to neglecting to stress, in churches or small groups, how terrible sin really is. This subtle failure will lead hundreds to reject God’s authority over them as Adam and Eve did.

Our failure to stress the severity of sin has caught up with us and now people are paying the terrible consequences of our neglect.

This is NOT to suggest that those who share Christ should stress doom and gloom, in contrast to joy in serving Christ! Truth MUST be balanced with the love as well as fear of God. It is the joy of the Lord that is your strength! (Nehemiah 8:10) It is essential to live His joy out in our daily lives. Always be full of joy in the Lord. I say it again—rejoice! Philippians 4:4 (NLT2) In the midst of that, the lack of healthy, reverential fear of God’s righteousness and justice will gradually drain away that same joy of our Lord because, sin separates us from God. (Isaiah 59:2) It happened to King David in the Bible and can happen to any of us today.

 

It felt like a wave of disorientation crashed down upon me. I had established a workable routine. Then, unexpectedly, multiple personal aspirations simultaneously raced towards me as must-deal-with-now issues. My schedule, monthly priorities, and workable routine were overwhelmed, then seemed to vaporize. I felt like I was being buried alive, trying to stop my car after being broadsided by a 150-mph gust of wind, or losing my mind! Yikes!! When did that last happen in your life?

Gratefully, my mind and emotions slowly re-stabilized! In its wake were challenging pending pressures, but when they merged, they slowed to a more manageable pace. So much for the value of prioritizing—or is it? Can we live fruitful lives without having core value priorities? When a person has strong core values, those priorities serve in an analogous way as instincts serve a falling cat that ends up on his feet.

Priorities reveal the true character and core values of a person. They speak far louder than words or deeds. If our daily choices, which are products of our priorities, revolve around our desire for pleasure (just to have fun), things (possessions), or pride (need to be number one and control others), James 4:1-10 explains our priorities are self-centered. This will lead us to experience conflict wherever we go. On the other hand, if our daily choices revolve around seeking to live under God’s authority and allow Him to control every part of our daily life, we will experience closeness to God. Let the peace of Christ rule [be umpire] in your heart (Col. 3:15).

To be clear; while most people live totally for themselves, few live totally under God’s authority. A Christian’s spiritual journey consists of progressive shifting from being mostly self-centered to living mostly under God’s authority. The more we depend on the Holy Spirit’s leading and empowerment, the faster we are transformed into spiritual maturity. When we pause and look back over the last 6 months or year, we can see how we have matured or become more like Jesus. We can get a decent glimpse of my progress after having endured stressful crashing waves of mental and emotional disorientation. If I am still pressing hard at becoming spiritually mature or being like Jesus, I can rejoice in the God of my salvation. If not, I must be a person of integrity and seriously seek His guidance on what life adjustments will position me to better ‘land on my feet’ when encountering my next trial.

I recommend you proactively consider this. If a court investigator examined your daily choices over the last 3 months, what verdict do you suspect he might determine are your working life priorities? Do you believe they would represent what you want them to be, or do you have a sense of what you need to do to better prepare yourself before that next wave hits you? If you have become aware of something that needs to change, GREAT because that revelation from God indicates He is ready and willing to guide and empower you to make those changes. Considering these thoughts again makes me pause once more to think about the choices I will be making regarding how I use my time, how deeply I value experiencing God’s presence, and how clearly my choices in life reflect Jesus to those around me.

I feel irritated when a store advertises a significant discount to entice you to come into the store. When you arrive, the salesclerk says the product is either out of stock or there are other stipulations that must be met before the discount will be applied. This sales technique is often called false advertising or bait and switch. The taste it leaves in my mouth is not desirable. I do not want to do business with them because I cannot trust anything they may do.

I highly suspect some pray to receive God’s wonderful free gift of grace consisting of eternal life. However, after they have been coming to church for a time, they are virtually given a list of things they must do in order to live a Christian lifestyle. Consequently, they begin trying to live up to those qualifications. Over time they become weary of trying because when they take one step forward, they end up falling back one or even two steps. Eventually, they come to believe it is impossible to live as they were told and succumb to talking the acceptable talk but not walking the walk as they have seen so many others do.

The problem is two-fold. In the first place, trying harder to be a Christ-follower feeds our sin nature. We soon learn nothing is free in life. You only get what you pay for. And working for something makes a person at least feel like they are earning a good relationship with God. Second, few in the church world ever grasp the truth that salvation or heaven is NOT about earning anything, nor is it about feeling obligated to do so in order to get to the good place after you die. The problem with this self-discipline or willpower Christianity is that it puts you back into the center of the equation. If you are able to succeed in checking off a few things on the list of accomplishments that qualify you to receive God’s extraordinary gifts, you pat yourself on the back. You become proud of these accomplishments which lead you to look down on those who continue to fail in their efforts to be holy. Furthermore, if you slip up on what you thought you had accomplished, you berate yourself. When that happens, you are prone to put on a mask of righteousness and go deeper into living a hypocritical life. No wonder so many in the church wear masks!

Biblical reality on God’s grace is this. Grace can only be received, it can never be earned, no matter how much effort is put into it. Beating yourself with the proverbial whip to try to make the flesh be holy can NOT help you. It only hurts you. Grace is given when a person acknowledges their utter helplessness and humbly asks the Spirit to flow His life through them. Like a fruit tree, the fruit of righteousness naturally grows. Paul refers to it in Galatians 5:22-23. It is possible to manipulate or otherwise coerce a person into right behavior or right doctrine. However, unless the heart humbly recognizes its desperate need of God’s powerful grace from salvation to physical death, no authentically righteous fruit can grow out of it.

God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it. Ephesians 2:8-9 (NLT2)  So it is God who decides to show mercy. We can neither choose it nor work for it. Romans 9:16 (NLT2) You will recognize them (authentic Christ-follower/prophets) by their fruits: they do not gather grapes from thorn bushes or figs from thistles, do they? Matthew 7:16 LEB

Are you a person who others might say you have ice in your veins? What might that statement mean? Could it mean you do not deeply care for someone, or could it mean you are emotionally detached from your environment, including those around you? I know individuals who seem to thrive on drama or some sort of crisis. They get in such a frenzy it works others around them to go into a crisis mode. If life around them is too smooth, they dramatize a small thing to the point they make it sound like a crisis. I also know individuals who rarely get emotionally charged. To be sure, I much prefer having a medical person, like a doctor, to have a benevolent emotional detachment with my predicament when they must do surgery on me.

As I write this, Russia has invaded Ukraine. No doubt about it, it is a very painful crisis, especially for the Ukrainians. It has the attention of a substantial portion of our world. Russia has occupied the largest atomic energy plant in the world. I understand it provides electricity to a large part of Europe. For that reason, there is talk that Putin is planting bombs around it to use its potential destruction to blackmail the European nations. That is extremely serious! So how are we to respond in such a case? Do we get all emotional and attempt to carry the weight of the world in the palm of our hand? Or do we take a more benevolent detachment approach by looking at the bigger picture?

Humans are not designed to carry the weight of the world in the palm of their hands. Jesus said, that is why I tell you not to worry about everyday life—whether you have enough food and drink, or enough clothes to wear. Isn’t life more than food, and your body more than clothing? Look at the birds. They don’t plant or harvest or store food in barns, for your heavenly Father feeds them. And aren’t you far more valuable to him than they are? Can all your worries add a single moment to your life? “And why worry about your clothing? Look at the lilies of the field and how they grow. They don’t work or make their clothing, yet Solomon, in all his glory, was not dressed as beautifully as they are. And if God cares so wonderfully for wildflowers that are here today and thrown into the fire tomorrow, he will certainly care for you. Why do you have so little faith? So, don’t worry about these things, saying, ‘What will we eat? What will we drink? What will we wear?’ These things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers, but your heavenly Father already knows all your needs. Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need. So don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today’s trouble is enough for today. Matthew 6:25-34 (NLT2) Jesus said this in the context of worrying about financial provisions but the foundational truth behind it is far broader than our worries about money! Paul wrote, do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. Philippians 4:6 (NIV).

At first, this approach sounds like a cop-out. We cannot just crawl in a hole. It does not seem right to pretend like nothing is happening on the other side of the world or even on the other side of our state. What do we do? Jesus was not paralyzed by the pain of everyone around Him, even though He saw the pain firsthand. He went on doing all His Father had called Him to do and speak. Was He criticized in doing so? Yes, but He responded by essentially saying, “This too is in My Father’s hands.”

Father, teach us to show your love to those around us. But help us to not take upon ourselves more than just the work you have called and entrusted us to do.

Having retired from occupational ministry, looking back, I have so much for which I am extremely grateful to God. Despite my resistance in each stage of my ministry, God was patient with that resistance and remained with me while I finally surrendered my desire to His desire for my life. What He did through me, despite my foolishness, has been almost unbelievable. I feel dumbfounded and yet so privileged that at each stage, He exerted His faith, wisdom, power and truth through me in such a way His kingdom marched forward while I tried to fulfill my assigned position. There is no question in my mind that I did not accomplish what happened by my own strength. I was only a pawn in the hands of God. What a blessing it was to have been a small part of what He purposed to do. I suspect Jesus’ disciples experienced similar feelings as they passed out the loaves and fishes or participated in other God orchestrated deeds.

Nevertheless, I do have a few regrets. There were times I engaged in a few ministry activities I thought Christ would want me to do, but He did not necessarily instruct me to do. There is a fine line between doing what we think He would want us to do and doing what He prompts us to do. When we do what we think God wants us to do, when He has not told us to do it, we use our own strength to accomplish it, which puts our body, mind and emotions under unnecessary stress. When that happened, we presumptuously blame our stress on our ministry or serving.

We are not sure what prompted Judas to betray Jesus. His subsequent suicide may offer a clue as to why he had made that serious mistake that he interpreted to be irreversible. Judas would have been aware Mary had manipulated circumstances that would compel Jesus into turning water into wine. This is what launched Him into ministry. Despite the fact Jesus had repeatedly taught otherwise, all the disciples had the belief Jesus would set up an earthly kingdom. (Acts 1:6) So could it have been Judas thought he too needed to do something similar to what Mary had done and manipulate circumstances so Jesus would be pushed into taking His ministry to the next stage of ruling as King on this earth?

For reasons we can only speculate on, 1 Samuel 15 records how King Saul altered God’s command through Samuel to utterly destroy all the Amalekites had. For some reason, Saul got the idea of offering a praise sacrifice to God was what He wanted him to do. Therefore, Saul saved the best of sheep and oxen to offer as this great sacrifice to God. That is not all that much different from what Judas did. Saul, too, paid dearly for that presumptive act of disobedience. It is still a mystery to me why some who act presumptuously receive greater negative consequences than others who only put unnecessary stress on themselves. But that is part of God’s ways we will not understand until we enter Heaven.

As you consider your life, could it be you may have presumptively acted on what you only imagined God might want you to do? Such a presumption may amount to taking a mission trip, contributing money, protecting someone, or feeling guilty about something without God’s prompting. Your presumptive act may have hindered God from using the related pain to teach or train someone a critical life lesson?

Only by more diligently maintaining a close relationship with Christ can we avoid this mistake. When we are close to Him daily, we can more easily discern His desires for us and avoid the regrets of following our own way.

The word success is relative and needs to be defined or qualified. It can be correctly defined scores of ways. Have you ever articulated, verbally or in writing, your personal definition of success? A surgeon would call a life-threatening surgery a success if the person lived a healthy life after the surgery. A farmer or rancher would call a season a success if the crops planted became fruitful or animals raised produced healthy offspring. A businessperson (certainly including a farmer or rancher) would consider it a success if the price of their product exceeded their production costs. A student would call it a success if he or she graduated with grades that prepared them well for the future.

If you have not written out a definition of success, why don’t you do so before reading the rest of this blog? Why? Doing so forces you to drill down to what you value the most in life. Your definition reveals your core value system and your integrity—how all you consist of works as one fine-tuned machine. There is nothing wrong with success in itself. You can ask God for it and enjoy it. However, if success becomes one’s obsession or compulsion, you have allowed it to become a rival to God Almighty. Anything that competes with Him results in self-destruction sooner or later. The most abundant life is living out how God designed one to live. Anything that falls short of God’s design only causes disruption and some form of dysfunction, be it personal or social. There is no system or governmental structure that is sustainably fruitful other than living out the ways and values taught in His Word.

This is especially clear when you write out your definition of what comprises a successful life for you. I can define this type of success in diverse ways. But all definitions can be reduced to two fundamental ways. One of them relates to our world, which are outward elements that relate to how we feel about ourselves. This form of success is temporarily satisfying or leaves the compulsion for something more, thus short sighted. The other form of success focuses on one’s love relationship with God. It is noteworthy that at the end of life, instead of drawing worth from titles, achievements or financial status, Jesus and the apostle Paul’s success related to their worth in Father God’s value system. Jesus said I have brought you glory on earth by completing the work you gave me to do (John 17:4, NIV). Notice Paul did not write I have won my race but wrote I have done my best in the race, I have run the full distance, and I have kept the faith (2 Timothy 4:7, GNB). He said nothing about what others thought about Him.

There is nothing wrong with titles, wealth, acclaimed position or such things. However, when compared to leaving an honorable legacy, such accolades quickly fade into the shadows. Has the life you’ve lived so far left you still wanting something more or has it left you with a healthy sense of well-being, deeply felt contentment, peace and hope for the future? What statement in your definition of success, do you need to reassess in order to better reflect God’s definition of success? Jesus said, the thief comes only in order to steal, kill, and destroy. I have come in order that you might have life—life in all its fullness (John 10:10, GNB).

Why don’t many of our dreams become reality? I’m sure some don’t because they were nothing more than unreasonable fantasies. When I was a child, I remember fantasizing about being a cowboy, as I wore my cowboy boots and rode my stick horse. It was fun to imagine, anyway. Some dreams don’t materialize simply because they are not meant to do so. Others are meant to be, but not in our imagined timetable. I had dreams of being an accountant, businessman, counselor—but vowed I would never be a clergyman! I grew up in a pastor’s home and did not want my family to endure what I had experienced. As it turned out, I loved God enough to allow Him to reshape my heart (through lots of tears and time), as we may use stakes and wire to reshape a young, misaligned tree. Through it all, I lived out a form of all I had dreamed by becoming the pastor I vowed I would never be! Other dreams are meant to be, but we do not take the initiative to strategize how to make it happen, then taking the steps to fulfill that dream.

One paradox of the Christian life is how God gives us gifts but then requires us to take the initiative to sacrifice some of our current comforts to step out and grow into actualizing God’s gift. God told the early Hebrews (Nu. 13:2) He would give them (Nu. 13:2) what the Bible called Canaan, or the Promised Land. He even brought them to the border of the Promised Land so they could see it. While they spied out the land and found it indeed was the land of plenty, they became spooked when they discovered giants living in that land. At that point, they were like a young tree that you try to reshape it to grow upright, but they were too stubborn to bend and trust God to give it to them. Consequently, their fear of the dreadful things that might happen and their stubborn hearts meant they would have to wander in the desert wilderness until all that generation died except two families, those of Joshua and Caleb. By backing away from the details, can you see God gave them their gift, but they never realized with the gift came battles against giants and fortified cities? God’s gift often requires us to take the initiative to fight while fully trusting God to empower us to be stronger than our giants.

As it turned out, the next generation took the initiative to fight while trusting God to go before them. God indeed brought down the walls of cities, gave them strategies to defeat their enemies and empower them to do what they feared could not be done. I want to point out, though, they still had to exhaust themselves with the labor of fighting to possess the gift God had promised them.

God has given you dreams to be fulfilled as you depend fully upon His power working in you. Paul reports how that was exactly what He had to do. He wrote for this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me (Colossians 1:29, ESV). The words toil and struggle in the original Greek language referred to working as an Olympian exhausting himself to win the event, but while trusting in God’s power working in and through him. Please understand, coming to actualizing God’s gift to you is not for the faint of heart! He will do His part but also insists on you having serious personal stakes in the process.

It would be wonderful if, when we received salvation, God dropped into our mind the complete knowledge of God and instilled in us a delight in spending hours in prayer, reflection on His Word and a desire to share our faith. Instead, He gives us a free will to work out our salvation and the dream He has put into our heart. (Phil. 2:12b) Are you taking the required initiative to be all God has designed for you to be—and you also dream to be?

Have you purchased an item you dreamed of owning only to later discover it could not do what you imagined it would do? I have invested money only to find out later it was not as great as expected. How did that make you feel?… angry or sick? I was SICK!!

I fear some have prayed a ‘repentance prayer’ falsely assuming salvation is comprised of mentally accepting Jesus lived, died, and rose again. Without intrinsic sorrow, they express no heart-felt love for God, nor a desire to read the Bible to discover more about Him. Life would then proceed as usual. It is strange how we can understand putting a quarter into a pop machine does not result in getting a 20oz, Mountain Dew. Yet we fail to understand why checking off a shortlist of religious activities does not result in what is far more valuable than a 20oz, Mountain Dew. Regardless, the misguided individuals will eventually discover their assumption of salvation was severely misguided and be angry or very sick.

In the ancient near-east, treaties were made between nations. One such was a suzerain-vassal treaty composed of a stronger state (suzerain) entering into a kinsman-type treaty with a weaker country (vassal). The suzerain would provide family protections, provisions, and guidance, as well as to allow their vassal sovereignty to control their internal and foreign affairs. In return, the vassal provided consummate loyalty. Since a human is incapable of serving two masters, for a vassal to take more than one suzerain would be tantamount to treason.

We read in Exodus 20, especially in Deuteronomy 5, of God making such a covenant with the Hebrews. Those passages begin with, “I am the LORD your God, who rescued you from the land of Egypt, the place of your slavery Exodus 20:2, NLT2). The next verse reads of the vassal side, “You must not have any other god but me. Exodus 20:3, NLT2). We also read of all God would provide for them, much of which He had already been providing, and what having no other god but Him looked like. While at first appearance it looks like a legal arrangement, if probed more deeply, you discover God was entering a loving kinship type relationship with them. In this relationship, God insisted they love and worship Him with all their hearts. If they would do this, they would live a long, blessed life—but a cursed life if they broke this loving relationship.

Jesus often referred to that relational bond. Most precisely, He said the greatest commandment was not in how they did or did not behave but rather the kinship relationship factor. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength (Mark 12:30, ESV). It is noteworthy that when Christ later addressed the church in Ephesus in Revelation 2:4 (ESV), He commended their behavior but when on to say, I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love [close kinship] you had at first.He followed that by pointing out the profound consequences for breaking that side of the covenant.  

Since a love-attachment bond is so essential to salvation, how can we awaken misguided ones to the fact God’s merciful provisions flow only out of intimate relationship and not out of rhetoric or empty ritual? The Bible repeatedly stresses how God insists on our pure love for Him, not just impersonally following a list of rules. Overlooking that vital element will cause deep frustration, anger, or sadness when they finally realize their life had been lived based on misguided assumptions, not truth? Is it possible for you to lovingly reach out to those in your sphere of influence? Could you offer thought-provoking questions that might awaken them to the fact eternal life is based on close relationship, not impersonal religion or tradition? I am sure you want the best for them too.

When I look at a baby, I tend to talk baby-talk. When I speak with a hearing-impaired person, I talk louder. I try to adapt to the occasion. Communication is most effective when both parties understand how each other thinks and adapt their words and concepts to the other person’s level of understanding. An inability to adapt will handicap your ability to communicate effectively. So we try to adapt to the situation.

Why is it easier to adapt when you are in virtual control of the circumstances, in contrast to trying to adapt when you have no control over what is happening? When you have good health, it is easy to adapt to being with a sick person, but it is hard to adapt if you are the one sick. Why? Because of your minimal control over how the illness, be it physical, mental or emotional, will affect your mind, body, or what your future holds. Control becomes the pivotal issue.

I have watched those gifted with strong leadership skills and serving as such all their life, unable to adjust well to retirement or otherwise lose their leadership role. I was concerned about how I would adjust to retirement after serving in leadership roles for over 50 years. From all I had observed, I knew it might be possible that I would drive my wife crazy! The same is true in the role affluence plays in one’s life. Those experiencing these transitions are prone to make very unhealthy choices in what they say, do, or how they think. They are miserable themselves, so make others miserable as well. It brings to the surface just how much of a role control plays in our mental, emotional, and spiritual health.      

Imagine Jesus leaving Heaven, becoming a very vulnerable baby who had to have everything done for Him. Then, living as a servant leader and being crucified. He had to be emotional and spiritual maturity to do that. Paul revealed his level of maturity when he wrote… for I have learned how to be content with whatever I have. I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little Philippians 4:11-12 (NLT2). The Bible character Joseph is a classic picture of a person with strong leadership skills having had to adjust to being a slave or servant. What a superb model for us.

The temptations of a person in control differ from a person who has never been in control of much. It makes me wonder if the Holy Spirit does not position us in various roles in life just to teach us how to manage our attitude towards controlling and submitting. These tests or schools where we learn to be Christlike could happen in marriages, work, assignments in life, or such things. The story of Jacob, whose name meant supplanter or what we might think of as a manipulator. That type of character was clear in his lifestyle—until he met the angel of the Lord (Gen. 32). After first wrestling all night, the angel wrenched his hip out of its socket, then changed his name to Israel. Jacob’s life was forever changed, having to learn to live physically handicapped. God used this handicap to deliver Jacob from his life of controlling others.

Life has been much more satisfying, as I have adapted to retirement and growing older. We also experience the most fruitful life when we adapt to God being our king instead of trying to be lord over others or our situations. Might you need to have a wrestling match as Jacob experienced to live the best life possible?

Is your God so awesome that He does things you cannot comprehend? It is easy to understand God as being big enough to do anything we may want Him to do. But is it just as easy to understand when He does remarkable things we cannot comprehend? It is hard to understand when He chooses to allow things to happen to us that bring pain or work against what we were hoping would happen.

James, Jesus’ brother’s words, are fascinating. Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. James 1:2-3 (NIV). I first need to point out that the original Greek word translated face here is also translated fall or unexpectedly encounter trials/problems, not of your own making. They fell into them, which means God had allowed them because He protects His children. The second important word here is because. That gives us a clue as to why God allowed us to fall into it. The verse tells us it is to develop perseverance, a quality that separates the men from the boys. This happened to Job who also wrote, God thunders wondrously with his voice; he does great things that we cannot comprehend. Job 37:5 (ESV). God’s plan for the wealthy Job was about enduring the worst losses any human could experience with the right attitude. The reward for his perseverance was foremost an incredible knowledge of God, with the tangible reward of twice what he possessed when his trial started. There is no indication that God ever explained to Job the reasons for all his terrible sufferings.

Jacob wrestled all night with a stranger (Ge 32:30-31). Because of what happened to Jacob, it is thought the stranger was Christ in the fleshly form before He came to earth as a baby. Whoever he was, after the night of wrestling ended, this stranger touched Jacob’s thigh, and from that time onward, Jacob walked with a limp—but he also was given the name prince. It forever changed his life for the good. We normally do not think of a handicap of a limp as something great. On the other hand, here is a case when God inflicted pain as surely as He heals a body or raises the dead. Jacob never complained about his malady, nor did Job complain of all he endured. Both interpreted what they lived with was an invaluable gift of grace from God.

Is your God big enough to bring you awe-inspiring good through doing things you do not understand, even painful things?

God wants me to trust Him, even when I am incapable of understanding what or why He is allowing this strange event in my life. Too often I look upon God as the mender of broken hearts and the binder-up of our wounds. He does this, thank God. But He also breaks hearts and causes wounds. But He never bruises a person He does not also bless because of how the person responds to Him. The only time a person walks away sorrowfully is when that person chooses to walk away from what Christ offers because the person loves his current life more.

I must ask myself; do I limp because of my thigh? Christ is not ashamed, nor does He feel slighted for the scars He bore for me or you. The wounds of the Christian are God’s applause for a life well-lived. Can you look beyond what you do not comprehend and trust, an awe-inspiring God and His impeccable love for you?