Not All is Lost

"For,lo, I bring evil on the city which is called by my name, and should ye be utterly unpunished? Ye shall not be unpunished: for I will call for a sword upon all the inhabitants of the earth, saith the Lord of hosts." ~Jeremiah 25:29

"If so be they will hearken, and turn every man from his evil way, that I may repent me of the evil, which I purpose to do unto them because of the evil of their doings." ~Jeremiah 26:3

People are always asking why God lets bad things happen to "good" people.  For Christians, it can be a time of growth and learning as they reap from their past.  For those who do not have a relationship with God, it's usually them reaping from their past, but they aren't able to have the same kind of outlook and relationship to it.

Those in trials, both with a relationship with God and without, will react in one of two different ways.  They will either turn their backs on God and lean on the power of men, or they will turn to God and hand this trial they are going through over to Him.  Christians aren't perfect, plain and simple.  Sometimes our natural reaction will overpower us at first and we will try to fix a situation using our own willpower, with which we will inevitably fail.  Only when we fail will we remember that God is there, and always has been there.  He's the loving parent that watches us struggle, waiting for us to ask for His help.  However, when we start into a trial and turn to Him first, oh the peace and joy we will find in His will.

When bad things happen, sometimes it's because of us breaking the Law, God's law.  He doesn't punish just those who have no relationship with Him, but punishes His children as well. In Jeremiah 25:29, He says that there will be a sword upon ALL the inhabitants of the earth and that the city called by His name was not left out.  If we will call upon His name and repent of our sins, however, we will begin to have a desire to be in His will.  Within His will, we have no desire to break the Law, but instead have a desire to please and fellowship with Him.  With breaking the Law no more comes a lack of a need for punishment.

Will we turn from our sin filled life and move towards God, or will we continue to wallow in our sin until the judgment day?  The choice is yours dear friend.

My Strength is in the Lord

"For I heard the defaming of many, fear on every side. Report, say they, and we will report it. All my familiars watched for my halting, saying, Peradventure he will be enticed, and we shall prevail against him, and we shall take our revenge on him.

But the Lord is with me as a mighty terrible one: therefore my persecutors shall stumble, and they shall not prevail: they shall be greatly ashamed; for they shall not prosper: their everlasting confusion shall never be forgotten." ~Jer. 20:10-11

When the world is against us, God is for us. I've never been one to easily witness to others face to face. Writing something on the Internet is one thing, but asking someone where they are going when they die and they're standing there in front of you, that's just a TAD bit harder...okay, a lot. That thought while going up to someone's door, "What if they shut the door in my face?" You know what? Been there, done that, it's really not as bad as I thought. Why? Because I was obeying God. When we obey, it's out of our hands and in the hands of our Heavenly Father.

I recently went on a missions trip with my church to help an outreach in Washington and it opened this new door of understanding up to me. While I met new people who were a blessing beyond measure because of their faithfulness to serving God, I also met people whose souls were truly lost and began to completely trust and understand God and His power more and more. God doesn't ask us to save people, he asks us to push against the doors of others' hearts with His Word and Truth. We may never see someone saved at their door or wherever we may end up talking to them, but God says that His word will not return void. He may ask us to push a rock, and we should push with all our might. The rock may not move, but He never asked us to move the rock, just push obediently so that we may become stronger and He can be glorified for the work that is done (an illustration borrowed from a Pastor in Oregon).

People will watch us, waiting for us to give up and fail. If we work in our flesh, we will easily fall. But with God, everything is possible to those who are within His will. He will strengthen us and guide us. And when the blessings come, they will always come in such a way that He alone can receive the glory for what has happened.

"Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.

In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths." ~Prov. 3:5-6

Following Your Heart?

"The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?
I the Lord search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings."     ~Jerimiah 17:9-10

"Follow your heart," says the world, but how many times have we done that and had it end well?  I can honestly say, it doesn't.  Following the heart leads to pain and wickedness down a path that seems bright at first, but just as the Alaskan Summer, the brightness comes to an end and it simply gets colder and darker until finally we are so deep in the trenches of darkness that there's only a glimmer of light here and there.  We get so caught up in the here and now that we don't always focus on the future.  Our eyes get caught by the glitz and glam that we see in the world that we forget the beauty in what is above our heads.

"The heart is deceitful above all things," and it will do it's best to keep our focus off of God, but thankfully there is a light that cannot be hid by the darkness.  The light that pierces the darkness of our hearts and exposes our ways.  This Light is our Savior Jesus Christ and though He knows everything we ever have and ever will do, He still loves us.  He wants us to walk in the light with Him and share His hopes and dreams for our lives.  He doesn't want us to blindly follow those before us in the darkness, but to walk on the true path to life everlasting with Him.

We will always reap what we have sown, but we don't have to go through it alone.  God loves us so much that, even though He knew how sinful we would be, He sent his ONLY begotten Son to die upon the cross for our disobedience to His law.  This gift was given freely so that we can walk with Him forever.  It is up to us to accept this gift humbly, knowing that there is nothing we can do as humans to earn our way into Heaven.  No good works will get us there as our works can never justify the rules we have broken.

If we never accept this gift, we will be eternally separated from God in a place that is forever burning, yet no one dies.  Where will you stand when you die?  In heaven with God or in Hell, separated from God for all eternity?