Category: Peace

Time to Exercise

Posted on by Dorci

Years ago we were going through something and my husband was talking to his mom about it.  Her response to him was, “Well, isn’t that what your faith is for?”  And of course she was exactly right. 

There are times when trials come and our faith has the opportunity to be exercised.

Not long before Jesus was going to leave His friends and this world, He told them, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” (John 14:27)

He knew their lives would not be easy. Their world would be filled with suffering and danger and persecution and they could be tempted to fall back into their human emotions of fear and anxiety. 

Of course we’re no different today.

Emotions can be contagious, and if we’re not careful we can get caught up in the world’s anxiety.

But Paul reminded us to “…not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which passes all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”  (Phil 4:6-7)

The word “peace” that Paul talks about is the same word Jesus used when He told His friends He was leaving them His peace. It means one, quietness, rest, set at one again,” and comes from a verb (an action word!) meaning to join.

As we join our hearts, spirits, and minds to the Lord in prayer, He will quiet our souls and give us rest. He will fill us with not just any peace, but His peace.

Jesus said His peace would be different than the world’s. The world can only have peace (maybe) when there is no trial, no suffering, when everything in life seems good.

But Jesus’ peace isn’t dependent on outward circumstances; it comes from within. Just as Jesus promised to send His friends the Comforter, He has filled us with His Holy Spirit so we can live in His peace no matter what’s going on, even if our flesh and the world wonders why we aren’t panicked.  We are gifted with His Spirit and can have His peace even when it makes no sense at all. 

We don’t have to be anxious.  As we take everything that concerns us to our loving and compassionate Heavenly Father, He will exchange our anxiety for His peace.

And as we’re filled with His peace, the light of Christ shines through us, and nowhere does the light of Christ shine more than in the darkness. 

While the world panics, we can pray to the One who knows all things and controls all things.  We can stop, pray, let the Lord quiet our souls from within, and be a beacon of Christ’s love and peace in the midst of trials and in the face of the unknown. 

And who knows just how many might see Christ shining through us, and ask us why we have such peace.

Who knows what God may do in answer to years of prayers for revival, as we determine to live with the peace of God in our hearts and our lives. 

I think about Jesus’ friends and all they went through all the way up to their deaths as they proclaimed Christ, spreading the gospel throughout the world, and I wonder how many times His words filled their hearts and minds and comforted them. We are their brothers and sisters when we do the same.

Take it from 6-year-old Cameron Brundidge:  

“But God did not give me a spirit of fear, but power, love, and a sound mind.” (2 Timothy 1:7)

Amen, sweetie.

 

Oh Almighty God, Heavenly Father, Lord Jesus, Holy Spirit, we come to you and ask that you fill us with your peace that surpasses all understanding. Help us walk in the Spirit and not in our flesh.  Help us think about things that are true, and noble, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable, and excellent, and praiseworthy…  Keep reminding us to pray for one another, and to pray that the world will take notice of the love and peace we have, and remember that we are also people who have put our faith in you, and we pray you would draw people to you through our faith.  Help us to be a light right now, Lord. We pray you would give us the words to tell anyone who asks about the reason for our hope.  May you pour out your Spirit on all people, and bring revival to our weary world.  In Jesus’ holy and precious name, amen.

Sunday Praise and a Prayer to Keep Pressing In

Posted on by Dorci

Heavenly Father, we praise you.  We praise you for who you are and for all you do. 

Father, we need you desperately, and yet there are times when we press into you more, pray more, read more, that we then begin to feel attacks from the enemy. But you are with us, Lord.

Please give us focus and wisdom to “be alert and of sober mind. [Our] enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.” Give us strength to “resist him, standing firm in the faith, because [we] know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of sufferings.” (1 Peter 5:8-9)

We lift up our fellow believers all over the world who are facing severe persecution. Please, Holy Spirit, we ask that your presence would fill jail cells and other places where believers have fled, that you would fill them with your peace that passes all understanding when they are tortured, when they are hated, and rejected. We pray you would lift them up and encourage their spirits because the joy of the Lord is their strength. And remind them that their very great reward is with you. 

Help us stay focused, Lord. No matter how the enemy tries to throw us off course, discourage us, make us feel unloved, unneeded, and unwanted, remind us Who has called us. Remind us Who loves us, Who died for us, and Who gives us purpose every single day.

Remind us that when we feel the enemy’s breath, he’s there because we have become a threat to him, because through our prayers You, the Almighty God, moves mountains, changes hearts, and pulls souls back from the brink of hell.

Encourage us to keep pressing in, to keep praying, to keep reading, no matter what, and even more as the day grows nearer to your return.

Like Isaiah, we say “Because the Sovereign Lord helps me, I will not be disgraced. Therefore have I set my face like flint, and I know I will not be put to shame. He who vindicates me is near.” Isaiah 50:7-8a

We pray it all in the mighty, precious, holy name of Jesus, amen.

 

Are We Really Living a Christian Life?

Posted on by Dorci

I am so blessed to be able to sit in church on Sunday and worship the Lord with some beautifully composed music and be fed by pastors who love the Lord greatly and study hard to bring us Bible-based sound teaching. During the week there’s a Bible study and home groups. My social media page is full of pastors and messages that remind me about God’s truths. I have at least 15 Bibles in several translations, and more faith-based books than I will probably ever be able to finish.  On the internet I have access to teachings from some of the most gifted pastors and teachers from all over the world, countless commentaries, uplifting Christian music…

And I wonder how many other people are doing the very same thing Sunday after Sunday, week after week.

We are deluged with messages from and for believers of every type, for every situation, every level of faith, and every age.

So why does the church, at least here in America, seem more anemic and ineffective than ever?

Why do we live our lives largely indistinguishable from the world?

Why do we get up in the morning and still feel like we’re being sucked under the trials of life, wondering where the joy is we’re supposed to be experiencing? Why we’re not feeling like an overcomer? Why we aren’t living that life Jesus talked about when He said:

“The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy.
I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly”
(John 10:10)

That question has a lot of answers, but I want to tackle just one right now.  Could it be the thief is still working hard to steal, kill, and destroy as much of that abundant life as he can, and maybe he’s using busyness, even “Christian” busyness, to do it?

Could it be that we have so much all around us that we are kidding ourselves into thinking we’re living a Christian life that would lead to abundance without really living it?

Maybe all the doing – sitting in a seat on Sundays, singing along, having a Bible (and maybe even opening up from time to time), maybe listening to a Christian song every now and then or even reading a faith-based book, is causing us to think we’re accomplishing something.

But maybe all it’s become, if done in the flesh, in our own strength, is nothing more than a rote religion, or just another sort of self-help.

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control…”
(Galatians 5:22)

Jesus came to give us life, and when He went back to the Father He gave us His Holy Spirit to bring about the abundant life we desire and Christ died to give us.

All those things – the teachings, the worship (the music is not a warm-up concert for the pastor!), the studies, the reading, are all meant to draw us closer to Jesus as we walk through them with the Holy Spirit. He is the power in our lives. He will bring about the abundant life we all so desperately want.

We’re on a journey with Him to know God and love Him more, to grow in faith, not to just put in our time on Sunday morning. Walking with Him is not just part of our life, it IS our life.

God desires to do so much in our hearts, our minds, and in and through our lives, and He wants us to partner with Him – to seek Him, to know Him, to love Him – as we do those things.

Do we pray before going to church, asking and fully expecting to hear from God, to receive from Him what He wants to say to us? Do we use the time we sing together to truly worship the Lord, to enter into the throne room of God and praise and exalt Him and let Him prepare our hearts for His message? Do we pray for our pastors during the week, that He will speak to them as they prepare the teaching, and that He will speak through them on Sunday morning? Do we pray before reading God’s Word or other books, or before listening to teachings online?

Do we pray without ceasing, inviting the Holy Spirit to speak to us and change us through those things?

Are we, the branches, clinging to the Vine, allowing Him to use all those things as nourishment for our souls, bringing its fruit in His time?

What all those things are meant to do, what they should do, is draw us closer to Jesus, reminding us of His love and grace and mercy so that we will continue reaching out to Him, reading and studying His Word and praying, inviting Him into every aspect of our lives. Inviting Him to leave no sin-stone unturned in the sanctifying of our souls. Inviting Him into every bit of suffering, every attitude, every decision, every joy.

Oh Church, we must leave the dead religion behind and get back to a living, breathing relationship with the One who died to bring us abundant life – to mold us into His image, to bring about the godly treasures we could never find in the world if we looked forever, and to be a light to the world.

Can you imagine if we invited the power of God into our lives every single day? If we let the Holy Spirit continually have His way in and through us?

If He changed the world with 12 men, what could He do with a nation full of Spirit-filled, God-fearing, mercy-loving believers?

“Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.”
(Ephesians 3:20-21)

.

Heavenly Father, thank you for not only giving us your Holy Spirit to be with us, but to indwell us.  He is an amazing gift and we are so grateful. Help us to always walk in the Spirit, to breathe and live and grow and speak in the Spirit. Help us to cling to you through Him so that He might produce the fruit and gifts in our hearts and lives that you desire so that we, as your church, your kingdom, can be effective witnesses and bright lights to the world around us that’s so dark and seems to get darker every day. Help us to have wisdom and discernment to know how to live in this world, but not to be of it.  Help us to glorify and magnify the name of Jesus.  It’s in His precious name we pray, amen. 

Clotheslining satan

Posted on by Dorci

Ah, the enemy.  he may be stupid, but he’s relentless.

I’ve found one of the most dangerous times for a believer is right after God gives us a victory.  He brings us through a hard fought battle and we might be tempted to celebrate, sit down, and relax.  But satan knows that, and he’s not about to let us off the hook that easy. he’ll try coming at us again and again.

Maybe God’s given us the ability to forgive someone.  The next day, and the next and the next, the enemy will try dragging us back into the mess and remind us of the way that person hurt us, filling our minds with things like “shouldn’t you have the right to be angry…”

Maybe God’s filled us with a godly contentment with our circumstances…“but you could’ve been doing that…”

And so it goes.

God reminds us though, that we can choose what to think, and that in Christ we have the power to “…take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” 2 Corinthians 10:5b

I call it clotheslining satan.

 

 

 

 

“shouldn’t you have the right to be angry…” 

I stick out my arm (figuratively, of course), and in my head (or maybe out loud if nobody’s around) I immediately yell “NOPE!”  Clotheslined.  Stopped.

“but you could’ve been doing that…”  “NOPE!”

“but what about what that person…”  “NOPE!”

“but…”  “NOPE!”

I don’t entertain the thought.  I simply say no to his lies and stop the enemy right in his tracks.

I’ve taken my thought captive and made it obedient to Christ – to His victory for me, to His love for me, to His grace and mercy toward me, to walking in the abundant life He’s given me.

I don’t have to allow myself to be pulled back into the pit, back into unforgiveness, back into anger, back into discontentment… I can keep walking in the Spirit and remember that “if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed” John 8:36

 

“Heavenly Father, thank you for the victorious life you’ve given us through your Son, Jesus.  Thank you for giving us a sound mind and for equipping us with the tools to fight the enemy. And thank you for your joy, and for humor.  We praise you, and we pray it all in the name of Jesus Christ, our Victor, amen.”

 

Sunday Praise and a Prayer for Healing

Posted on by Dorci

“Praise the LORD, my soul;
all my inmost being, praise His holy name.
Praise the LORD, my soul,
and forget not all His benefits –
who forgives all your sins
and heals all your diseases,
who redeems your life from the pit
and crowns you with love and compassion,
who satisfies your desires with good things
so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.”
Psalm 103:1-5

Dear Heavenly Father, we praise you.  I come to you today and lift up to you so many us who are suffering with severe and prolonged physical illness.  Lord, it’s so easy to lose focus of you when we or a loved one is suffering and there seems to be no end. The day to day pull to focus on the pain, the illness, the medications, whatever it may be, can be overwhelming and exhausting. 

Lord, we need your strength.  We need your presence to overwhelm us and turn our eyes back to you, to gaze on your beauty, your grace and mercy, your compassion which never ends. Help us remember that our suffering is in your hands, and through it we can identify with Christ’s suffering, with His death and resurrection, for we have died to sin and you’ve made us alive in Him to the spiritual things which are infinitely of more worth. 

We ask for your peace that surpasses all human understanding, for your wisdom to lead us every day, and for your joy fill us to overflowing, that we would be a walking testimony of your love and goodness, of the fact that this is not our home, that we wait as we put our hope in a future home, a future life where all things will be made new.  So whether you heal us in this life, and I pray if that’s your will for any of us that you would, or if you heal us in the next life, may you be glorified in ways we can only imagine. 

Please use us Lord to proclaim your name, to have compassion on others, and to show the world your grace that many would be saved, and those away from you would return. 

“Therefore we do not lose heart.  Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.  For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.  So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” 2 Corinthians 4:16-18

May your will be done on earth, Lord, as it is in heaven.  May you bring a revival to our own hearts, to the body of Christ, and throughout the world.  Maranatha!  In the eternal name of Jesus Christ I pray, amen.

Sunday Praise and a Prayer for Peace

Posted on by Dorci

“Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.”  Philippians 4:8-9

 

Heavenly Father, you are praiseworthy.  You are true and noble and right and pure and lovely and admirable, and we choose to think about you and all the ways you’ve shown us your goodness.  You’ve rescued us time and time again.  You forgive all our sins and have removed them as far as the east is from the west, and remember them no more.  Your grace is always upon your children, and your mercy, too. 

You have promised to prepare a place for us with you and to come again for us and take us with you where you are, where there is no more crying or pain or suffering.  Your love sustains us, teaches us, and matures us until the day when your wisdom says it’s time to come home.  Lord, in all these constant ponderings throughout the day and night, you give us peace, and we praise you.  You know the trouble we face in this world, but we know you’ve already overcome it.  Help us cling to you, both in the times when things are going well, and in times when things are hard.

Give us the strength to turn to you when the enemy is whispering in our ears that you don’t care.  That you can’t possibly love us after what we’ve done.  Give us the strength to call those what they are: lies from the pit of hell.  Help us cling to the truth, and where our beliefs are false, we ask that you would change them.  Where we believe wrong things about you, please show us the truth.  And where we believe wrong things about ourselves, please break down those strongholds of falsehood, knowing they keep us from living purely in the victory you would have us.  We give you our minds and our hearts to mold as you will.  We receive your peace, and we give you all the glory.  In the mighty name of Jesus, amen.

The Cross is Just the Beginning

Posted on by Dorci

“Then Jesus said to His disciples,
If anyone desires to come after Me,
let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me.”
Matthew 16:24
 

It is just into the first century.  The roads are dusty, the work is back-breaking, the nights are long.  The religious leaders are corrupt, and the Roman Empire rules the region with an iron hand.  Taxes are exorbitant and punishment is cruel.  Beheading, strangling, being buried alive, and among the worst: crucifixion.  Being hung on a cross.  The people are afraid, looking for a savior.

A man called Jesus has risen from among them and has garnered a following.  He teaches in the Temple, raises the dead, makes the blind to see, and feeds thousands from five loaves of bread and two fish.

The people begin to have hope, especially the twelve who are His constant companions, those He’s taken under His wing.

But He begins to talk of suffering.  That He “must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.”  Luke 9:22

And then He drops a bombshell.

“Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.”  Luke 9:23

Those with Him look around at one another with a stunned and confused look on their faces.

Take up our cross?  Daily? What is he talking about?

Jesus would predict His own death two more times. He would lead the way.

Still, His friends couldn’t grasp what He was saying.

The night comes and He is betrayed by one of them and dragged before Herod Antipas, the son of Herod of Great who was responsible for killing all the boys under the age of two when he heard that men had come to worship the one who was born King of the Jews.  Herod Antipas sends him to Pontius Pilate, and Pilate sends Him first to be flogged, and then to the cross.

 

Jesus carries His cross until near collapse from exhaustion and pain. He is nailed to it, and lifted up to a punishment reserved for the worst of criminals.  A punishment designed to not only torture and kill, but to shame and send a message to all those watching.

His friends scatter. Their minds are reeling from the events they’d just seen. They think back to the time Jesus said they must take up their cross.

Are we next?

Darkness comes over the land.  Jesus dies and is buried in a tomb.

And that is that. Hope is lost. Death is the end.

But then the morning of the third day comes.

 

It is evening now and the disciples are gathered together in a room with the doors locked for fear of facing their own torture, grieving over the death of their friend and the hope He’d given them for a better life, when suddenly they hear –

“Peace be with you!”

It’s Him! Wait..is it? Is it a ghost?  No!  It’s Jesus! And their joy comes flooding back.

And again – 

“Peace be with you!”

They laugh and hug and rejoice, and they realize death was not the end. 

It was only the beginning.

Maybe the understanding about what He meant by denying themselves, taking up their cross and following Him came as slowly to them as it does to us.  But He had given them a stark picture.

It doesn’t mean reluctantly accepting a disease, or a difficult relationship.  It doesn’t mean sacrificing any one thing.

It means dying.  To everything.

Sacrificing oneself. 

Willingly, wholeheartedly, just as He had done.

The word Jesus used when He said “deny” themselves is aparneomai – to deny utterly.  To disown.

If we want to follow Christ, to be His disciple, the only way is to follow Him all the way to the cross.  Not a literal cross, of course, but a cross for the flesh, the self will.  It is saying to the Father what He said in the garden: “Not my will, but yours be done.”

Christ might have in mind for us to go and do and say what we wouldn’t dare.  Will we follow? Will we die to our desires, let go of our fears, and go with Him?

Dying to our wishes and desires, giving up the life we had in mind, is not the end!

There is the glorious morning.  A new beginning.

It is the beginning to a bigger, better life than we had ever imagined. Infinitely bigger than a life of catching fish.

We will become fishers of men, and women and children and neighbors and family.

When we walk with the risen Christ, we are filled with Life ourselves, and all that He is and has for us.

Peace be with you!

 

Exposed to the Light

Posted on by Dorci

 

“Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.” Ephesians 4:32

I bowed my head to pray and to forgive someone who had hurt me years ago.  As I was praying, I started to say things like “they probably didn’t mean it…”  

And the Holy Spirit stopped me right there.  “Don’t make excuses.  Bring the sin into the Light.  Acknowledge it, all of it, so that you can completely forgive it.”

Of course He was right.  If I’d made excuses for the sin and acknowledged only part of it, I would only be able to forgive a part of it, and the rest would continue to grow its bitter root in my heart.

Jesus hung on the cross, wearing only a mocking crown of thorns on His head, fully exposed to the crowd, the elements, the humiliation, and became sin.  My sin and your sin. 

Our sin was on Him, and none of it was covered.  He laid bare before the Holy Light of the Father, with every sin heaped upon Him, offering up Himself as a sacrifice.  Nothing was held back.  No excuses were made.  It was raw and ugly.  Sin always is.

And it was forgiven.  All of it. 

There is now no condemnation…

When we stand before the Father asking for forgiveness for our sin, or forgiving another, bring it into the Light.  All of it.  Acknowledge it, no matter how painful and ugly and humiliating it is.  And let God pull the sin’s darkness out from the roots and plant His peace in its place.

Finding Peace

Posted on by Dorci

 

“Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom His favor rests.”  Luke 2:14

I had always set up our nativity scene on a buffet table right by the front door.  Everyone who came and went saw it. Anyone in the living room or kitchen could see it.  And I liked it that way.  I always wanted Jesus to be front and center of Christmas.

Then we moved to a new house and the best place for the buffet was in the front living room.  You know, that room no one ever goes into.  The one that gets passed by on the way to the family (tv) room and the kitchen.

We started unpacking Christmas decorations and the nativity scene automatically went on the buffet. But I still wanted Jesus to be front and center, so I walked around the house looking for a more suitable place for him.  Nothing seemed right.  I didn’t want it where it could get broken.  Some places weren’t big enough.  Some were too high.

“But people will have to go out of their way to see it” I thought. 

Yes, yes they will.

 

There was a lot going on that first Christmas in the little town of Bethlehem and throughout the surrounding regions. The first census had been ordered by Caesar Augustus, and there was a lot of traffic as people made their way to their tribal towns to be counted.  Joseph and Mary traveled 70 miles…70 miles, from Nazareth to Bethlehem, while Mary was very pregnant.

They came into town, dusty and thirsty and exhausted. Maybe the birth pains had already begun. All they wanted was a place to lie down and prepare to give birth to the King of kings.

But there was no place for them. They knocked on doors, but everyone had gotten there ahead of them and every room was filled. Joseph and Mary found refuge where they could, somewhere near the animals, away from the crowd.

No one knew they were there. Not one person in that small but suddenly bustling town knew that just around the corner, in the still of the night, under the stars, was the center of the universe.

Those who heard were the shepherds out in the quiet field, suddenly hearing from a host of angels that the Messiah had been born. They left their lives for a moment, and went out of their way to see the Savior of the world, the One God’s people had been waiting for.

Some time later the magi left their lives for a moment, and went out of their way to follow a star to worship and bring gifts to the King of the Jews.

Christmas is a busy, bustling, noisy time of year. But really, when are our lives not that way? For most of us, not very often.

Our lives are full of busyness and running here and there.  The world is full of chaos and anxiety, and is as short on peace now as it was then.  It always will be.  Funny though, how we can try looking for peace in the world, right in the middle of all that chaos.

But God calls us to come away.

Like the shepherds and the magi, when we come away from the noise, away from the hustle and bustle of the season no matter what season that may be, to worship the King, to see and hear from the Savior of the world, the Savior of our own lives, we will again find a miracle, wrapped in humility and joy and peace.

When we go out of our way to meet with Him and give Him our whole heart’s attention, He will be there, waiting, and we will be ready to receive Him and all He is and has for us.

 

This is God’s Will for You

Posted on by Dorci

 

“…give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”  1 Thessalonians 5:18

Thanksgiving week comes and we hear people talking about the things they’re thankful for. Maybe you sit around the Thanksgiving table and tell one another what you’re thankful for. But maybe you’re a little hard-pressed to think of anything to be thankful for this year.

God tells us to give thanks in all circumstances. All is a pretty inclusive word.

Not just the good stuff. But all the stuff. Now, I know that’s a really hard to thing to do sometimes. When you’re missing family members, when your health is bad, when the money is tight.  Sometimes it’s an act of sheer will, of obedience, of faith that God is going to do something in and with those circumstances.

It’s easy to give thanks once that circumstance has passed and we can see the good the Lord has wrought in it.  But we are to give thanks when we’re in the middle of the mess.

When we don’t see what God’s doing.

When we don’t know how long it’ll last.

When we don’t know how we’ll get through it.

But why is this God’s will?

Giving thanks in the storm makes us humble and crushes our pride.  It keeps us from allowing bitterness and resentment to settle in, creating a Grand Canyon-sized gap between us and God.  It keeps those vital communication lines open and that allows for His peace to flow into our hearts.  It keeps us following Him, allowing Him to do the good He desires to do with those circumstances instead of going through them with no fruit at the end.

It’s no coincidence that God tells us “Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.”  Philippians 4:6

Continually placing all circumstances in the Lord’s hands gives us His peace and assurance, and naturally – or more accurately, supernaturally – the thankful heart will come, and we can confidently go through any circumstance with hope and the joy of the Lord. 

Once we’ve walked with the Lord a while, and I don’t just mean knowing who He is, or going to church on Sundays, but really walk with Him, day by day, circumstance by circumstance, conversation to conversation, we’ll see more and more that He is a Father we can trust.  We can rest assured that He is with us no matter how far down in the pit we are, no matter how bleak the circumstances feel.

Remember, Jesus knows what it’s like.

For the One who gave His life for us, we live a life of worship, and all great acts of worship start with the first one – a thankful heart that’s trusting our Father’s goodness and grace to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine.