4SpiritualSecrets

“Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed…His mercies never fail, They are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness.” (Lamentations 3: 21-24)

I will make more observations about these quotes from the Lamentations of Jeremiah. In his despair and grief over what he had to see during the conquest of Jerusalem, Jeremiah called to mind that it is only because of the great love of the Lord that we are not consumed.

This raises the question: ‘What do we think we deserve and why?’ When the Rabbi wrote his book about bad things happening to good people he assumed a thesis. He assumed that the people were good and deserved good things. That does not agree with Scripture. According to Jeremiah, it is only because of the mercy of God that we do not get what we deserve.

The word “mercy” means unconditional love. God showed Jeremiah that His mercies are new every morning. His next words inspired a great hymn called, “Great is Thy Faithfulness.” God is faithful to us even when we are not faithful to Him. Every morning is a clean slate for us because His expressions of unconditional love are new every morning.

When we meditate on these thoughts, inspired by Jeremiah we should thank God every day for the mercy that withholds and the grace that bestows salvation on anyone who will believe that Good News. Jesus Christ died on that hill where Jeremiah wrote these words so that God could withhold what we deserve and bestow on us a salvation we do not deserve but receive by faith.

Today would you like to thank Him for His mercy and trust Him for salvation?

“Yet this I call to mind… Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed… His compassions never fail… They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.” (Lamentations 3: 21-24)

After writing his prophecy which has moved many scholars to label him “The Weeping Prophet” Jeremiah adds a short postscript to his fifty-two chapters of weeping. That postscript is called “Lamentations” which means “Weepings.”

You simply have to know why Jeremiah is weeping to understand and appreciate his writings. He is weeping about the Babylonian massacre and captivity of God’s chosen people! For years he warned the people of God that unless they repented this awful tragedy would happen. As he writes his Lamentations he has been permitted to remain in the land of Judah. Sitting in his Grotto he laments all the tragic things that have now happened.

In the midst of his deepest expressions of sorrow and sadness he suddenly breaks forth with the verses quoted above. These verses have been translated and paraphrased to tell us more clearly that what God revealed to Jeremiah in his darkest hour was that He had never stopped loving His chosen people. In some ways, God had never loved them more then when He chastised them with that Babylonian conquest and captivity.

A providential wonder of prophecy is that Jeremiah’s Grotto where he was seated as he wrote these Lamentations was on the top of a hill that was called “Golgatha.” This means that God gave Jeremiah this wonderful prophecy that His unconditional love was being expressed for His chosen people throughout the tragedy Jeremiah was lamenting on the very spot where centuries later God would pour out His unconditional love for the whole world.

“…we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand..” (Romans 5:2)

Paul writes that God has given us access, by faith, to a quality of grace that makes it possible for us to stand for Christ in this world, and live lives that glorify God. Then he writes that we should rejoice in our suffering, because God sometimes uses our suffering to force us to access that grace.

How must our God feel when He sees us struggling in our own strength to live as we should, knowing He has provided us with a way to access all the grace we need? We are to rejoice when God uses suffering to make us an offer we cannot refuse that drives us into His grace.

There are levels or degrees of suffering we simply cannot endure without the grace of God. When our suffering drives us beyond the limits of any human resources we have within ourselves, these times of severe testing become God’s opportunity to provide and prove His grace to us. A devout hymn writer has expressed that truth this way:

“When we come to the end of our store of endurance.
When our strength has failed and the day is half done.
When we have exhausted our hoarded resources
Our Father’s full giving has only begun.

“His love has no limit. His grace has no measure.
His power has no boundary known unto men.
For out of His infinite wisdom and mercy
He gives and He gives and He gives yet again.”

According to Paul, it is the love of God that sometimes uses our suffering to force us to access the grace he prescribed in the second verse of Romans chapter 5 and in that great verse about grace he wrote in his second letter to the Corinthians.

Are you willing to let problems you cannot solve or suffering you cannot endure drive you to access the amazing grace of God today?

“God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, might abound unto every good work.” (IICorinthians 9:8)

This is the most emphatic verse in the Bible about the grace God has made available to His people. According to Paul, God is able to make all grace (not just a little bit of grace), abound (not just trickle), toward you (not just Billy Graham, the pastor, and the missionary, but toward you), that you (he repeats that for emphasis), always (not just sometimes), having all sufficiency (not just some sufficiency), in all things (not just some things), may abound (not just limp), unto every good work (not just some good works).

All grace, abounding, always, all of you, I mean all of you, all sufficiency, all things, always, abounding in all the good works God wants to do through you! The New Testament church turned the world right side up because they believed and experienced the truth Paul was proclaiming in this extraordinary verse about God’s amazing grace.

The challenge for you and me is to believe in, and access, the grace of which the apostle was writing in this magnificent verse. The grace of God is not only the undeserved favor of God we receive when our sins are forgiven. Grace is the power of God He wants to pour out on His people as they live for and serve Him. The word “charis” is the Greek word for grace. The word “charisma” or “charismata” is the Greek word that describes the grace of God being dispensed to His people. It is impossible to live the life of a disciple of Jesus Christ without the grace of God. In the pure sense of this word there is no other kind of Christian but a charismatic Christian.

This verse is the most exciting and challenging verse in the Bible regarding the availability and accessibility of the grace of God to you and me. The great challenge is to believe this grace is there for us to access on a daily basis. Do you believe God is able to make all grace abound toward you today?

Do you believe that you, always, having all sufficiency in all things can abound unto every good work God wants to do through you today?

“… Being confident of this very thing that He who has begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Christ…for it is God at work in you to will and to do according to His good pleasure.” (Philippians 1:6; 2:13)

The Apostle Paul was in prison when he wrote these words to his favorite church. He was chained between two Roman soldiers without any privacy or time he could call his own. He was not able to shepherd and teach these believers he loved so very much. But is he stressed out because he fears that they will fall away from their faith? No, he has a beautiful confidence that they will continue in their faith until the day when Christ returns for His church!

The source of his confidence is found in two realities: he knows that the risen, living Christ has begun the miracle of regeneration in them and he is completely convinced that Christ will continue any miracle work of salvation He begins. His confidence is not in the fact that he has led these people to Christ. His confidence is in Christ! He expresses his faith in that miracle in the Philippians 1:6.

In Philippians 2:13 Paul continues the thought when he adds that his confidence is in God Who is at work in them giving them the will and the power to do according to that which pleases Him. Why is it that some people want to please God and others do not? Why is it that some people have the grace to do what pleases God while others do not? Paul answers those questions when he writes that it is God working in these believers giving them both the want to, and the power, to live in a way that pleases God.

Where is your confidence that you will continue in what Christ has begun in your life? What a miracle it is when we see evidence that God has begun the work of salvation in the life of one of our loved ones. I knew that work had begun when I heard one of our loved ones say, “I wonder where my want to went to!” Where is your confidence that those you love will continue in what Christ has begun in their lives? Is your hope in them? Is it in your ability to shepherd and mentor them?

Or is your hope in the Christ Who began that miracle and in the God Who can give them the will and the power to do what pleases Him?

“Let us cross over to the other side…” (Mark 4:35…)

Jesus Christ was the greatest Teacher this world has ever known. On this occasion He wanted to teach the apostles about faith. When we take science courses today there is a combination of lecture and laboratory learning. On this occasion the laboratory of Jesus was a great storm. His lecture was a great question He asked the apostles in the middle of that great storm. In one translation that question reads, “Do you not even yet believe in Me?”

We read that these men came to Jesus where He was asleep in the back of the boat when the storm was at its worst and asked Him, “Do you not even care that we are all going to drown?” Jesus had told them they were going to the other side of the Sea. He had also told them so many things about who He was and about the kingdom He was establishing on earth and the part He wanted them to play in that kingdom. His question implied that they believed He, along with themselves and the kingdom of which He was teaching them, were all going to end at the bottom of the Sea of Galilee!

Jesus has promised to take you and me to the other side of life into the eternal dimension. While He is taking us there He told us we would have many storms. Sometimes those storms are great storms. You may be in the middle of a great storm right now. If you are you are in the laboratory section of the school of faith. You must remember the great question of Jesus that can turn your great storm into a great calm: “Do you not even yet believe in Me?”

“In everything … with thanksgiving tell God every detail of your needs … And the peace of God which transcends human understanding will stand guard over your hearts and minds as they rest in Christ Jesus.”
(Philippians 4:6, 7)

As I have tried to apply what Paul prescribes in the verses quoted above (in the NIV and the J.B. Phillips), I have found this prescription for peace to be more helpful than any other spiritual discipline. According to Paul, an attitude of gratitude leads to the therapy of thanksgiving as we apply thanksgiving to our stressful circumstances.

Be sure to make the observation that Paul does not prescribe giving thanks for all things. He instructs us to give thanks in all things. When we do this it automatically moves our mindset from the negative to the positive. The apostle promises that the peace of God will protect or stand guard (like the soldiers chained to Paul as he writes these words), over our hearts and minds as they rest or trust in Christ Jesus.

Our circumstances are not always determined by God but may be caused by evil people who are persecuting us. We cannot always control our circumstances – but we can control the way we respond to them. Paul is telling us to respond with thanksgiving, because if we do, we will find this response to be God’s prescription that will bring the peace that can contribute to our victory over those circumstances.

When a pastor asked one of his members how they were doing, their response was “Pretty good pastor, under the circumstances.” The pastor responded “Whatever are you doing there?”

The therapy of thanksgiving can lead us out from under our circumstances and into the peace of God.

“When He had received the drink, Jesus said, ‘It is finished!’”
(John 19:30)

These last words of Jesus are actually one word in the original language. This word was written over the record of a prisoner who completed their sentence in a Roman prison. They were written above the cross of a prisoner crucified by Rome. What a providential irony that Jesus would choose this word at the end of His suffering for your sins and mine.

What He meant was that He paid in full a debt He did not owe because we owed a debt we could not pay. Theologians refer to this as the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross. One thought is that we cannot possibly add anything to what He finished for us there on that cross. A more profound thought is that we must put our faith in what He did for us there.

Still another thought is if we could add anything to what He did, or be forgiven on the basis of our own good works, then Christ did all that suffering for nothing. In the garden He sweat great drops of blood as He pleaded with the Father to let this cup pass from Him.

The Father’s response was that there was no other way, so He had to go to and through the suffering of the cross. To think that we could save ourselves by works is like saying to the Father and to our Savior “You really didn’t have to go through all that suffering because I can save myself by the good works I am doing.”

The response we must make is to believe in what He finished.

“I have glorified You on the earth. I have finished the works which You have given Me to do.” (John 17:4)

Jesus was obsessed with the works His Father gave him to do. Doing those works was more important to Him than food. When He came to the end of His perfect life all He had to do was die. The night He was arrested, in deep prayer to His Father he prayed the words quoted above.

In these words He not only gave a capsule summary of the meaning of His perfect life, He showed us all the purpose of our life. “The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.” That’s the way a catechism devout parents have taught their children states the purpose of life. By example and precept Jesus stated the purpose of a purpose driven life for all of His followers for all time. Our purpose is to glorify God.

He also showed us how to glorify God. We glorify God by finishing all the works He has given us to do for Him. When I was thirty years old I had an accident that I miraculously survived. Many asked me if I had been terrified that I was about to lose my life. That was not my concern. My concern was that I had not finished the works I knew the Father wanted me to do for Him. I had not even found those works at that point in my life. Forty-nine years later I feel much better about that life goal.

Are you glorifying God by finding and finishing the works He wants you to do for Him for His glory?

“I must work the works of Him who sent Me while it is day. The night is coming when no man can work.” (John 9:4)

The Gospel of John gives us another window into the way Jesus felt about the works God wanted Him to do. According to this vision statement of Jesus He knew the reality that He had less than three years to do those works.

In 1956 the famous missionary Jim Elliot was speared to death, along with his four colleagues, by the tribal people they were trying to reach with the Gospel. Jim was a passionate follower of Jesus Christ. About four years before he died, he wrote in his journal, “When it comes time to die, make sure all you have to do is die.”

We can’t understand how God decides the day of our death. We don’t know when our own finish line will come. But we should all live in such a way that when we come to the finish line of our life there will be no unfinished business, no works our Father assigned to us that we’ve left undone.

Do you have the magnificent obsession of Jesus to work the works God has assigned to you while it is day not knowing when the night is coming and you cannot work anymore? Can you accept the challenge of being like Jesus in your attitude toward the works God wants you to do?