Our Honor

Today I was reading the book of 1 Samuel.  It feels good to return to a book I have not read in about a year and it is astonishing to see how in that short time I now read it with new eyes, seeing things I had not seen prior to now.  I saw this today while reading chapter 25 which acts as a short digression from Saul’s pursuit of David’s life.  In chapter 25 we see David’s men, acting on behalf of and in the name of David himself, going up to a rich man, Nabal, in search of favor.  The men come and ask Nabal to provide hospitality, a cultural norm, for David and his men.  Now, Nabal is not spoken of prior to this chapter and not a lot is known about him but it is clear from the text that he had it good and that David had helped in keeping that way, and so it is not illogical to guess that he would comply with the request.  I don’t know about you but I think I would be excited to meet David; the one who defeated the giant Goliath, the one destined for the throne, a man after G-d’s own heart.  But Nabal did not share this sentiment.  Rather, he defamed David’s name and discounted his work when he said,

“Who is David?  And who is the son of Jesse?  There are many servants today who are each breaking away from his master.  Shall I then take my bread and my water and my meat that I have slaughtered for my shearers, and give it to men whose origins I do not know?”
1 Samuel 25:10-11

So, David’s men return with a very unexpected and surprising rejection.  Here David is met with an important decision and unfortunately chooses the reaction of the flesh.  David says, I have been slandered and unappreciated by a man who should have respect for me and show me kindness, now I am going to kill him.

I hope you have not been here, on the verge of murder, but I know we have all been in a similar situation.  I know you have gone unappreciated, been hurt, had your name defamed, been the victim of a rumor, or been the butt of a cruel joke.  And I know you have felt the urge, just as David did, to strike back and exact justice, after all you were wronged, right?  But the L-rd desires something different.

I am reminded of A.W. Tozer’s Five Vows, one of which is, “Never defend yourself.”

Why?

Because G-d will.  And that is what He does for David.  Through Nabal’s wife Abigail, David is kept from sin while the L-rd exacts His justice, killing “the fool”.  The L-rd makes a promise in Exodus 23 saying,

“I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries.”
Exodus 23:22

We, as children of the Most High, no longer need to worry about our name, our reputation.  The eyes of the One we seek to please are not persuaded by rumors and the L-rd will fight for us in the eyes of all others.  You bear His Name if you are in Christ, the one Name that will never be put to shame.

He is strong and He loves you, I pray you rest and trust in that.

Grace and Peace beloved.

In Christ,
AC

Questions About Anxiety

When teaching those two messages entitled "Do Not Be Anxious" (find them here) from the Sermon On the Mount (Matthew 6:25-34), I realized that there would be some very big questions raised about the implications these sermons would have for our day to day lives. Unfortunately, I did not have time to address these questions for us. Praise God for The Overflow Blog : ) I want to tackle a few of those questions now.

In these 2 messages you might remember that I pointed out the 6 means Jesus has given us to fight anxiety: (1) Look Outside, (2) Remember Who Your Father Is, (3) Pray For Your Daily _______, (4) Put Anxiety to the Test, (5) Be Faithfully Forgetful, and (6) Be Anxious About the Things of the Lord.

Here are a few of the questions I could imagine all of us had as I was pointing these things out...

1. Does This Mean We Don't Think About the Future?

I can see how we might go to this extreme. After all, doesn't the Lord call us to "not be anxious about tomorrow?" Didn't I call us to be "faithfully forgetful?" Yes. And both of these calls still stand. Are we then to forget about tomorrow all together? No. We are to change the way we think about tomorrow. Christ says, "Do not be anxious about tomorrow," not "Do not think about tomorrow." We are to think about tomorrow, only in light of who God is and what God has said. We don't get caught up asking questions about the future: "What if? What if? What if?" Rather we make statements about it:

"He has said, 'I will never leave you nor forsake you.' So we can confidently say, 'The Lord is my helper; I will not fear; what can man do to me?' (Heb 13:5b-6)."

We remember His faithfulness so we can faithfully forget about our worries when we think about and plan for tomorrow.

So, think about tomorrow, only don't worry about it. Make plans, only submit them to God.

"Instead you ought to say, 'If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that'” (James 4:15).

That is why you will find these words above The Rain Calendar. We think about the future, yes we do. We just submit it to the Lord and stop worrying about it (easier said than done, right : ).


2. Does This Mean We Don't Work?

If God is going to provide for us like He does for the birds and the fields, if we are not to be anxious about our lives in regards to food, drink, clothing, etc., doesn't that mean we don't need to work at all? Can't we just trust God to do it for us? Isn't that what He said? Yes and no.

Taking the birds and the fields for example: We must see that God supernaturally provides for them in seemingly natural ways. For He provides for the birds, not in spite of their work, but in and through their work. They might not store up in barns or worry about food for tomorrow, but they do fly from tree to tree looking for nuts, insects, etc. And it is in this seemingly natural "work" that God supernaturally provides for them. He provides flowers for the fields in much the same way. For God clothes the fields with flowers via very seemingly natural processes--He gives them rain, sunshine, nutrients, etc. and little by little flowers are produced. And yet, all the while it can be said: God is clothing these fields!

Paul clearly agrees with this:

"For even when we were with you, we would give you this command: If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat. For we hear that some among you walk in idleness, not busy at work, but busybodies. Now such persons we command and encourage in the Lord Jesus Christ to do their work quietly and to earn their own living" (2 Thessalonians 3:10-12).

So then, obviously we are to work. Christ is not dealing with whether we should work or not in our text. He is dealing with the way in which we work. We are to work not out of fear or anxiety, not because we have to in order to survive (for we trust in God not our work ultimately to provide for us), but because we want to serve and glorify God. Our motivation for work is different. No longer are we to be "eating the bread of anxious toil" (Psalm 127:2), but we work, as Adam did back in the Garden of Eden, because we love God and love others!

"Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need" (Ephesians 4:28).

We would do well to hear George Muller on this subject. This is especially important for all of you students asking the questions: "Why I am I in this major? Why I am I looking to start this career? Etc." The answer better not be: "Because if I don't, I won't have food on the table." Wrong! That cannot be our fundamental reason for work. God has promised to provide for us. We do not work because we have to in order to survive (as if our heavenly Father were either unable or unwilling), we work because we want to in order to serve and glorify God. We work because it is a calling from Him! But I digress, here is Muller:

"Why do I carry on this business, or why am I engaged in this trade or profession? In most instances the answer would be, 'I am engaged in my earthly calling so that I may support myself and my family.' Here is the chief error that causes almost all the other errors by children of God concerning their calling. To be engaged in a business merely to obtain the necessities of life for ourselves and family is not scriptural. We should work because it is the Lord's will concerning us. 'Let him labor, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth' (Ephesians 4:28)."

"The Lord generally meets our needs through our jobs. But that is not the reason why we should work. If providing the necessities of life depended on our ability to work, we could never have freedom from anxiety. We would always have to say to ourselves, 'What will I do when I am too old to work, or if I am sick?' but if we are engaged in our earthly calling because it is the will of the Lord for us, He is sure to provide for us because we labor in obedience to Him."

"Why do I carry on my business? Why am I engaged in this trade or profession? These questions should first be settled in the fear of God and according to His revealed will. We will then answer honestly, 'I carry on my business as a servant of Jesus Christ. He has commanded me to work, and therefore, I work.' Whether a believer chooses to become a missionary, a teacher, a carpenter, or a businessman, he will be blessed and find satisfaction in his career--as long as he works in joyful obedience to the Lord."

The Autobiography of George Muller, pp. 169-170.

3. Does This Mean We Don't Suffer?

This will be the last question I tackle (though I am sure there are more that could be dealt with). One could draw this conclusion from the fact that Jesus says:

"Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you" (Matthew 6:31-33).

"All these things will be added to you?!" That sounds like, so long as I seek God first, I will never suffer, right?!! Wrong. Some birds fall to the ground dead. Some fields catch fire. And some Christians can go hungry, thirsty, naked, and even die!

So what good is this promise then? It is a promise that moves on through eternity. It means, we will ultimately, eternally be provided for by our Father, even if He sees it fit for us to suffer for a time here. Does it mean that He will provide for us here? Yes, absolutely. But sometimes, His providing for us here is to take us through tribulation that refines our character or increases our heavenly reward or gives us rest from our earthly sorrow. After all, a sparrow does not fall to the earth apart from our Father (Mat 10:29)!

We can see this truth clearly in Romans 8:

"What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written,

'For your sake we are being killed all the day long;
we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.'

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 8:31-39).

God's love and provision supersedes (in an eternal sense) any famine or nakedness or even death (in a momentary sense)!

So no...this promise is not your ticket for a suffer-free life. But it is a promise from God that He will provide for your needs, whether that be through giving you food or withholding it from you.

"I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me."

"...And my God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus. To our God and Father be glory forever and ever. Amen" (Philippians 4:12-13, 19-20).

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Here's to fighting anxiety for the glory of God!!!

Bear Fruit with Patience

Hey brothers and sisters,

For any of you who have been frustrated in not seeing fruit in your life as at many times I have been, I wanted to encourage you with a verse that spoke to me a couple days ago.

In Luke chapter 8, Jesus tells the parable of the sower and of how seeds sown land on the path, on rocky soil, among thorns, and finally on good soil. The good soil is the only soil that produces a crop, and Jesus explains to his disciples, "As for that in the good soil, they are those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with patience" (Luke 8:15).

In reading this passage, it is key to take note, first off, of God's tremendous grace in this. The seed is the word of God and he has sown that seed in our hearts. That's the Gospel in us. We have heard that Jesus died and rose again. That's grace. We need to remind ourselves and let that be planted in us every day. That's the first and most important thing.

But then once we've had that seed planted in us, we need to let it flourish and let it produce fruit in us. In the past, I've wrestled with this because that puts pressure on our end of things to think that we need to produce fruit, but what stuck out to me in reading it and thinking on it these past couple days was the word patience. We bear fruit with patience. The analogy of a seed growing into a plant is so perfect because 1) it does it naturally. It doesn't exert itself to produce fruit. I've never seen a plant have to strain to push out fruit, it just does. 2) It doesn't happen right away. It is a slow process that sometimes is not visible at all to the eye. So take heart my brothers and sisters when you don't see fruit in your life. Seek the Lord and pray that he would move in you and till the soil of your heart. Seek God who is light earnestly just as a plant grows and stretches and reaches for the light of the sun, and then wait on him with patience for fruit to crop up.

Love you guys. More than you know.
MTL

Jehovah Sabaoth

Jehovah Sabaoth (יְהֹוָה צבאה)

Jehovah Sabaoth (yeh-ho-vaw' tseb-aw-aw') is the last name of G-d that we will touch on (if you are interested at looking at the others that we went through I would encourage you to check out this site, http://www.blueletterbible.org/study/misc/name_god.cfm). This one was an interesting one for me, I went into it expecting to see it point to G-d as the ruler of the heavens and how angels bow before Him singing forever in worship, for that is undoubtedly true (read Revelation 4 and 5) but it is not so much what is captured in the name Jehovah Sabaoth. Rather what is seen of G-d is that He is a G-d of war. He commands not only heavenly armies but human armies as well, and He is constantly fighting for His glory. This was not what I was expecting to find yet what confidence is found in the ferocity of the L-rd for His glory in the heart of a believer. I find David agreeing when He says,

Then David said to the Philistine, "You come to me with a sword and with a spear and with a javelin, but I come to you in the name of the LORD of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied.
(1 Samuel 17:45)

The past two days we looked at how our Father provides for us and how He gives us peace, but this does not amount to anything unless He is also strong and mighty, unless He is able to fight for us. And that is what He is doing, He is fighting for us. He is glorified in our salvation and our sanctification and so we have now, by the blood of Yeshua, been placed in line with the ferocity He has to get His glory. This is a ferocity that would ultimately send this powerful G-d, a mighty ruler and commander of the heavenly hosts, to take human form, weakness in the fullest measure, and die on a cross. But He did not simply die but rather He conquered sin and Satan and rose on the third day, Jehovah Sabaoth has fought the battle and He is victorious. He has fought the battle we could never win and won it on our behalf.

He has done it and it is finished!

Jehovah Sabaoth is victorious!

Grace and Peace beloved

In Christ,
AC

Jehovah Shalom

Jehovah Shalom (יְהֹוָה שָׁלוֹם)

Jehovah Shalom (yeh-ho-vaw' shaw-lome') is a name that appears only once in the Old Testament, in Judges chapter six. Here we find the beginning of the story of Gideon. Maybe you know how Gideon defeated thousands of enemy soldiers with his 300 men. But this is before that, this begins while Gideon is still in his father’s house. It does not say how old he is, it does say that he was the youngest, but I would venture to say he was not much older than the average college age guy now-a-days. But what the L-rd calls him to do is anything but average, He calls him to go and free all of Israel from oppression. He picks Gideon, the youngest of his father’s house of the smallest tribe in all Israel. Try to imagine this, America does not deal with the kind of oppression Israel was facing at the hands of the Midianites but think to what this would be like, think to how you would react.

It does not take too much reading of the Bible to see that G-d often chooses small people, weak people, run of the mill nothing special kind of people to do great things. He used young Gideon to fight off an oppressive nation, He chose David as a young shepherd to lead a nation, He chose a cupbearer named Nehemiah to rebuild the holy city, and He chose to incarnate Himself as a town carpenter. Perhaps you, even now, are feeling the bearing down of the world and it seems too large for you, I know I feel this a lot and I would venture to say these men did too. But G-d is not a far off god, He is not one to leave us to fight these battles on our own. That is why He tells Gideon,

"Peace to you, do not fear; you shall not die." (Judges 6:23)

You better believe that this spoke directly to Gideon’s fear, but what does G-d do with his fear? He gives him peace. He not only tells him that things will be okay and that he will make it but He gives him peace. Gideon goes on to make an altar and call it Jehovah Shalom (The L-rd is Peace) because he knows this to be true. The L-rd is the source of peace and He is able to give it freely. I pray you would seek Him for it, I know we are all in desperate need of it.

Grace and PEACE beloved

In Christ,

AC

Jehovah Jireh

So the past quarter or so the prayer group that meets up at 7 a.m. on Tuesdays has been going through the different names of G-d, that is the different names to which G-d is referred in the Old Testament. I don’t know how everyone else felt about this but I know it has always helped me to know more fully who it is to whom I pray and to be able to call upon G-d as my healer or my righteousness has given new meaning to my prayers and requests. In total there are sixteen names which G-d is called by in the Old Testament however, we were only able to make it through thirteen of them during our Tuesday meetings. The L-rd, in His sovereign will, has left us three names to encourage and bless us, as is my prayer, during this week.

Jehovah Jireh ( יהוה יראה)

Jehovah Jireh (yeh-ho-vaw' yir-eh') is a name that is first used by Abraham in the book of Genesis. It comes from a story that many of you have heard, that is the sacrifice of Isaac. You see, G-d had promised Abraham that He would create for him a never ending line, descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and the sand on the shores. This was a promise that was to be fulfilled in Abraham's son Isaac. But in Genesis 22 G-d asks something rather strange of Abraham as He tells him to take his son up on a mountain and kill him as a sacrifice to the L-rd. Now this is a request that makes us squirm even to read and therefore it is no stretch to think that Abraham had a hard time hearing this from G-d. However, as we continue to read we see that Abraham, being a righteous man of faith, knows that G-d is more powerful than death and so he takes his son up the hill to offer him up as a sacrifice to the L-rd. Abraham knew, in that moment, two truths that we so often forget.

He knew that the L-rd is our provider.

He knew that the L-rd is good

He was sure that the L-rd's promises hold good regardless of circumstances and that if Abraham was to have a long line of descendants through Isaac that not even the death of his son could stand in the way of that promise coming to fulfillment. So Abraham walked in faith, to the point of tying up his son and raising the dagger ready to plunge it into his own beloved son. But the L-rd stopped him and said,

"Abraham, Abraham!" And he said, "Here am I." He said, "Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him, for now I know that you fear G-d, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me." And Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him was a ram, caught in a thicket by his horns. And Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son. So Abraham called the name of that place, "The L-RD will provide"; as it is said to this day, "On the mount of the L-RD it shall be provided."
(Genesis 22:11-14)

The L-rd provides.

I would imagine that most of you are not in this position but I believe that a connection can be extrapolated none the less. G-d called Abraham to do some crazy things when you think about it but at the base of everything G-d asked was made the simple request,

“Will you trust Me?”

That is what the L-rd is after, He is after our heart and He wants it set on Him and what He says to us. That is what He is asking you right now, I guarantee it. Many of you are heading into finals this week and He is asking,

“Will you trust Me?”

Some of you do not yet know what the summer holds and are still making plans and He is asking,

“Will you trust Me?”

For some of you this week is no different than the last but still He asks you, with even the seemingly normal everyday events,

“Will you trust Me?”

The L-rd is our provider, He is our Father and He knows what we need even before we ask Him. He loves us and He is working all things for our ultimate and eternal good. I pray you approach Him with this knowledge today, and I pray you place your trust in Him for He is worthy of it.

Grace and Peace beloved.

In Christ,
AC