Fearlessly Courageous
Desk of Dennis Piller
10 29 2024
To a Discouraged Soul. Sunday is coming!
Have you noticed when you are discouraged, God seems far away? When your soul is down, it feels much more like a weariness that has seeped in like the cold dampness of a rainy morning. It gets right into your bones… and if left unattended…into the marrow. And one withdraws looking for a blanket to just be alone and feel sorry for ourselves. But there is no warmth because there is no peace.
Whether this cloud of discouragement came because you wandered into a sin or perhaps some calamity stole your peace and certainly your joy. Isolation is not your friend. A lion looks for the straggler in the pack or the wounded. Doesn’t he look for the stray, the disgraced, and certainly the despairing? We forget God’s warning in 1 Peter 5:8 “ Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:”
Satan is looking for someone to devour. But God’s encouragement is to stand firm in your faith because He has given us the power to resist him. Why are we always so surprised there is another battle? Every test prepares us for a larger battle and an opportunity to raise our shield and wield the armor of God. Attacks will come, but we can “Stand in Faith” by being rooted in God’s word. Why aren’t our words immediately…I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me!
I think of the Disney Song, “When You Wish Upon a Star…makes no Difference Where You Are.”
We know the melody but wishing will not see you through The valley of despair or the darkness of discouragement. I know it’s hard when we are wounded emotionally, physically, spiritually, or financially. Perhaps we have let our faith grow stale, or a sin has made its way in, and now the residue is showing itself in discouragement and even despair. Whatever the cause, being alone is not the answer.
Isolation is not the cure.
So what breaks us free? It is not a renewed resolve…or a determined stance or wishing upon a star but a choice of believing in living promises. Becoming saturated in his living word. When we cut ourselves, we put on some ointment and a band-aid, and in a few days, healing begins. My daughter broke her foot and tore her ACL and MCL and it will take weeks and months to heal. Our expectations are often so out of line. We expect the battle or hardship to be gone when we wake up tomorrow. That is so unrealistic. Satan wants to make this battle about you…It’s not...It’s about OBEDIENCE. It is not about performance… It is about OBEDIENCE!
Check your perspective…What are you looking at? Where is your focus? What are your words saying? Put your perspective back on God, along with your faith and the words of your mouth.
We are surely in a battle. He said there would be battles. But the answer is the Blood of the Lamb and the Word of our Testimony!
What does God’s Grace mean to you? Do you think about that in the Battle or is it that you don’t deserve this…I can’t handle this…Why is this happening to me? When will we learn it isn’t about us?… Can’t you look back and see the devil has always made it about you? BUT It is about Him.
Ps 59 says “My god of mercy will deliver me”. No, I don’t deserve it… Mercy isn’t deserved.
ITS YOUR CHOICE
Gods mercy is not about being qualified or worthy…We’re Not! I know I’m weak…but I believe
“My God of Mercy will come!”
Lord, help me to NOT make this about me, even when I mess up. Father, it just takes one drop of your blood, and I Am Free! I Win! Yes, there will be Giants in my life, some of my making and others not. Giants are alive and well in the Christian life; there will be fighting, but we will win…sometimes these giants will appear in my marriage, my children, my finances, my health… My faith…BUT
“My god of mercy will deliver me”.
Can you say that? Will you say that? Over and over and over until it seeps into the marrow of your bones?… Like the antibiotic we place on a wound to heal it…”My God of mercy will deliver me”. “My god of mercy will deliver me”.
The liberating promises of God are unfailing when we believe! They make away beyond the prison walls to the brightness of the sun in the morning…even when our circumstances haven’t changed yet.
Robert Maguire captures the beauty of promise: “Promise sees the dawn from the midnight, anticipates the sunrise from the sunset, recognizes in the leafless trees and cheerless snows of winter the harbinger and earnest of the fruits and flowers and seasonable enjoyments of the summer-tide” (Commentary, 96).
Discouragement is a spirit we have authority over…It is your choice.
Choose you this day who you will follow…Who will you believe…Whose promise you will trust…
I promise- “My god of mercy will deliver you”. Sunday is coming.
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Psalm 23 (I Am Not Alone) [Live at Linger Conference] People & Songs ft Josh Sherman
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8OlMGnPUAdw
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