“Trust in Him at all times; ye people, pour out your heart before him: God is a refuge for us. Selah.”  — Psalm 62:8

There is a place where you are always welcome. In that place you are completely safe. There you continually feel loved, no matter who walks into or out of your life. Even through dark times, that place is always able to give the fresh glow only the Son can give. To get there, all you need to do is get down on one knee and then the other, close your eyes, and tell God that you are giving him your all. Give him present or past relationships that you are hurting from. Tell Him your frustrations and anxieties. God wants to be the friend you talk to in the middle of the night, the one you greet when He wakes you, and the one you thank when you see a beautiful sunset.

But there’s a catch: in order to get there, you need a solid foundation of trust that only comes from a heart-to-heart between you and Him. It is only by testing and trying God that we are able to trust Him and trust for all the things He’s promised. Through our journey of testing we often feel disbelief at first, and when He comes through we are amazed and ready to give more of ourselves. In the end we  are no longer testing Him — it has beautifully bloomed into a reliance and trust.

When we establish this level of relationship with God, He gives us three gifts in our heart. These are peace, perfect joy, and complete protection. Like a rock, these three things cannot be moved or shaken from our lives. Once we enter into this level of intimacy and allow Him to move into our being, He will hold us up amidst all of our troubles. We can be at peace, because even at our most jaded state of being, there is a solid foundation of God grounded in our core.

“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.”  — Proverbs 3: 5-6

For the past month I’ve been pondering what to write about. Usually I know well in advance, and my thoughts have clear direction. However, this entire month I struggled with what God wanted me to say—what He was trying to teach me. I would land on a subject only to change my mind soon after. Spiritually, I felt pulled in a thousand different directions, which was probably because my heart has been heavy. It wasn’t until last night that I received my breakthrough.

One ten in the morning. I decide to take the emotional plunge and wade through what’s been ailing my heart—what’s been keeping me from the joy I find in Jesus everyday. I think about the last couple of weeks. Though I had been showered with amazing preaching, though I was fed the word of God and wrapped in praise and worship, I still ended up at the altar, crying my eyes out. And though I should have been rejoicing, I found myself heavy and couldn’t understand why. Ah, the ever-present question of why. Why? Why, God? But instead of asking why, I decide to think about what. What? The memories come flooding to me. Tears fill my eyes, as the weight in my heart grows.

I ask God, when I am able to speak, “Lord, what do I do? I realize now it’s been me all along carrying this weight. I’m letting it go. I’m giving it to you. I’m letting you take control again. But, Jesus, what do I do? What happens when I try and try, but no matter what I do, nothing changes? What do I do when I’ve tried to maintain relationships with people but they fall apart? What do I do when someone hurts me by hurting You? What do I do when differences can’t be reconciled? I know You’re in control, and I trust You. I won’t worry, but is there anything humanly possible that I can do? Search my heart, Lord, is there something that I missed? Is there something I need to say? Is there something I should do? What do I do?”

I feel the Lord’s arms wrap around me as He warmly tells me, “You love them.”

“That’s it?”

“You love them.”

“Really?”

“Really. Love each and every one like I do. And remember how much I love you. You might find the weight lighter. Never did I say that I expected you to be perfect. That’s My job.”

God’s Love. Could it really be that simple? I wipe the tears from my eyes. I think about every situation that weighs on me. I add God’s love to the equation. Suddenly, every issue fades to gray. My heart begins to feel lighter. 1 Corinthians 13:12 says “For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known. And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three: but the greatest of these is charity.”

If any of you are like me, we all go through times when everything in our lives seems to fall apart. We all go through rumble strips—periods where God will bring you through a trial to teach you. Note that I said bring you. Sometimes we get so wrapped up in all of our problems that we forget that God will bring us through. We get so busy that we forget that He is always with us; we are never alone. In the meantime, what can we do? We can love. Even when we feel that we’ve been wronged and that people should love us, we can still love others. In Matthew 7:12 Jesus clearly states, “Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.” Similarly Luke 10:27 says, “And he answering said, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbor as thyself.” And again this concept is stated in Luke 6:31.

Never should we find an excuse not to love our neighbors. It sounds so simple, but it’s something we forget to do sometimes. The important thing is, it’s not about us—it’s about Jesus. It’s about His sacrifice, His love, His commandments. God truly loves us, so what reason do we have not to love others? Do you have enemies? Love them. Do you have friends? Love them. Do you have co-workers? Love them. We are commanded by God to love. The more you let God take control, the more you love, and the more you do unto others as you would have them do unto you—the more true, God-given joy you will feel.

So it’s simple: how many people have you loved today?

So often I come to the altar wanting to give my all to God… but I also desire to know what the future has in store for me. I want to have the security of knowing I’m in God’s will and knowledge of what will happen in the future. While it’s great to know exactly what is in store for you down the road, I realized that knowing what’s in store doesn’t make me surrender my life to what God wants. That’s not seeking Him first. The truth about my feelings is that I want to take a look into my future without surrendering my life to God — I choose to wait until he reveals the things in my future that I want to know about before I’ll commit to Him.

That isn’t how He intended it at all! We are to throw ourselves into whatever he has for us with an almost reckless abandon, not caring what becomes of us, so that we can become all that He has for us to be, whether or not it’s revealed to us at this moment. We must become willing to submit His process for our lives whether He shows it to us or not.

Imagine that you’re a young child and that God is your father, taking you on a vacation. You’re excited because He’s told you that you’re going to another state and the two of you will be driving there. While you’re on your journey there, however, what are you doing? You are in the car with Dad, having a splendid time, but what are you doing? Since you don’t have a driver’s license, much less a road map, you’re left trusting that He knows where He’s taking you. You must accept that He knows the way and He has the best route in mind for you.

We know that we cannot successfully guide ourselves through the roads of life and make every turn correctly. We must rely on our heavenly father. We are mere children in the scope of eternity, in need of a Father to guide us and make sure we get to our destination safely. We can’t control where he brings us: we just have to submit to the ride ahead and hopefully enjoy it.

I want to surrender to God’s process for my life without doing it for a look into the future. My prayer is that you will do the same.

“Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.”  — John 14:27

Let’s ponder that thought; God’s peace is not likely to be experienced in a reasonable fashion, with a humanistic point of view. Proper worldly behavior is dictated to us daily by various forms of media, and airwave propaganda, all of which give off the stench of self indulgence. This broadcast, if put in the form of a book, would be titled “How to serve Self for Dummies!” After a introduction to this subconscious manipulation, we become fully trained in the art of entitlement.

It is a false sense of security when we find peace this way, an imitation if you will. After the senses are tickled and our comfort is established, we resist everything that challenges this ideal. It becomes our natural reaction and the peace that God wants to give us, a true and everlasting peace, is compromised. We are bombarded daily by questions that challenge our faith and our dream of finding peace. Be aware: the enemy is always working to compromise our relationship with God. Many times after these encounters we may question God in prayer, “Why did you do this?”, “What did I do to deserve that?”, “Can you even hear me?”, “Are you listening?”, “Can’t you see the pain and suffering in our world?” and “Why aren’t you doing anything?”

A proverbial tantrum!

These are all questions I have found myself asking at one juncture or another, and from these places my faith was tested. The peace that God wanted so desperately to give me was challenged. I have found that there are always two roads to take: one leads to understanding, the other to misunderstanding. One will leave you with true peace and the other will appear to be peace but will leave you with feelings of fear, worry, doubt, etc. One choice is made in surrender, the other in resistance.

The peace that God wants to give, that the world cannot, is only experienced through surrender.  To know God is to love Him, to love Him is to trust Him, and to trust Him is to surrender. That is always the result of trust. How we act during the times that are difficult for our flesh will determine whether we have peace or not. It’s easy to be at peace when everything is going good, but when things aren’t so good, what will I do?

I will either surrender or exact my will. Either I will resist, or I will surrender as Jesus did: “And he went a little further, and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt” (Matthew 26:39). By His word we have understanding that He is in control. Trusting Him with control of our life is the doorway to enter into his rest. Peace be unto you!

Here’s the question: was the cake worth it? Was it worth the pain and anxiety of waiting?

There’s a close analogy here with the way God does things. We sit there waiting and growing more and more hungry as time wears on, yet we know that back in the “kitchen” something wonderful is being made. Something delicious is being cooked. Your life’s story is being mixed with God’s love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, self control, and mercy — just to name a few — to create a wonderful concoction, or as we call it, “cake.”

The writer of Psalm 25:21 said, “let integrity and uprightness preserve me; for I wait on thee.” This is what we need to pattern our lives after. We need to be able to wait on our situation. We need to realize that, just like the cook, God knows what He’s doing and it will come out delicious and better for us in the end. What do I mean by better for us in the end? Well, take the cook for example again. Say the cook took a bunch of raw ingredients and threw them into a pan and then cooked them. Would that be healthy for you? It wouldn’t, and that’s exactly my point.

God knows precisely what to put in and exactly how long to wait. It will come out perfect in the end if we let God be God and the cook be cook. They are professionals at what they do, and who are we to tell God what to do or how? The Lord created heaven and earth, and He did a pretty good job! Don’t you think he can take your situation and make it into something “delicious”? Speaking of my own life, I am completely confident that He can and will do exactly that! The promise is in Romans 8:28, “and we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.” We are the called, and that means all things will work together and will end up excellent at the end! Believe it, see it . . . then consume it!

Have you had long processes in your life that produced excellent results? What would you say to someone who is in the middle of that process and can’t see the end of it yet? Share a few words in the comments.

It reminds me of the story of Gideon, a judge of Israel. After an angel appeared to him and foretold the victory God had in mind, Gideon asked for a sign. First he laid out a fleece and asked for the fleece to have dew on it in the morning, but for the ground around it to be dry. The next morning, the fleece was wet and the ground was dry. Then Gideon asked for the situation to be reversed. Again God answered: the fleece was dry and the ground was wet with dew. He didn’t ask for another sign.

Perhaps Gideon doesn’t seem to be a great man of faith just yet. After all, it took an angel and two miracles for him to believe. He is not the picture of confidence and valor that people look for in a leader. But God had chosen him, and now God showed his own confidence: “Gideon! Your army is too big! If you win a battle with this army, Israel won’t accept that it was My doing. Tell all the fearful men to go home.” The army of 32,000 shrank to 10,000 after that announcement. God spoke again: “Your army is still too big — go to the water and have the men drink. Let only the watchful men stay.” Gideon was left with 300 men.

If you’ve heard this story before, you probably think I’m going to say that God told Gideon to equip the men with trumpets and pitchers and lamps and go out to battle with that odd assortment of weapons. But there’s a problem: God didn’t tell Gideon what to do after that, other than to go fight the Midianites. Gideon was in serious need of direction.

So who came up with the battle plan? Who decided that trumpets and lamps were the weapons of a victorious army? Apparently Gideon did. After setting him on the right path, God left the method of victory up to Gideon. He made a choice . . . and God stepped in to back him up. It was Gideon’s plan, but God’s victory.

I’ve often wondered if I would have the guts to make a choice like that. It seems like there are so many ways to make a wrong choice. But the story of Gideon helps me realize that if God has trusted me with a choice and my heart is in the right place, I will always make the right choice because He will back it up.

When everything around us seems to be going wrong and our life is crumbling at the foundations, we lose sight of God’s goodness because we are shrouded in the feelings and thoughts created by our circumstances. Personally, I struggle to see God’s goodness when things aren’t going the way I think they should be. Every Christian has this struggle at some point in time. We forget that when we signed up to be a part of God’s army, we really were signing up for an army. There will be battles to fight, giants to face, and dreams to lay aside. God did not promise that life would be easy: He told us to take up our cross and follow him.

Perhaps we need to be reminded that it was not without reason that Isaiah called Jesus “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.” Follow Him down the path that he took — a path that was paved with pain, suffering, heartache, trial, temptation, frustration, and even death. If we take His path we will surely experience all of these things.

However, if we stick to the path laid out for us in scripture, trusting in Him, God will reveal to us His goodness, His grace, and His love. He promised to pick us up when we fall, to carry us when we have no strength, and to lead us to a glorious finish and a new beginning. Because of His goodness, I can’t wait to pick up my cross again tomorrow, even though it seems heavy. If I am in His will, He will help me carry it.

That famous phrase can be used in almost any form of competition, from the World Series to a Scrabble tournament, from a heavyweight fight to the final scene of a drama. The thrill of the odds-defying comeback story has probably enchanted everyone at some time.

But I want to talk about something even more significant than a story line or the encouragement of a coach or a Yogi Berra quote.  I’m talking about dreams that have died. About promises that have not yet visibly produced and ideas and thoughts you had that now seem impossible. I’m talking about the healthy relationships you desired or the realization you aspired to.

Think about the things that have been buried deep inside you: the promises, giftings, callings, and abilities; the words of hope and love you once longed to feel. You may have even forgotten them. Maybe you’ve just given up. You don’t want to be disappointed again, so it’s easier just not to hope.

But it ain’t over till it’s over.

Let me tell you about a woman named Rahab who lived in the city of Jericho.  She was not the local success story; in fact, she was a harlot. There were probably other things she would have preferred to do for a living, but for whatever reasons she was stuck being who she had become.  Maybe she had longed to be a respected woman.  But now she was trapped in Jericho, a city doomed for destruction.

The Israelites were marching toward her home. She knew the power of the God of the Israel: His mighty acts of protection and provision and how He had delivered opposing armies into their hands. It must have been an awful feeling. The thought, “my life is a wreck and now all hope is gone,” must have crossed her mind at some point.

It seemed like the end of the book. To Rahab’s joy, it was really the beginning of a new chapter: God gave Rahab and her family another chance. That’s exactly what God wants do for anyone who has dreamed and whose dream has died. Things may seem to be getting worse and worse, just like Rahab’s situation in Jericho. Everything she had known and everything she was used to was crumbling around her. But through this shake-up, God was making a way for her to escape the dream-killing, aspiration-quenching place she had been stuck in.

What seems like shaking and up-heaving and un-surety might just be God liberating you to believe again. Maybe the hopelessness around you is God tearing down the walls that have confine you. Let Him breathe life into dreams the giver of all good gifts has given you. Hope again, believe again, trust God again.  And remember . . . it ain’t over till it’s over, baby!

Has God restored some dreams in your life? Or are you in the middle of a shakedown? Visit the comments section for this article and remind someone that it’s not over yet!

When oil painting the artist will use multiple layers to bring the painting to the point of being ready to be unveiled. It’s the kind of work that takes a great deal of patience. Many times I have noticed God working on our lives in “layers,” either adding or removing them depending on the situation.

Image of oil painting from freeparking on Flickr

As an example, we recently had a “watch-night” service in which God changed something in me — but I didn’t know what He had done. I just let the Artist paint me the way he saw fit.

It is beautiful when we allow the Artist to paint the layers of our life even though we are unsure or unable to comprehend what he is doing. This is where trust comes into play. We must be willing to trust that God knows what he’s doing even if we don’t understand what the process is doing in us.

My own experience with art class was brief, but I did notice that the base layer of the painting was not always the same as what came out in the end. The beginning was only one of the layers to the masterpiece.

Layers may be a situation or circumstance that God allows into our lives. They’re not always what we want, but He is making a masterpiece. You may not like the layer the Master Painter is adding right now, but I implore you to let Him finish. The Artist knows what He intends to create. Trust God with the layers He is adding to your life, and in the end it will be something beautiful.

Have you noticed the layers God puts in your life? Has He given you “beauty for ashes” (Isaiah 61:3) on the way? What does it mean for your attitude? Tell us your story in the comments.

God created process for a reason. He even went through a process himself: Jesus didn’t just run to the cross, fling himself on it, and die. There was a process He had to go through. He had to see what it was like to be in our shoes. He had to feel our pain, know what we go through, and experience death. He was to be our perfect example – but it took a process.

We go through processes, too. Our lives are processes. We have to go through different situations to learn what God’s plan is. God can’t just poof us to the end of our current circumstances to make us comfortable. We have to go through the process He has us in to learn what life is like. There are different lessons to learn on the way to the final lesson God wants you to learn.

No, our lessons aren’t comfortable all the time, and no, we may not want to go through them, but it is necessary. I know multiple families from the church I attend are finding this principle to be true. Some of them have gone through sickness, financial difficulties, and loss on massive scales. But it’s a process. God is teaching us to rely completely on him. he’s teaching us to fall back on his promises and to trust Him completely.

Trust is not the easiest thing to do in that situation, but that’s part of the process. Experiences change you. They shape you and the way you think. God has plans for you and I, and those plans will change who we are forever. God isn’t bringing you through a process for no reason. He’s teaching you and making you better along the way! Let Him take you through the process you’re experiencing right now. You will be glad in the end that you did.

Does God have you in process right now? Have experiences shaped your life in ways that seemed unfair at first, but ended up preparing you to help others? Share some encouragement or just discuss the processes you see right now in the comments.