As I was going through my devotionals this morning I noticed there was a certain theme to each one of them. They all had a different topic, but the theme was the same. And that theme was to "stay grounded" or "stay put" in Christ. No matter what fears come your way, no matter what trials come your way and no matter what temptations come your way....stay solid in Jesus...during and after!
It is quite obvious that the one thing the enemy wants to do is cause you to stray from God. It is his number 1 goal. It is the only thing that allows him to move into your live and cause trouble. If he cannot get you to distance yourself from God, then he knows he has nowhere to move in. We often hear messages or read about things the things that can cause distance too. And for the most part they are always things of the this world...sin, heartache, trouble, temptation....these are topics we tend to hear about the most. However, there is also one thing, that if we are not careful, can cause us to distance ourselves in a way that we are almost completely oblivious to. And it could be one of the most dangerous ones because we can be so blind to it. What I am referring to is a distance that comes between you and God because the calm has come from the storm you were in. Things look better. The "light at the end of the tunnel" is finally starting to shine or the headache that has been crushing you is finally losing it's grip on you. These all sound like great things...and they are, but what we must not forget when things start to look better is the One who made them better for us. We lean so hard on God in the difficult times, but then we tend to start to stand on our own again when the hardship (whatever it was) starts to ease up. DON'T do this!!! This again is something the enemy wants you to do. God just brought you through something that may have looked impossible on your own. During that time you relied on Him, grew closer to Him, told others about Him and maybe even started doing more work for Him. Then as time passes and the storm passes, we can find ourselves praying less, making less time for Him, giving our testimony less....and even serving less. Not because we are trying to shut God out of our life, but because there is this human side to us that feels like we need to "stand on our own 2 feet" again once things start to look better. And I can't help but think that when we do this....when we act like this....God is just shaking His head (in love) and saying "did you not learn anything?".
This trap can be so easy to fall into. I've even caught myself in it and I have to remind myself of all He just brought me through. What did I learn from it all? I know this will not be the last thing I will "need" Him for and the closer I can stay to Him when things are good, then the easier it is going to be to get through the next thing satan throughs at me. But most importantly.....the closer I can stay to Him when things are good, the more He can use me to impact the life of someone else who may be in the midst of their storm. And ultimately I can't help but think this is really what it's all about....it's His design. To bring us through things so we will point others to Him when they are going through things. And what a better way to do this than to continue to grow in Him and through Him even after the storm is over. What better way put satan in his place than to show him...not only did I make it through the storm, but because of the storm I came out stronger and closer to God and have a desire to serve Him even more. When we look at it like this, it enables us to one day look back on the storm that He brought us through and say "thank you for that storm, it got me where I am today".
Look at the enemy and quote Genesis 50:20 "But as for you, you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, in order to bring it about as it is this day, to save many people alive."
God, we thank You for bringing us through our trials, heartaches and temptations. But God we apologize for the times that we have backed off in our "chase for you" after the storm has passed. Help us keep the zeal that brought us through the storm so that we can praise You, worship You and serve You in the good times, just as passionately as we did in the hard times. Help us to look for ways to be used to help those who may be going through what you just brought us through! In Jesus name, Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment