THAT SINKING FEELING

“Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus. But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, ‘Lord, save me!’ Immediately Jesus reached out His hand and caught him. ‘You of little faith,” He said, “why did you doubt?’”  (Matthew 14:29b-31 NIV)

I've heard many Christians say that faith is not a matter of feelings. Generalizations can be misleading. God created us -- feelings and all. In many Bible stories, we see God being "moved" to action. Many miracles of Jesus are preceded by heartfelt compassion.

It is not wise to deny our feelings. Rather, we should seek to know the source of our feelings. Peter, in his joy and relief of seeing the Lord, began to walk on water. But fear of the rough sea soon caused him to sink. For Peter, fear of being overcome by the sea literally became a sinking feeling.

Do you ever get that sinking feeling? Denying it won't change your situation and going it alone isn't going to save you. Instead do what Peter did: Immediately take hold of the Lord's hand. A rescue may seem far away, but the Lord is always within reach. Your feelings can be a very powerful way in which the Lord works out His plan in you. 

-- Alan Neal

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THAT ALL-TIME RELIGION

“Calling the crowd to Him with His disciples, Jesus said to them, ‘If anyone would come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me.”  (Mark 8:34)

I am not here to please the dominant culture or to serve any all-show, no-go bureaucracies. I live to please my Lord and Savior. My spiritual taste buds have graduated from fizz and froth to Fire and Ice. Sometimes I’m called to sharpen the cutting edge, and sometimes to blunt the cutting edge. Don’t give me that old-time religion. Don’t give me that new-time religion. Give me that all-time religion that’s as hard as rock and soft as snow.

I’ve stopped trying to make life work, and started trying to make life sing. I’m finished with the secondhand sensations; third-rate dreams; low-risk, high-rise trades; and goose-stepping crusades. I no longer live by and for anything but everything God-breathed, Christ-centered, and Spirit-driven. 

-- Leonard Sweet, excerpted from his “Magna Carta of Trust” published in his book “A Cup of Coffee at the Soul Cafe”

SHARING GRACE

Jesus said, “Since I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash each other’s feet. I have given you an example to follow. Do as I have done to you.”  (John 13:14-15 NLT)

Grace has happened to you. Look at your feet. They are wet -- grace soaked. Your toes and arches and heels have felt the cool basin of God’s grace. Jesus has washed the grimiest parts of your life. He didn’t bypass you and carry the basin toward someone else. If grace were a wheat field, he’s bequeathed you the state of Kansas. Can’t you share your grace with others?

To accept grace is to accept the vow to give it. 

-- Max Lucado in “Grace: More Than We Deserve, Greater Than We Imagine”

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FEAR OF CHANGE

“Now a certain man was there who had an infirmity thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there [by the pool], and knew that he already had been in that condition a long time, He said to him, ‘Do you want to be made well?’”  (John 5:5-6 NKJV)

Who wouldn’t want help? Someone afraid of change.

This man was sick for quite a duration. At a point approaching four decades, it was the only life he knew. He may not have liked it, but he learned to survive as a beggar. Times were tough, but on the upside he hadn’t had to learn a trade or put his back into hard work. His home was his mat. His community was the pool, and he was who he was. It’s amazing what people can learn to endure.

And isn’t there a touch of this man in all of us? We accept a lot of things that we know could be better. We say, “Well, that’s just my life,” as if it’s engraved in stone. We decide God must want us to be here, because if he didn’t, he’d make something else happen. In other words, we blame God. And if it’s God’s fault that we are in the situation we are in, then why would we ask Him for help?

After a while we get used to things, and a limited life is less frightening than the thought of change. Resignation is better than disappointment. 

-- Kyle Idleman in “The End of Me: Where Real Life in the Upside-Down Ways of Jesus Begins”

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OUR RESPONSE MATTERS

“We know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose.”  (Romans 8:28 NIV)

We cannot always or even often control events, but we can control how we respond to them. When things happen which dismay or appall, we ought to look to God for His meaning, remembering that He is not taken by surprise not can His purposes be thwarted in the end. What God looks for is those who will worship Him in the midst of every circumstance. Our outlook of inquiring trust glorifies Him. This is our first responsibility: to glorify God. In the face of life’s worst reversals and tragedies, the response of a faithful Christian is praise -- not for the wrong itself, certainly, but for who God is and for the ultimate assurance that there is a pattern being worked out for those who love Him. 

-- Elisabeth Elliot in “A Lamp for My Feet” 

(Elisabeth Elliot, 1926 – 2015, was a Christian author and speaker. Her first husband, Jim Elliot, was killed in 1956 while attempting to make missionary contact with the Auca people (now known as Huaorani) of eastern Ecuador. She later spent two years as a missionary to the tribe members who killed her husband. Returning to the United States after many years in South America, she became widely known as the author of over twenty books and as a speaker. Elliot toured the country, sharing her knowledge and experience, well into her seventies.)

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