Why do we praise God in suffering?

Why should we worship God in untoward circumstances? We do know why we worship God in the gracious provisions and happy times of our lives, but why would or should we worship in our confusion about the will of God? {Trusting God, Jerry Bridges is the resource for this subject and many many sermons have been preached by many people} It seems to me, just to boil down my own miniscule experience of worship, since becoming a Christian that the word of God directs us to focus on God being just and the justifier of them that come to God through Christ. That is the warfare on this earth as expressed in Scripture. If we justify God in our lack of understanding, He promises to justify us and our situation, eternally. We really do deserve Hell, but Christ has paid our ransome. It is so easy to forget this as we live in the lavish mercy of God that He extends to us so liberally. The first thing that we say in suffering is "Where is God?" "How could He love me and let me go through this or that thing?" It is not fun to suffer and it is not fun to worship in suffering. But when we do, we experience God's perspective of being seated in "heavenly places" together with Christ in viewing the losses and difficulties. God will show us His reasoning, by and by, but for now to express verbally, that He is worthy of worship regardless of my situation is a reminder of His supremacy in the world.

Lord of the flies, vs. Lord Sabaoth? God is greater, than any problem I have.

James 5 vs. 3-8 Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days. Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth. Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton; ye have nourished your hearts, as in a day of slaughter. Ye have condemned and killed the just; and he doth not resist you. Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain. Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts: for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh.

“ All one body, we. One in faith and doctrine, one in charity…”

God warns us for our own good, about the day of prosperity. Know why you’re given the day of prosperity that you are given. Know that God is weighing the usefulness and the circumspec t way that you are using your resources. Are you wanton? Are you concerned about the wastefulness of the day in which you live? Are you thrifty and looking for where better use can be made of your riches?

This passage, almost above all other passages makes me think of why RL Stevenson wrote Kidnapped. He said, as it were, “I have been in complete need and predisposed to a wasteful uncle and I have seen poverty sit, on the bay waiting for the benevolent hand of the rich person to share and make use of his riches and he sat inside afraid to interact and afraid to create an economy of life-giving for his world and curses came upon him of great proportion, pray his soul was spared, in eternity. But what good uncle could have done?”paraphrase is mine, of course.

God promises in James to make those curses come to fruition when a person of means hides his wealth in the attic. I could see the dance of the dry bones at the bottom of the fall from the stairs, which signifies the power that wealth has to {even, as it were} breathe life into the dry bones of spiritual death. He didn't fall into the valley of dry bones, but imagined that if he had fallen into the valley of dry bones, God would have breathed upon him. It was an allegory. The power of wealth can be used to pick us up, as a culture or judge us. The last days that James is speaking of, seems to be the day when there is Christian wealth makers and givers. Seems a fearful thing, but could it be that a Christian could be rich? James doesn't seem to say this. God can redeem that day.

When the principles of Christianity and wealth come together and RL Stevenson who has seen the woman cursing on the other side of the moat of need holds the reigns of society and not the foolish uncle, what would he do? This to me is the picture of Clarence Day Sr. They showed, he hired people to do everything for him. One servant cleaned the stairs and one servant opened the door for people and one servant cared for the cooking, etc. Down to even his spiritual life, it even seemed that his soul was bartered out to his wife, as it were. He seemed to say, my soul’s business is my wife’s affairs. She is hired to get me to heaven. An amazing thought that culture had been so affected by Stevenson that a seeming rank sinner, raised with no real fear of God would have been so touched by common grace to think in such a way.

I certainly seems to show that you are what you eat. God will judge us by what we feed our children. If we feed them Lord of the Flies, God will become the Lord of the Flies to us. If we feed them Kidnapped, the sinners will become David Balfour. We judge ourselves on this manner. What calls the wrath of God upon our culture, James tells us in James 5. The world is not much different from Elijah’s day, is it? James says. God will be entreated for the earth, as he was with Noah and Elijah prayed for his nation and God was well entreated. How much the more, when the reigns of society are given to the godly, or godfearing man, what a force for good that can be in the world; imagine. Thank God, He has given us all things for life and godliness and even resources to teach us to flee our own wastefulness. Amen.

Kidnapped, online resource I am afraid, Lord. Your Word has found me out. How do I know you will have mercy upon me? Christ alone has paid it all. Is my trust in Him? Cursed is the arm of flesh. If my trust is in my own works, they will fail me. If my trust is in another they will forget me. If my trust is in Christ, He will own me for the sake of His glory. I have nothing to merit salvation on my own merit. I have forsaken my own way. I must repent and forsake the sins of my past and flee to Christ daily and solely for salvation or my trust is futile. I will arise and go to Jesus, He will embrace me in His arms!...Embrace me with Your Grace and Mercy, Dear Jesus and then, make me an agent of blessing on the earth for Your Glory and not for my own glory. In Jesus Name, Amen.

Psalm 42... He is the Health of my Countenance?

When I can't see the purposes of God in my situation it clearly causes fear and sadness. David, seemed to be expressing this feeling in his lament and calling unto God. I want to see what is making me so sad, seemed the call from the depths of soul. In some seasons I seem aware that God is with me though the darkness of the situation might be deep and then, at other times I can't see His presence. I can't see His favor toward me; I can't see how this would or could be His will and He still love me;etc. When the clouds roll away from my eyes and I see His "face", as it were I am helped. His visage is the encouragement of my soul. Amen, Oh I want to see Him!

This is My Father's World?

This is my Father's world, And to my list'ning ears, All nature sings, and round me rings The music of the spheres. This is my Father's world, I rest me in the thought Of rocks and trees, of skies and seas; His hand the wonders wrought.

There is rest in the thought that we are the creation of a thoughtful and careful Creator. Nature sings. The music of the spheres is on the lips of creation and we either sing along, or we don't. Are we singing the praises of our creator? Or, are we singing the praises of ourselves? Aren't we beautiful, is the antithesis of the praise of God. We don't always see this point. We don't say God is nothing, but, like the devil, we say, we will be beautiful as God is, if we are not praising Him. He is worthy of all of the praises in the universe. We are in danger, the closer that we are to the worship of God. The temptation to syphon off a little of the praise and lavish it upon ourselves is our human condition. The devil did that and he will never return to his position. Praise God for the grace and mercy that we have received that our stumblings in this way, don't solidify our condition apart from His grace! Nature sings God's Glory! We sing the mighty power of God, that make the "mountains rise". We have access to God's mercy, through the sacrifice of Christ. It should make us more replete and lavish in our worship than the rest of creation. Oh, Halleluia! We get to sit between creation and the creator, to hear creation delight in His Glories and enter into the praise, as well.

Is it Father's Day yet? {from an essay on Sept 24,2010}

Our father on the earth...ie. Mr. Day {Life with Father}, Mr. Knight{my great grandmother's father} and everything in between

It is not polite what people call children who grow up without a father. I call them bereft, at the very least. Some men have impressed our culture to have them exemplified by their children who have risen and called them examples of what Christianity can lift men to aspire to live up to the ultimate example of God as Heavenly Father. Not just in America, but I love the ones exemplified in America, most. {but, of course, I am biased, in that American way.} The examples that I am considering came from the Cosby show, Life with Father, Cheaper by the Dozen and How Green was My Valley, Spencer's Mountain, Yours Mine and Ours, etc. My father's lifelong grief that he had to grow up without his father led me to look at what men personified fatherhood, to him and to me through him and why.

Since our culture is truly affected by the Judeo-Christian ethic and every good and perfect gift comes from the father of lights in whom is no variableness of turning, I think it is a blessing and unto gratitude and edification to consider the blessing of fatherhood throughout recent history as given to us in the remembrances of children who have been affected or infected by the grace of God in Christ, either directly as Christian children or indirectly, by being in the agreement of the American government that we have inherited.

Calling God our Father, in Heaven has a sacred intimacy that is, at times taken for granted or deemphasized. Jesus could have said, say "Our Heavenly Monarch", which would have had a certain denotation which is certainly appropriate. "Our Father" intimates that we have access to knowledge about God that people, unbought {by the blood of Jesus} have not.

The Day children, the Gilbraith's the Llewellyns, etc. were reared in a time that cherished the biblical example of fatherhood and shined it up and put it on a pedestal; Not the man, but the office, as was clear in their remembrances. Christianity in America and the known world had developed to a point where the role of father was not eaten up by the peer pressure of conformity to materialism. All of the other "isms", no less present then as now, were subservient to the family dynamic. War changed that for everybody and much of what Bill Cosby seemed to do in his expression of the contemporary, post war father, was pick up the pieces of fatherhood that war had shot to smytherines.

It is God's Bride the Church who has developed culture to the point where fatherhood is able to imitate God, to any degree, in any time period. God makes His Church long for what is the image of God on the earth and the battle lines are drawn for the Church to take up the gauntlet and fight.

I do pray that as we honor our fathers on fathers day. We will see and appreciate the love of Christ to give us such a concept of loving leadership. God give us the intelligence and skill to protect and project the real fatherhood that God is and rejoice that we have some part of fighting for the preservation of faithful fatherhood in our day. It is of your mercies that we are not consumed and Your image consumed from us. We have Your example God, to attempt to imitate. Bless our men to be emboldened to attempt the impossible, for the Glory of God. In Jesus' Name, Amen.

Christ holds the keys of sound wisdom and righteousness!

Proverbs 2:7. He layeth up sound wisdom for the righteous: he is a buckler to them that walk uprightly. 8. He keepeth the paths of judgment, and pre- serveth the way of his saints. 9. Then shalt thou understand righteous- ness, and judgment, and equity; yea every good path.

What a clear reminder is this truth in Proverbs 2 this morning. Charles Bridges underscored the reality in this most coveteous generation that we have been born into. Yes, we may be born into the most prosperous generation in the history of the world and it is impossible to see Christ clearly for the advantages that we have inherited. In Christ, we come as beggars, for the keys of protection from our own lusts and advantages. We are no less to come to the foot of the cross to find mercy and grace to help in the time of need. What greater need than the need of great advantage. Our bellies distended at our continuous corruption in the light of the blessings of prosperity that we have afforded to us. God has our state in His hands. God has bid us, through Charles Bridges this morning to see our need as an opportunity for our Lord and Saviour to grnt us the protection that we need for our souls. In reality, our prosperity clears our mind, if we are honest to know ourselves to be paupers, before the one most highly exalted one. Only, by His Grace we will be saved. We hold as it were one hope in our hands and there are tangled threads around us. Only one of those threads will not break in the day of our greatest need. If we are holding any other hope but the blood of Jesus, we will sink into the abyss. Our daily reminder is where is your treasure? If beauty, it will fade, if friends and lovers, they will forsake, if money it will rot, if Christ, we will reign with Him and all of these things that we hold loosely are preparing us for the greater glory of judging the angels. Let us learn to walk uprightly, that our hearts will be "buckled"{pun intended} correctly to the truth of God and that in that day we should be found having our eternal hope not dashed. Serving the Lord with gladness and giving ourselves in service to those around us, for the Glory of God! Halleluia and may we be found worthy to live eternally with our Saviour! He is the only hope for our condition. We lose, only in that we do not come to Him. Amen.Proverbs 2 commentary from Charles Bridges. God's blessing to us today.

The Faith of Saul?

Where is your faith, today? Is it the faith of the godly David? or, is it the faith of the lost soul Saul? Saul had every advantage, except one a godly moabitess Great grandmother. Let's not go back to Moab, she spoke in her silence. It is not the lineage, that is the advantage, but the perspective. Which way is Moab? It is in your heart, says godly Ruth, to us her spiritual grandchildren. Is it in the music? Is it in the dress? Those are fruit of the godlessness, says grandma. The real fruit is in your heart. Do you worship the true and living God in your heart? Are you willing to make that move from the comfortable relationships of kinship with the familiar to get to know God, who is so other from us, in His holiness, in His truth, but most of all, in His Faithfulness. He is truly other than us. Ruth said to Naomi, I will not leave you and God said to Ruth, I'll not leave you either. Nearly completely destitute of all true relationships but eachother and defiled by having been out there in the world was their condition. They dared to trust God. God made manifest His fidelity to heart religion. Not externalism, but true heart love and still, His relationship with Ruth is manifest to the world. He continues to save the Moabites. He continues to save to the utmost, those who truly come to God through Ruth's most beloved, decendant, the Lord Jesus! Halleluia, What a Savior!