How To Handle The Load You Are Under?

1 Peter 1:6 (KJV)
⁶ Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations:

Have you ever felt overloaded by burdens? Has life ever pressed you to the point where you wanted to quit?  Life has a way of emasculating your vigor and fortitude to forge forward.  The burdens of life have a way of wearing and weighing you down.  One thing after another seems to keep coming at you without any time to adjust to everything that is going on.

Have you ever felt like you have a bulls eye on your back and you are a moving target?  As time goes on you seem to lose your resolve and resiliency.  It gets harder to continue to function day in and out.  You try to appear as if everything is fine, but you know people can see through the mask you put on every day.  The situation seems to deteriorate as seconds turn into minutes, minutes into hours, hours into days, days into weeks, weeks into months and in some cases months into years.  What do you do when you pray for the load to be lightened, but it seems to get heavier?   How do you keep going when you try to motivate yourself to keep going but it does not work? 

The Apostle Peter encourages us in the midst of a season of trials.  He tells us in our season of suffering, affliction or trials to rejoice because it is only for a season.  That is good news to me.  God has determined and dictated the length of our season of trials.  You can rejoice because what you are experiencing now is only temporary.  I love the song that says, “I’m so glad that trouble doesn’t last always.”  We need to be reminded of that when we are going through our trials.  You are not the finished product.  Your life is not over.  God has not put the finishing touches on your life.  Things may be dark right now, and you can’t see your way.  However, a brighter day is ahead.  Peter also says to rejoice because the season of trials is necessary.  God is grooming you for your next season. 

It is necessary for you to cry right now, hurt right now, not understand right now, and to be alone right now.  Dr. A.W. Tozer says “God can’t use you greatly until he has hurt you deeply.”  The quote suggests to me that pain propels us into God’s purpose for our life.  Pain is merely weakness leaving the body.  It is also the fuel that helps pull the productivity out of us.  God knows what he is doing with your life and he is preparing you for your next season. Hang in there and remember the hardest fight is just to keep holding on.  

God bless and keep you is my prayer.

The Blueprint for Rest

Genesis 2:2 (KJV)      

² And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.

       We live in a very fast past world that demands so much of our time.  Have you ever found yourself wondering at the end of the day where the time went?  Do you look at your “to do” list and find you cannot seem to finish what you have started?  Do you feel anxious or overwhelmed on a day to day basis because of all of things you have to accomplish? 

       Life has a way of presenting us with multiple things at multiple times that seem to make our plate overflow.  I know we have many things we are obligated to, but often times we have too many irons in the fire.  I like the quote that says “The man that tries to master everything ends up mastering nothing at all.”  We have to learn how to be better stewards and managers of our time.  It starts by prioritizing and setting goals for ourselves.  If we learn to manage our time we won’t feel so rushed and we can experience true rest.

       In our text God gives us the blueprint on how to experience rest.  First of all, God had a plan before he started creating the world.  I know that sounds very elementary, but how many times we do things without planning and thinking it all the way through.  It is good to have a spontaneous idea, but it is better to take time to develop the idea before taking action.  God worked in stages to finish his plan.  We have to remember we cannot get it all done in one day.  It is fine not to finish everything in one day.  I really believe if God wanted to finish creation in one day he could have done so.  I think he took his time to teach us the value of not rushing to complete things.  He also demonstrated to us everything has a process in which it must go through before it is completed.  The scripture also teaches us everything has a natural sequence of order and we should live in a world of order and not chaos.  Most of us live in a world of organized chaos. 

        How often are you pushed to complete assignments and then in haste you do not do your very best?  When we learn to take our time and become better stewards and managers of our time then we can rest.  After God finished working, he could rest because all of his work was good.  When was the last time that you have felt a sense of fulfillment at the end of the day?  Can you lay down at night to rest knowing you gave God your best with the day he gave to you?  “Your life is a gift from God, and what you do with it is your gift back to him!”

God bless and keep you is my prayer.

How Do You View Your Trials?

James 1:2 (KJV)
² My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations;

Life has a way of making a swift transition without any signs or warnings.  It is interesting how one day you are perfectly well and the next day terminally ill.  One day you are on top of the world and then the next day you are looking up from the bottom.  One event can change the course of our life forever.  The reality of life is we do not know what will happen in our lives from day to day.   None of us can control what happens to us, but we can control how we respond to what happens.

James writes this letter to encourage believers who were suffering great trials.  Many of them had become discouraged because of the trials they were suffering.  Often times we become discouraged because of what we experience.  James says that in the midst of trials we can be encouraged if we look at our situation the right way.  How do you view your situation?  Do feel like God is picking on you?  Do you feel like a victim?  James says to count it all joy.  We need to have the right attitude about our situation.  What is your attitude concerning your situation?  Are you negative in the midst of your trial?  Are you difficult to deal with? 

James said to have joy.  Joy is an internal condition not based on our external conditions.  True joy can only be found through a relationship with Christ.  Do you have real joy?  If you don’t have true joy in the midst of your trial, it may be your relationship with Christ is out of place.  James also expresses we are not exempt from trials.  There are some things we have to go through to grow.  Trials are designed for us to grow.  When we are going through it, we need to seek to discover what God is trying to teach us.  We need to thank God for the opportunity to grow.  Do you thank God in the midst of the pressure, pain, and plethora of perplexities? 

God bless and keep you is my prayer.

Break the Cycle!

John 5:1-6 (KJV)
1 After this there was a feast of the Jews; and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 2 Now there is at Jerusalem by the sheep market a pool, which is called in the Hebrew tongue Bethesda, having five porches. 3 In these lay a great multitude of impotent folk, of blind, halt, withered, waiting for the moving of the water. 4 For an angel went down at a certain season into the pool, and troubled the water: whosoever then first after the troubling of the water stepped in was made whole of whatsoever disease he had. 5 And a certain man was there, which had an infirmity thirty and eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lie, and knew that he had been now a long time in that case, he saith unto him, "Wilt thou be made whole?"

Has your life ever felt like it is at a standstill? Have you ever examined your life and it seems as if you are in the same place you were last year? Often times we live in a vicious cycle of helplessness and sometimes we allow our situation to handicap us by holding us captive. When you look at the flow of your life, what keeps knocking your life off balance? Seemingly every time you turn around, the same issue keeps reappearing and you don’t know what to do. What do you do when you have a lingering issue that won’t go away? The issue has persisted so long you have conceded and given up on overcoming your issue. You have reasoned within yourself that maybe this is the life God intends for me to live. You question if things will ever get better or if things will change because the issue won’t go away. We have to remember to be optimistic when a situation is spiraling out of control. It does not matter how bad the situation is or how long you have been dealing with your issue. Our issues are never too bad to lose hope.

In the text mentioned above there is a very interesting story. As the text unfolds, we discover an impotent man who has an issue and he is sitting. This was the time of celebration but he is sitting instead of celebrating. Often times in our life we cannot see the forest because we are blinded by a tree. This man should have been thankful for all of the things going right in his life instead of focusing on one issue. For thirty-eight years this man had been enabled. He was always looking for others to do for him what he could do for himself. We have to be careful in life because enabling others leads to them depending on us. God never intended for us to depend on others, but to depend on Him. Stop looking for others to do for you what you can do for yourself. God is all about empowering others to take a step to do what seems impossible. This man was near breaking his cycle for thirty-eight years but fell short time after time. He sat around and for thirty-eight years and watched others overcome their issues.

When others are being delivered from issues around us, we might need to take a look at ourselves. Can you imagine seeing a different person year after year overcome issues? The question we need to ask is what is preventing me from moving forward or overcoming my issue? I can answer the question for you if your life is at a standstill and your issue is handicapping you. The answer is faith. Jesus asks the man a very pivotal question. Do you want to be made whole? That is where the solution lies to your issue. What do you want to do about your situation? Do you want to keep making excuses, feel sorry for yourself or make a change? If you want to change your situation, get up by faith, trust in God’s word, and do something about your situation.

God bless and keep you is my prayers.

The Fear Factor!

Numbers 13:33 (KJV)
33 And there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak, which come of the giants: and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight.

Mark Twain once said, “Do the thing you fear the most and the death of fear is certain.” I love that quote because it suggests in order to overcome our fears, we have to be willing to take a risk. Our lives can be summed up by the risks we have taken. If we look at our lives, many of us are at the place we are in life because we have not taken a risk. When was the last time that you have taken a risk? Does your fear of the unknown prevent you from taking a risk? Does fear paralyze you and hold you captive? There is nothing to fear but fear itself. All of us have a fear of something. What do you fear? Have you faced your fear? Fear is a tool the devil feeds off of and uses against us to make us underachieve. Sooner or later, we have to face our fears if we want to reach the destination God desires for us to reach.

In the text above, Israel is at a critical point. God’s vision for them is to make it to Canaan. Moses is ordered by God to send twelve spies into the land to scout out the land and bring back a report of the land. The twelve spies brought back evidence of the fruitfulness of the land. Despite the fact they brought back evidence, they allowed fear and the lack of faith to make them miss out on a golden opportunity. When you look at your life, what opportunities have you missed out on because of fear and the lack of faith? Ten of the spies gave a fearful report and two of the spies gave a faithful report. Fear always leads to doubt. When doubt sets in, it makes us look at things from the wrong perspective. It also makes us question where God is leading us. The ten men that brought back the fearful report focused on Giants in the land. It is interesting how fear makes things look bigger than they really are.

What are you facing that looks impossible or too big for you to face? There is nothing too big that we face for God or that God can’t get us through. Fear also makes you feel incapable of achieving whatever task has been assigned to you. It makes you doubt yourself and view yourself as insignificant. They had a bad view of themselves and they were worried about what others thought of them. You will never be able to achieve anything great in life and for God with low self worth. God has uniquely made everyone of us. Stop allowing others to define you and to determine how valuable you are to yourself. Self confidence comes from having faith in God and knowing he has equipped you with everything you need to accomplish whatever task he has assigned to your hands.

When I played football in college my coach used to ask us if we were afraid to be great. Are you afraid to be great?

God bless and keep you is my prayer.