Broken things

From Streams.. March 15

"Fear not, thou worm Jacob....I will make thee a threshing instrument with teeth." (Isa. 41:14, 15.)

Could any two things be in greater contrast than a worm and an instrument with teeth? The worm is delicate, bruised by a stone, crushed beneath the passing wheel; an instrument with teeth can break and not be broken; it can grave its mark upon the rock. And the mighty God can convert the one into the other. He can take a man or a nation, who has all the impotence of the worm, and by the invigoration of His own Spirit, He can endow with strength by which a noble mark is left upon the history of the time.

And so the "worm" may take heart. The mighty God can make us stronger than our circumstances. He can bend them all to our good. In God's strengthwe can make them all pay tribute to our souls. We can even take hold of a black disappointment, break it open, and extract some jewel of grace. When God gives us wills like iron, we can drive through difficulties as the iron share cuts through the toughest soil. "I will make thee," and shall He not do it? --- Dr. Jowett.

"Christ is building His kingdom with earth's broken things. Men want only the strong, the successful, the victorious, the unbroken, in building their kingdoms; but God is the God of the unsuccessful, of those who have failed. Heaven is filling with earth's broken lives, and there is no bruised reed that Christ cannot take and restore to glorious blessedness and beauty. He can take the life crushed by pain or sorrow and make it into a harp whose music shall be all praise. he can lift earth's saddest failure up to heaven's glory. --- J. R. Miller. "

["Follow Me, and I will make you".... Make you speak My words with power, Make you channels of My mercy, Make you helpful every hour. ]

["Follow Me, and I will make you".... Make you what you cannot be�w Make you loving, trustful, godly, Make you even like to me.
--- L. S. P. ]

Lord, I need you.

Lord I come I confess

Bowing here I find my rest

And without You I fall apart

You're the one that guides my heart

Lord I need You oh I need You

Ev'ry hour I need You

My one defense my righteousness

Oh God how I need You

Where sin runs deep Your grace is more

Where grace is found is where You are

And where You are Lord I am free

Holiness is Christ in me

Where You are Lord I am free

Holiness is Christ in me

So teach my soul to rise to You

When temptation comes my way

And when I cannot stand I'll fall on You

Jesus You're my hope and stay

And when I cannot stand I'll fall on You

Jesus You're my hope and stay

 

 

 

Holy Spirit Pleading

Romans 8:24-28

     We are saved by trusting. And trusting means looking forward to getting something that we don't yet have - for a man who already has something doesn't need to hope and trust that he will get it. But if we must keep trusting God for something that hasn't happened yet, it teaches us to wait patiently and confidently.
     And in the same way - by our faith - the holy spirit helps us with our daily problems and in our praying. For we don't even know what we should pray for, nor how to pray as we should; the holy spirit prays for us with such feeling that it cannot be expressed in words. And the father who knows all hearts knows, of course, what the Spirit says as he pleds for us in harmony with God's own will.
     And we know that all that happends to us is working for our good if we love God and are fitting into his plans.

The Echoes of Eternity

"Eternity" Bridge at the Sydney Olympics
 
[Ecclesiastes 3:11-14]

"He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet <sup>no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end. 12 I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live. 13 That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God. 14 I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it..."

Pastor spoke today and told a story about a man named Arthur Stace...

(The following is from Wiki..)

Arthur Malcolm Stace (9 February 1884 – 30 July 1967), otherwise known as Mr Eternity, was an Australian reformed alcoholic who converted to Christianity and spread his form of gospel by writing the word "Eternity'" in chalk on footpaths in Sydney over a period of approximately 35 years.[1] Only four known photographs of Stace exist, all of which were taken by Trevor Dallen for the Sydney Sun.



The child of alcoholics, he was brought up in poverty. In order to survive, he resorted to stealing bread and milk and searching for scraps of food in bins. By the age of 12, Stace, with virtually no formal schooling, had become a ward of the state. As a teenager, he became an alcoholic and was subsequently sent to jail at 15. Afterwards, he worked as a "cockatoo" or a look-out for a Two-up "school". In his twenties, he was a scout for his sisters' brothels. In March 1916, at age 26, he enlisted for World War I. He suffered recurring bouts of bronchitis and pleurisy, which led to his medical discharge on 2 April 1919.

Stace converted to Christianity on the night of 6 August 1930, after hearing an inspirational sermon by the Reverend R. B. S. Hammond at St. Barnabas Church, Broadway. Inspired by the words, he became enamoured of the notion of eternity. Two years later, on 14 November 1932, Arthur was further inspired by the preaching of evangelist John G. Ridley,[2] MC on "The echoes of Eternity" from Isaiah 57:15:
"For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth Eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones."
John Ridley's words,"Eternity, Eternity, I wish that I could sound or shout that word to everyone in the streets of Sydney. You've got to meet it, where will you spend Eternity?" proved crucial in Stace's decision to tell others about his faith. In an interview, Stace said, "Eternity went ringing through my brain and suddenly I began crying and felt a powerful call from the Lord to write Eternity." Even though he was illiterate and could hardly write his own name Arthur, legibly, "the word 'Eternity' came out smoothly, in a beautiful copperplate script. I couldn't understand it, and I still can't."</sup>

After eight or nine years, he tried to write something else, "Obey God" and then five years later, "God or Sin" but he could not bring himself to stop writing "Eternity".

"Eternity, Eternity, I wish that I could sound or shout that word to everyone in the streets of Sydney. You've got to meet it, where will you spend Eternity?"

..I am coming

 

 

I was reading my bible late last night and came across a verse in 2 Corinthians that, whether I've read it before or not, seemed completely new. This version of the verse struck me in a new way and I'm grateful I came across it. I've thought about the times in my life that included sorrow that caused me to turn to Him. Our sorrow comes from all sorts of things, but the "best" and most fruitful kind is the kind that turn our hearts toward God. I look back and think about the times I would say were filled with the most sorrow, and I remember that those are the ones that pushed me to seek God the strongest.

I get the privelege of spending my wednesday nights with a group from 8-12 high school school girls, and last week we spoke on difficult times, their struggles, seeking other things for fulfillment, and intentionally seeking time with the Lord. Just like my girls, many of us have sought things to fulfill us besides the Lord...and time and time again these things do not fulfill. We create idols and have to learn over and over, "There shall be no other God's before me." We were created with an empty space in our hearts that can only be filled by a relationship with Jesus. Our world tells us we will find it through everything BUT Jesus, and so many people fall into that lie. I pray we turn away from the things that can never fulfill and bring eternal joy and turn our hearts to our loving, all powerful God. I have learned that it is in, by, and through Jesus that peace and fullness are found. Praise God for his grace and his open arms. May we take time for Him, because he has all the time time the world for us. I pray that this is what our hearts speak.....

 

[Psalm 27:8] My heart has heard you say, "Come and talk with me." And my heart responds, "LORD, I am coming."

Something Beautiful

"No experience in your life is ever wasted or in vain if you give all your cares to the Lord. Even if your fragmented life looks like an abandoned battlefield, Jesus can reshape all the pieces of your past into something beautiful....We need inner strength to keep from being overwhelmed by outward circumstances. We must allow God to gather up our fragmented dreams and remold us.... To do that, He may have to crush the few pieces we have left into fine clay, water us with His Word, reshape our lumpy mass of leftovers, and put us back on His potter's wheel. But He is more than capable of designing something miraculous from whatever we have left to give Him." -j.m.

Romans 8:28 -  And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who^[a] have been called according to his purpose.

[See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland. --Isaiah 43:19]

2 Corinthians 5:17 -Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

Romans 10:13    “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”

 

Psalm 91:4

He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.

 

My feather from Canyon Lake

 

In His timing...

But the dove found no rest for or the sole of her foot, and she returned unto him... And the dove came in to him in the evening; and, lo, in her mouth was an olive leaf (Gen. 8:9-11).

"God knows just when to withhold from us any visible sign of encouragement, and when to grant us such a sign. How good it is that we may trust Him anyway! When all visible evidences that He is remembering us are withheld, that is best; He wants us to realize that His Word, His promise of remembrance, is more substantial and dependable than any evidence of our senses. When He sends the visible evidence, that is well also; we appreciate it all the more after we have trusted Him without it. Those who are readiest to trust God without other evidence than His Word always receive the greatest number of visible evidences of His love."
--C. G. Trumbull

"Delays are not refusals; many a prayer is registered, and underneath it the words: "My time is not yet come." God has a set time as well as a set purpose, and He who orders the bounds of our habitation orders also the time of our deliverance."

Our Guidance

From Streams Devo...

"With skillful hands he led them. (Psalm 78:72)"

"When you are unsure which course to take, totally submit your own judgment to that of the Spirit of God, asking Him to shut every door except that right one. But meanwhile keep moving ahead and consider the absence of a direct indication from God to be the evidence of His will that you are on His path. And as you continue down the long road, you will find that He has gone before you, locking doors you otherwise would have been inclined to enter. Yet you can be sure that somewhere beyond the locked doors is one He has left unlocked. And when you open it and walk through, you will find yourself face to face with a turn in the river of opportunity -- one that is broader and deeper than anything you ever dared to imagine, even in your wildest dreams. So set sail on it, because it flows to the open sea.

God often guides us through our circumstances. One moment, our way may seem totally blocked, but then suddenly some seemingly trivial incident occurs, appears as nothing to others but speaking volumes to the keen eye of faith. And sometimes the events are repeated in various ways in response to our prayers. They certainly are not haphazard results of chance but are God opening up the way we should walk, by directing our circumstances. And they begin to multiply as we advance toward our goal, just as the lights of a city seem to increase as we speed toward it while at night. F. B. Meyer

If you go to God for guidance, He will guide you. But do not expect Him to console you by showing you His list of purposes concerning you, when you have displayed distrust or even half-trust in Him. What He will do, if you will trust Him and go cheerfully ahead when He shows you the way, is to guide you still farther. Horace Bushnell "

First.

 

How can we trust God if we do not know him? How can we know him if we do not read his word? How can we read his word if we don't make time for him? and how can we make time for him if we don't do everything we can to put him in the forefront of everything in our lives? We must put God first and let everything else follow.