EMBRACING & REJECTING CAN PRODUCE BLESSING
Today, we begin a new working week with all its potential possibilities and wonderful blessings that will come our way in our walk with the Lord.
I do trust you had a blessed time in the House of God this weekend, we sure did, the worship was sweet, as we focused on the Lord, the preaching of the Word challenged and encouraged us. In the afternoon, we went to see the movie “The least of these” the story of the Australian Missionary called Graham Staines who was killed by Hindu extremists in the State of Orissa in India. The movie was so Christ centred and highlighted a choice man of God who gave over 30 years of Missionary service especially amongst the sufferers of leprosy in India. I came away very blest.
In my readings today I came across two verses of Scriptures one from the Old Testament and one from the New Testament, totally unrelated but showing how one thing creates another in the life of the Believer, and how one thing rejected will produce something awesome in the life of the Believer.
In Exodus 33:14 NKJV we read “My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.” The NLT says “I will personally go with you, Moses, and I will give you rest—everything will be fine for you.”
The MESSAGE says “My presence will go with you. I’ll see the journey to the end.”
I do not think there is anything better in the Believer’s experience that to be able to constantly experience the manifest presence of God in one’s life, I guess it can mean many things to many people, to me it is an ANCHOR in the storms of life, and as we read it the NKJV it gives you REST, you are aware of being able to trust the Lord because you know He is with you. In the NLT we read it puts in your heart the realisation that EVERYTHING WILL BE FINE FOR US. And as the Message says, we have that assurance that God will not abandon us and leave us as an orphan, but will be with us right to the end.
LIVE IN GOD’S PRESENCE AND YOU WILL EXPERIENCE GOD’S REST.
In 1 Peter 5:5 NKJV we read “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” The AMP N.T. says Clothe (apron) yourselves, all of you, with humility [as the garb of a servant, so that its covering cannot possibly be stripped from you, with freedom from pride and arrogance] toward one another. For God sets Himself against the proud (the insolent, the overbearing, the disdainful, the presumptuous, the boastful)—[and He opposes, frustrates, and defeats them], but gives grace (favor, blessing) to the humble. The MESSAGE says God has had it with the proud, but takes delight in just plain people.
The AMP N.T. encourages us to totally reject pride and put on HUMILITY like a garment permanently (not as an occasional accessory and have the attitude and mindset of a servant, and in the place of pride God will give us HIS GRACE, HIS FAVOUR AND BLESSING.
We need to regularly think about THE PIT FROM WHENCE WE WERE DUG, that all we deserved was the lowest hell and eternal separation from God, but Jesus came and WITHOUT HIM WE CAN DO NOTHING, but constantly throw ourselves on the grace and mercy of God, and as the MESSAGE SAYS be a simple plain person, and people will see the grave of God reflected in your life.
Do you want rest, EMBRACE AND LIVE IN HIS PRESENCE, Do you want to experience the GRACE OF GOD, reject, stinking pride and make HUMILITY AND SERVANTHOOD A LIFESTYLE.
