“Wait” – a most vital element…

28 Saturday Apr 2012

Posted by GuestContributor in Prayer, Waiting

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difficulty, expectant, future, Hope, plan B, prayer, praying, trust, waiting

Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord! -Psalm 27:14

The waiting room: a place we’ve all been and a place each of us dread in one way or another. Waiting to hear the results on whether the cancer has spread, whether a loved one has survived surgery, or whether a new life will draw his/her first breath. We find ourselves breathlessly counting the seconds, as time itself seems to stand still.

“…waiting…is one of the most vital elements in our lives as Christians.”

Waiting is one of the hardest things for us to do, and yet it’s what we find ourselves having to do so often. We live in an age where life has progressed to a state of constant rush; there is simply too much to do in too little time. But waiting, despite our annoyance and abhorrence for it, is one of the most vital elements in our lives as Christians. God repeatedly calls on us in His word to wait on Him. Along with this call is a host of blessings He promises if we are simply willing to so. Despite this, waiting remains one of the hardest things for us to do.

Why is it so hard for us to wait? I think for us, in our modern society, we are so used to taking initiative and so prone to taking matters into our own hands that we become something of a superhero in our minds. We follow our instincts and live by our own methods. We rely on ourselves, and how we can fix a problem rather then going to The Almighty for His input. This is something I’ve seen repeatedly in the church today and in my own life.

Prayer has become something of a plan B; we tell ourselves we’ll go to God once we’ve exhausted all our own resources.

We are neglecting the fact that Jesus has given us the key to the most powerful arsenal in existence! Prayer and continual fellowship with Christ makes the waiting bearable. When God tells us to wait, it’s more than just waiting; it can be a time of renewal, bonding, rest, and above all hope for what He has planned for the future.

The LORD is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him. -Lamentations 3:25

There are various words used in the Hebrew for our English word “wait”. One of the most used in the Old Testament is the Hebrew word yachal, which means to “hope“, or “wait expectantly”. God is telling us to trust Him and to get excited about what He has planned for the future! To hope, pray, and wait expectantly on what He is going to do in and through each and every one of us!

But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance. -Romans 8:25

My prayer is that God will grant each of us the strength and endurance to persevere through whatever stage of life we are going through at the moment. But above all that we will draw closer to Him through it and learn to hope and wait expectantly for the awesome things He has in store!

-Adam

Is God enough?

14 Tuesday Feb 2012

Posted by Christen Anderson in Daily Living, Devotion, Peace

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enough, Faith, Hope, hurt, sufficient, trust

“Whom have I in heaven but thee? and there is none upon earth that I desire beside thee.” ~Psalm 73:25

Could you honestly say what the Psalmist said in that verse? I had to stop and think about that one…and I have to admit, there are many times when I can’t say that. Yes, I know that God is more than enough – but do I really know it? Do I live it? Do I breathe it? Does that belief radiate through my life every day? Or is it just a head knowledge, with no practical application? People should be able to see, just by looking at us, that God is enough. No matter what heartaches and trials come our way, God is enough. Have you lost a close friend? God is enough. Are you hurting so bad you can’t see how life can go on? God is enough. Even when we are at the end of our rope, we don’t need to despair – God is still enough. So why are we walking around with our heads down, worrying and hurting and trying to pretend that everything is okay? We need to stop focusing on our problems and realize that God is all that matters. Everything else is transient. Think about that today – is God enough for you?

When faced with an impossibility….

23 Monday Jan 2012

Posted by Christen Anderson in Believe, Promise

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Abraham, believe, Faith, fulfillment, Hope, impossible, promises, rejoice, trust

Hope. Abraham was the epitome of a confident hope – an expectant hope – a belief that God would do what He had promised. Romans 4:18 tells us that he “against hope believed in hope.” God’s promise could not be carried out. The 90-year-old Sarah would have a son? Impossible! Abraham didn’t think so. He believed God. It wasn’t just a passive belief. Abraham didn’t say, “I sure hope God carries through. I don’t see how He could do it, but maybe it will all work out…” He believed. His hope was more than a longing for something to happen – it was a knowledge. A confidence. We know that with God all things are possible….but do we really know it? We know that whatever God has promised, He is able to perform….but do we make that a basis for rejoicing? Do we go around rejoicing in the promises of God, excited about how He is going to work? If we don’t, there’s something wrong! If we are truly confident in God, we won’t be able to keep from rejoicing about it!! Think about that today… is your hope and confidence in God so deep that it carries you through every trial? Are you rejoicing in His promises? God can work all things for good, but only when we believe.

~christen

…to a land I will show you.

10 Tuesday Jan 2012

Posted by hstelzl in Believe, Faith, Follow, Readiness, Trust, Trusting God, Uncategorized

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Abram, belief, Blessing, Faith, Genesis, Hope, nation, obedience, pain, pressure, promise, rest, Sarai

“Now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country and from thy kindred, and from thy Father’s house unto a land that I will show thee. And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing. Genesis 12:1-2

Leave all you’ve known. Forsake the familiar. Step out alone in faith and believe the impossible. God required it of Abram – not of his family, his friends, his acquaintances. And what of the blessing? A great nation? Abram’s wife was barren! A great name? How? In a country where no one knew who he was? Abram was established in the life he lived. But God wanted to do the miraculous – something that required unquestioning obedience.

Sometimes, I feel like I imagine Abram must have felt. Leave…by myself? And go where? How? But God offers, in the realm of the unseen, a blessing that cannot be matched by any other way – a blessing that is impossible with man: the barren being given a child. The unknown name becoming great. How can it be? But with God, all things are possible.

God often requires a setting aside of the common, comfortable climate of our lives and asks us to set out on a journey to a place He will show us. He desires to open for us doors of opportunity that require first, a solitary trek into the unknown. He gives no maps, no directions, no list of things to pack, no back-ups, no plan B’s. He wants it to be me and Him, you and Him…alone. Nothing to rely on, nothing to grab, nothing to justify human means. Total, surrendered, reliance. Blind faith, expectant hope – an attitude of “Though none go with me, still I will follow.”

Had Abram refused, we see all the blessings he would have missed. And what of our own obedience? Can you and I entrust our lives to God, regardless of what others are doing? Can we set out on a lonely journey and trust that the blessing lies just around the bend? To do such a thing goes against what our sense of reason endorses. Still, we see the fruit in the lives of great men – men who abandoned their lives to God’s calling, and laid down everything, only to find that the greatest blessings would have been missed had they not unconditionally obeyed.

The journey itself will be hard. The pain at times will surmount to more than you believe yourself able to bear. The pressure will rise to a level you have never known. Yet God says, “Go! Hold nothing back! Be blessed, and be made a blessing!” Know in your heart, and believe, that the Lord is not slack concerning His promises. And He will bring you to the land He has promised to show you – to the desired haven of rest.

…to the wealthy place.

04 Wednesday Jan 2012

Posted by hstelzl in Purification, Refine, Suffering

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affliction, broken, brother, chains, christian life, cleansing, dependance, dependancy, desperation, despise, dynamic, emotions, enables, enabling, fire, furnace of affliction, gentle, glory, grace, Hope, humility, increase, Joy, lonliness, Love, Master, net, pain, place, praise, proved, purification, purify, Refiner, rely, rest, rich, sacrificed, silver, suffer, suffering, testimony, tried, vain, water, wealth, wealthy, work, yield, yielded

“O bless our God, ye people, and make the voice of His praise to be heard: which holdeth our soul in life, and suffereth not our feet to be moved. For thou, O God, has proved us: thou hast tried us as silver is tried. Thou broughtest us into the net; thou laidst affliction on our loins. Thou has caused men to ride over our heads: we went through fire and through water: but thou broughtest us out into a wealthy place.” ~Psalm 66:8-12

He alone holds my soul in life: my mind, will, and emotions. They are given grace, hope, joy, but only as I yield beneath the purification of the Refiner himself. The refining of the Christian life brings pain, suffering, loneliness…the list may go on. Yet, the increase is a wealthy place. What wealth? A desperation for God is born in that furnace of affliction and the hunger is satisfied by the very near presence of God…a wealth that is immeasurable, priceless. In loneliness, a dependance on God is brought forth – a need to rely more heavily on the Master. This too yields a rich increase. For we find as the fires burn low, and the chains are broken that we walk free, with a Friend who sticks closer than a brother. And time and space forbid me to list the many others… a dynamic life testimony; a suffering which has produced a gentle humility – one that enables the mighty hand of God to rest upon that sacrificed life and use it to bring glory.

Oh, let us not despise the Refiner, nor his cleansing work. For whom He loves, He seeks to purify. And the hardened heart will still suffer…only in vain. Be yielded, sacrificed, a life given wholly to the Refiner Himself. He will bring you out into a wealthy place!

New Hope

25 Sunday Dec 2011

Posted by hstelzl in Holiday, hope, Hoping, Salvation

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affection, battle, child, christ, Christmas, competea, Counselor, cross, darkness, David, everlasting Father, extroidinar, fall down, fight, fire, foundations, Gideon, gift, government, greater, harden, hear, heart, Holiday, Hope, increase, Isaiah, John 3:16, Joy, judgment, justice, kingdom, kneel, light, live, Lord of Hosts, manger, Merry Christmas, Midian, mighty God, obey, oppressed, ordinar, pasture, Peace, people, perform, Prince of Peace, Psalms, redemption, remember, sheep, Shepherd, sin, Son, spoils, Surrender, unconditional, voice, weight, wonderful, world, worship, worthless, yoke, zeal

Isaiah 9:2-5, paraphrased…

Israel, Thy people that walked in darkness have seen a great light. It has shined upon them. You have multiplied them and gone before them and given them new joy. You have broken the yoke of their burden and the staff on their shoulder, and the rod of their oppressors, just as you delivered Gideon in the battle of Midian. Their enemies have become confused and the garments of their enemies are rolled in blood – they are conquered: but, this is nothing. It is all kindling for the fire.

Israel has fought the good fight. They are ready to take of the spoils of the enemy. Isaiah shows up on the scene, and he says “Those spoils are worthless to you. You might as well burn them up.” Why? Israel fought for those things – sacrificed their lives for them! They were oppressed, but now they are free…and leave the spoils? Isaiah tells them why:

“For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even forever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.” ~Isaiah 9:6-7

The worldly spoils…the things the world promises us happiness with…they are nothing. For unto us is given a greater gift. “For God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten Son…” This Christmas is new hope. A chance to remember over two-thousand years ago, when a seemingly ordinary baby was born, in an ordinary stable, to an ordinary young mother, to accomplish God’s extraordinary plan for redemption .A plan birthed before the foundations of the world.

Lay aside every weight, and the sin that so easily besets you. Push those things that compete for your love and your affection away. Turn to the child, the son that is born to you. Stand at the manger, and look up at the cross. He came for one reason…and it was to bring a light into your heart that could not have come in any other way, shape or form. Run to the cross, and fall down, and worship Him.

“Oh come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord, our God, our maker. For he is our God; and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand. Today, if you will hear his voice, do not harden your hearts…” ~Psalm 95:6-8

And so may you say, “For me to live is Christ!”

Merry Christmas!

~T&H

Saving Strength!!!

15 Thursday Dec 2011

Posted by hstelzl in hope, Strength, Trust

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adopt, adoption, alone, anoint, anointed, basic needs, believers, blessed, burdens, contrite heart, daughters, David, endurance, endure, extend, forgiveness, frailty, glorious, hateful, Hope, hopeful, living, miracle, Peace, persecution, physical, promised, Psalmist, saving, saving strength, sons, strength, strong, taking, tempt, temptation, trials

“The Lord is… the saving strength of His anointed.” ~Psalm 28:8

Alone…we cannot bear the burdens of breathing, walking, eating, speaking, sleeping. We cannot meet our own basic physical needs, and furthermore, we cannot achieve peace of mind, a contrite heart, hope in trials, or the ability to extend forgiveness to offenders. We cannot endure temptation or withstand the hateful persecution promised to all believers. What then? Give up? But the psalmist pours out new hope for living: Our Lord offers His own saving strength to meet our frailty. We are His anointed sons and daughters. His strength is ours for the taking! Blessed hope, glorious miracle.

~Hannah

…endures f.o.r.e.v.e.r.

11 Sunday Dec 2011

Posted by hstelzl in Abiding, Mercy, Promise

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“His mercy endures forever.”

It’s repeated over and over and over again, all through the Psalms, all through Scripture in multiple ways. The amazing grace of God – that in my neediness, He not only does, but He desires to draw near, and make me whole…complete…full. I fall every day. We all do. We slip in the dark, sometimes we slip in the light. Sometimes we just sit down to sulk. His mercy waits for us. His window of grace is open, being poured out, sometimes even on an unwilling heart, but there for the taking, nevertheless. Deserving? No. Yet, He sees our destitution before Him, whether we do or not. He knows our frame…dusty, frail, feeble. He pities. His Father-heart overflows with compassion for us. It is that compassion and love that causes us sometimes to be put in the furnace of affliction for greater refining. Yet the mercy is new and fresh ever morning. It endures. Not for today, not just for tomorrow. It endures forever…eternally given, eternally received. May we draw near, with thankful hearts, because we are fully assured of His love…that mercy will always pick us back up, and the grace of God will always abide near, to keep us in all our ways.

T&H

I Will Remember!

07 Wednesday Dec 2011

Posted by hstelzl in Praise, Testimonies, Worship

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archives, counsels, cure, doubting, effectiveness, emotional, Enemy, exalt, Faith, faithfully, faithfulness, fight, forget, forgetful, forgetfulness, Helper, Hope, Isaiah, merciless, praise, prophet, remember, remembrance, soul, stress, trust, truth, wonderful, Wonderful Counselor

Do we stop to remember the “wonderful”? Life brings challenges and praise gets lost most often in forgetfulness – plunged into the archives along with faith, trust, and hope. My current woe may be a great source of emotional stress, and in attempting (by human effort) to alleviate it, the very source of it’s cure is packed away – praise.

The Prophet Isaiah wrote: “O Lord, Thou art my God; I will exalt Thee; I will praise Thy name; for Thou hast done wonderful things; Thy counsels of old are faithfulness and truth.” (Isaiah 25:1)

Praise will fight the most merciless enemy of my soul with the greatest effectiveness. It will remember the faithfulness, the mercy of God, and will deliver me from doubting my Helper, and the Wonderful Counselor of my soul.

Be in Remembrance…

~Hannah

Test the Limit

05 Monday Dec 2011

Posted by hstelzl in Boundaries, Gifts, hope, Power

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believe, blessed, boundaries, boundary, boundless, boundlessness, climax, closed, dare, devotional, difficult, difficulty, divine, Faith, Father, finite, free, glory, grace, higher, hinderance, Hope, hoped, hopeless, imaginations, impossibility, impossible, limits, Master, matchless, measureless, physical, possibility, possible, praise, quote, range, reach, reckless, seize, shadow, Streams in the Desert, test, tested, testing, trust, trustworthy, unable, variable, vary, wider, will

“Face it out to the end, cast away every shadow of hope on the human side as an absolute hindrance to the divine, heap up all the difficulties together recklessly, and pile as many more on as you can find; you cannot get beyond the blessed climax of impossibility. Let faith swing out to Him. He is the God of the impossible.” ~Streams in the Desert

No closed door is too tightly shut for your Master to open, if it is within His will. No time is too short for Him to do a miracle. He is never a moment too late. No difficulty is too big for Him to face. They are all bigger in our eyes than in His. Our imaginations of the impossible are a drop in the bucket for Him. In the blink of an eye, the flick of a finger, the turning of a page, He can do what we would believe to take days, months, years, on our own physical time table. Yes, our limits are wide and varying. We are finite and unable. He is infinite, and He delights, amidst our hopeless weakness, to draw near and show us that He can do all things, anytime, in any way, to the praise and glory of His own matchless name. Dare to test the limit. He goes farther, higher, wider, than you ever imagined possible. You will not run out of range, you will not be beyond His reach. Yes, His boundaries are boundlessness, and you find yourself in a vast field of measureless grace, free for the taking, and reckless faith, offered by the most trustworthy One of all. Seize it, and look up!

One Love for Christ

~ Dedicated to helping young people grow in their walk with the Lord

Tag Archives: Hope

“Wait” – a most vital element…

Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord! -Psalm 27:14

“…waiting…is one of the most vital elements in our lives as Christians.”

Prayer has become something of a plan B; we tell ourselves we’ll go to God once we’ve exhausted all our own resources.

The LORD is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him. -Lamentations 3:25

But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance. -Romans 8:25

Is God enough?

“Whom have I in heaven but thee? and there is none upon earth that I desire beside thee.” ~Psalm 73:25

When faced with an impossibility….

…to a land I will show you.

“Now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country and from thy kindred, and from thy Father’s house unto a land that I will show thee. And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing. Genesis 12:1-2

…to the wealthy place.

New Hope

Saving Strength!!!

…endures f.o.r.e.v.e.r.

I Will Remember!

Test the Limit

Follow “One Love for Christ”