I sat down today with my toast and coffee to do some reading. The current book I am into is Having a Mary Heart in a Martha World . My dear friend Rachel gave it to me for my birthday. I set it aside for a bit while I finished up another book. After I was done with my other book, I was looking through all the Christan literature I have sitting around, deciding which one to go to next. It never ceases to amaze me. I am given a book or recommended a book my someone. I set it aside most times and get to it later on. The part that never cease to amaze me? That the book is sitting there and at the exact time I need to read what it is in, I pick it up. God is always working, isn't He?
I had already read the first Chapter. This book is more intense. It has a study guide in the back. Now this study guide is not like what you find in the back of most books. This one is INTENSE. I did it over the course of a week. The questions require that much. Excellent.
Today I sat down to get into Chapter Two. Chapter Two entitled Lord, Don't You Care? Oh man. How does God always know what I am thinking before *I* even know? I began my morning reading.
I had not gotten far in the Chapter before I was introduced to the Three Deadly D's~ distraction, discouragement, and doubt. As author Joanna Weaver describes it, "The underlying strategy is fairly simple: Get people's eyes off God and on their circumstances. Make them believe that their "happiness" lies in the "happenings " that surround them. Or send them good news-about somebody else. When they're thoroughly discouraged, tell them God doesn't care. Then sit back and watch the doubt do its work. " I was then directed to the story of Elijah.
Elijah had just won over the prophets of Baal and was feeling pretty good about himself. Then Jezebel deiced she wanted him dead and knocked him down a few notches. Holy fire fell from heaven, proving that God was God and what did Elijah do? He ran. The distraction made him fear and discouragement made him hide. We find that story in 1 Kings 18. Then we move on. In 1 Kings 19:4, we see the discouragement~ But he himself went a day's journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a juniper tree: and he requested for himself that he might die; and said, It is enough; now, O LORD, take away my life; for I am not better than my fathers. Elijah is asking God to take his life.
If we read on though we see something new. We see in verse 5-7 this: And as he lay and slept under a juniper tree, behold, then an angel touched him, and said unto him, Arise and eat. And he looked, and, behold, there was a cake baken on the coals, and a cruse of water at his head. And he did eat and drink, and laid him down again. And the angel of the LORD came again the second time, and touched him, and said, Arise and eat; because the journey is too great for thee.
What does this tell us? Joanna Weaver explains it this way, "When we're distracted and discouraged, tired and overwhelmed, there is no better place to go than to our Father. He alone has what we need. Don't snivel under a broom tree. Don't hide in a broom closet. Go to the Lord and let Him sweep away your discouragement. As you do, you'll find healing for your hurting heart. Even when it can't help but doubt."
If you are like me, you get distracted. You get discouraged and then you do indeed doubt. Even though I have seen God pull me through some really tough times and I KNOW He can do it, I still doubt sometimes. I still get discouraged and doubt that God cares. How easy it is to fall into that mindset.
What I feel conflicts with what I know. If I listen to what I feel, it drowns out what I know. The truth is not in what I feel, but what I know.
And the LORD, he it is that doth go before thee; he will be with thee, he will not fail thee, neither forsake thee: fear not, neither be dismayed. ~ Deuteronomy 31:8
I had already read the first Chapter. This book is more intense. It has a study guide in the back. Now this study guide is not like what you find in the back of most books. This one is INTENSE. I did it over the course of a week. The questions require that much. Excellent.
Today I sat down to get into Chapter Two. Chapter Two entitled Lord, Don't You Care? Oh man. How does God always know what I am thinking before *I* even know? I began my morning reading.
I had not gotten far in the Chapter before I was introduced to the Three Deadly D's~ distraction, discouragement, and doubt. As author Joanna Weaver describes it, "The underlying strategy is fairly simple: Get people's eyes off God and on their circumstances. Make them believe that their "happiness" lies in the "happenings " that surround them. Or send them good news-about somebody else. When they're thoroughly discouraged, tell them God doesn't care. Then sit back and watch the doubt do its work. " I was then directed to the story of Elijah.
Elijah had just won over the prophets of Baal and was feeling pretty good about himself. Then Jezebel deiced she wanted him dead and knocked him down a few notches. Holy fire fell from heaven, proving that God was God and what did Elijah do? He ran. The distraction made him fear and discouragement made him hide. We find that story in 1 Kings 18. Then we move on. In 1 Kings 19:4, we see the discouragement~ But he himself went a day's journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a juniper tree: and he requested for himself that he might die; and said, It is enough; now, O LORD, take away my life; for I am not better than my fathers. Elijah is asking God to take his life.
If we read on though we see something new. We see in verse 5-7 this: And as he lay and slept under a juniper tree, behold, then an angel touched him, and said unto him, Arise and eat. And he looked, and, behold, there was a cake baken on the coals, and a cruse of water at his head. And he did eat and drink, and laid him down again. And the angel of the LORD came again the second time, and touched him, and said, Arise and eat; because the journey is too great for thee.
What does this tell us? Joanna Weaver explains it this way, "When we're distracted and discouraged, tired and overwhelmed, there is no better place to go than to our Father. He alone has what we need. Don't snivel under a broom tree. Don't hide in a broom closet. Go to the Lord and let Him sweep away your discouragement. As you do, you'll find healing for your hurting heart. Even when it can't help but doubt."
If you are like me, you get distracted. You get discouraged and then you do indeed doubt. Even though I have seen God pull me through some really tough times and I KNOW He can do it, I still doubt sometimes. I still get discouraged and doubt that God cares. How easy it is to fall into that mindset.
What I feel conflicts with what I know. If I listen to what I feel, it drowns out what I know. The truth is not in what I feel, but what I know.
And the LORD, he it is that doth go before thee; he will be with thee, he will not fail thee, neither forsake thee: fear not, neither be dismayed. ~ Deuteronomy 31:8
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