Ever felt cut off from God's goodness before? I know I have.

Sometimes I feel that way because of the current situations I am in. 

Psalm 27:11-12 (NIV) - Teach me your way, O Lord ; lead me in a straight path because of my oppressors. Do not turn me over to the desire of my foes, for false witnesses rise up against me, breathing out violence.

When the threats and problems are current, right in your face, so to speak, it is easy to get caught up with the danger and trial and lose focus on the good that God has promised to us. And yet that is when we need to be mindful of God's goodness the most.

Psalm 27:13-14 (NIV) - I am still confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.Wait for the Lord ; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord .

Sometimes I feel that way because of things I have done wrong before. When current trials hit, there always seems to be some bright spark around me who will say "If only that time you had (ABC) then you won't have to go through (XYZ) right now..." Other times I don't need that bright spark around; I remember my own failings and mistakes well enough, thank you very much!

Lamentations 3:19-20 - I remember my affliction and my wandering, the bitterness and the gall. I well remember them, and my soul is downcast within me.

At such times, this is THE big question - are my mistakes, sins, and failings bigger and more powerful than God's goodness?

Lamentations 3:21-26 (NIV) - Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope:
Because of the Lord 's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail.
They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.
I say to myself, "The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him."
The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him;
it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord .

The point of the above passage, however, is that it is NOT guaranteed that we will make it through the trial. It is NOT a given that we can clear past a particular storm or crisis. In other words, there is still a chance we will go under.

What does it take to successfully make it through difficult seasons? It takes the goodness of the Lord. And how do we access it? The passage tells us "The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him". How does one actually hope in the Lord? By seeking him.

"... it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord" - This tells me the deliverance of the Lord will most likely take time. And during that time, as we are enduring trials and difficulties, we have to continue to seek God. It is not for the faint-hearted or impatient. 

Seeking the Lord will also enable us to discern if he wants us to plant ourselves down long term. Huh? Check this out:

Jeremiah 29:4-7 (NIV) - This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon:

"Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce.Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease. 

Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you intoexile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper."

Remember, these are people exiled from Israel as a punishment for their sins. Humanly, we would expect that God would either take them back to Israel swiftly as they submitted themselves to God's will, and so they should not be making long term plans; or that God had forsaken them, so they would just wither, shrivel up and fade into obscurity in Babylon. 

But God chose neither. He had the prophet Jeremiah admonish them to make long term plans, and even to pray to the Lord for Babylon to prosper. I cannot imagine how much this idea messed up their minds and their pre-conceived notions of God and his ways!

Oftentimes it is much easier to stay out of trouble. God has already warned us in this Word that sin will have consequences, and we won't like them. God often gives us an uneasy feeling about people we really shouldn't associate with, as they can turn a good situation into bad. The book of Proverbs has MANY warnings that help us recognize problematic people, and avoiding them or backing out of partnership with them is a lot easier than dealing with all the grief they cause later, believe me!

But once we are already mired in the problems, however, getting out of them, and more importantly, achieving God's purposes in the midst of them, takes a lot more wisdom to manage. We really can't see the big picture while we are caught up in the storm, so all we can do is listen to God and have him guide us one step at a time. We have to discipline ourselves to not give room for the flesh, the carnal nature, to rise up and goad us into doing things we will regret later. And we need to keep our hearts and minds on God. 

Romans 8:5-6 (NKJV) - For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.

May God continually guide and navigate us through life, and even more so during the difficult seasons! 

Like Water in the Morning

I drink a cup (or two) of water every morning, before I take breakfast in any form.

I gulp it down as I wait for the water to boil and I get my kids ready for school. I read in passing that the body is dehydrated and all that water will help to flush out toxins, waste matter and all that. *shrug* Maybe that helps explain my kid-like face after all these years?

Whenever I drink the water, I feel like it’s a clean slate, a fresh start to the day, as if all my dietary transgressions of yesterday have been wiped out. I’ve now got today to eat right. Over the past year or so I’ve grown very careless with my diet. Because I am usually traveling around all day for work, I end up eating fast food, sometimes even up to 5 times a week. It’s not good for me, and I know it. So the morning water is a symbol to me, that maybe, just maybe, today is the day I can start getting things right?

Likewise, sometimes we need spiritual symbols to tell us the same thing, that our sins and failures of yesterday (and last week, last month, last year and so on…) need not hold us back today. Today we have a clean slate, a fresh start with God, so maybe today is the day we can start getting things right?

Lamentations 3:22-24 (NIV) - Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning;  great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, “The LORD is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.”

Because God himself is faithful to us, we have hope. We can believe that God can rescue us from the pit that we are trapped in, whether it’s bondage to sin, tribulations or other stuff.

Lamentations 3:55-57 (NIV) - I called on your name, O LORD, from the depths of the pit. You heard my plea: “Do not close your ears to my cry for relief.” You came near when I called you, and you said, “Do not fear.”

God’s compassions towards us are renewed every morning. That is true even in the midst of afflictions. But we need to be deliberate in recalling his mercy and his faithfulness. The passage in Lamentations 3, just before the first Scripture we looked at, say:

Lamentations 3:19-21 (NIV) - I remember my affliction and my wandering, the bitterness and the gall. I well remember them, and my soul is downcast within me. Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope.

When we are suffering, remembering the suffering is easy. It grips our minds and our souls relentlessly. People can end up addicted to drugs or alcohol during such seasons, because all they want is some temporary relief from remembering the pain. It takes deliberate and disciplined effort (“This I call to mind) to remember the goodness of God. We see this in the Psalms too, where the psalmist has to force himself to hope in God.

Psalm 42:11 (NIV) - Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.

Notice how the psalmist speaks firmly to his soul here? In my personal experience, it is not enough to just think happy thoughts, or even holy thoughts. I had to open my lips and speak to my soul.

What is our reason for hope and courage?

Lamentations 3:24 (NIV) - I say to myself, “The LORD is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.”

Say it to your soul right now, “The LORD is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.” Say it again. And again, until you really believe it!

What happens when we know the LORD is our portion? We experience his presence and are open to being guided by him. We know we have a glorious destiny in him. Our desires for the temporal things of this world fade and our hearts are strengthened. Consider this:

Psalm 73:23-26 (NIV) - Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand.
You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory.
Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you.
My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.

Conclusion:
If you are facing a tough season, whether from external trials or your own internal struggles with sin, may I be the bearer of unpleasant news? You won’t feel better, you won’t get stronger, the problems won’t go away, without YOU rising up and taking charge over them. Your soul, your emotions, will NOT settle down unless you do something about them. And the “something” I am talking about here is NOT numbing your soul with drink, TV or K-pop videos on Youtube. 

I’m talking about speaking the Word of God to your soul, remembering the goodness of God and his faithfulness. If the troubles are heavy, you should even look for regular times during the day when you will habitually remind yourself of God’s compassion and faithfulness. For example, I have tied in certain household chores with my daily confession of Scripture. You can do the same, you just need to find daily events or moments to meditate on the Scripture.

And the good news is, when you take charge over the problems, to shake of the despondency, the guilt and condemnation, the hopelessness and depression, your spirit starts rising up. Your courage and hope starts to seep into your mind and heart. You realize that you can have peace even in the midst of the storm, you can rejoice even during the trials.

Be blessed!

Prayer Principles from Psalm 41

This passage has been on my heart a lot this season. 

Psa 41:1-3 (NKJV) Blessed is he who considers the poor;
The LORD will deliver him in time of trouble.
The LORD will preserve him and keep him alive, and he will be blessed on the earth;
You will not deliver him to the will of his enemies.
The LORD will strengthen him on his bed of illness; You will sustain him on his sickbed.

Notice that God promises deliverance from times of trouble. Which means that there will be troubles, even in the life of the generous. Notice also that it also implies that generous people are not immune to sickness, and that they will have enemies.

Psa 41:4-6 (NIV) - I said, “O LORD, have mercy on me; heal me, for I have sinned against you.”
My enemies say of me in malice, "When will he die and his name perish?”
Whenever one comes to see me, he speaks falsely, while his heart gathers slander; then he goes out and spreads it abroad.

In this case, David has fallen into severe illness. And he knows it is the consequence of his sin (vs 4). Pay attention: David does not ignore the sickness or pretend it's not his fault. He also did not think God ought to ignore his sin just because of the good he has done before. He understands God too well for that!


I know some generous people who don't take their own sin seriously, and they are taken aback, caught off-guard and offended when they reap the harvest from their sin. And they start raging against God. It’s actually quite common; there are some people who head charities, for example, and have terrible tempers, or commit adultery or embezzle funds. I suspect they feel, deep in their hearts, that their good works gives them some room to sin...


Make sure you don't fall into that deception!

Psa 41:7-9 (NIV) All my enemies whisper together against me; they imagine the worst for me, saying,
“A vile disease has beset him; he will never get up from the place where he lies.”
Even my close friend, whom I trusted, he who shared my bread, has lifted up his heel against me.

We don't see in the Bible any account of David falling sick, so it's hard to tie this psalm to a specific incident in David's life. The closest guess, in my opinion, is that this psalm refers to the time David committed adultery with Bathsheba, which eventually led to Absalom's rebellion and Ahithophel's betrayal (2 Sam 11, 13-16).


Remember that as David’s trusted counsellor, Ahithophel not only had the ear of the king, he also knew his heart. If any man would know how David would think and act, it was Ahithophel. Ahithophel thus would be the person most capable of plotting David’s downfall, since he knew David inside-out.


And if someone who knew him inside-out could not only reject him but actively work towards his defeat, it was a rejection of everything that David stood for. He must have been thinking “If someone who knows my heart so deeply could betray me, what does that say about my heart?” It's enough to crush a man's spirit!

Pro 18:14 (NIV) - A man's spirit sustains him in sickness, but a crushed spirit who can bear?

It takes faith to rise up above this. It takes faith in order to know God still loves us in spite of our sins and in spite of our failings. Hear the prayer of a man who pleases God's heart -

Psalm 41:10-12 (NIV) - But you, O LORD, have mercy on me; raise me up, that I may repay them. I know that you are pleased with me, for my enemy does not triumph over me. In my integrity you uphold me and set me in your presence forever.

Personally, I feel uncomfortable with this part. David prayed that God would let him avenge himself on his enemies. One thing I noticed, however, is that God kept David from doing so. Whether we are talking about Saul, who sought to kill David in the earlier days, or Ahithophel, or even Absalom, David never had to raise his hand against his enemies. God eventually took care of those enemies, and kept David from avenging himself on them.


The point, however, seems to be that because David loved God, David could pray what he wanted. God would still decide what was best and settle matters accordingly.


And that's what I want to share with you also. Just pray, pouring out your heart to God honestly, and let God decide how he wants to handle the matter.


Also, begin with remembering the promises of God.


If we had stopped at the end of verse 3, we would have thought this was a feel-good, sunshine-and-roses kind of Psalm. It’s when we look at verse 4 onwards that we realize that David wrote this in the midst of severe trial and testing. He was commanding his soul to feed on the promises of God.


We likewise ought to do the same. When we are in the midst of a difficult season, we need to discipline ourselves to not only to pray, but to pray remembering the promises of God. We see the same principle in the following passage:

Lamentations 3:19-26 (NIV) - I remember my affliction and my wandering, the bitterness and the gall. I well remember them, and my soul is downcast within me. Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, “The LORD is my portion; therefore I will wait for him. The LORD is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him; it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the LORD.”

Notice how the writer of Lamentations has to consciously remember the goodness of God even in the midst of grief? If we want to have a confident and enjoyable prayer life, we need to do the same.


Conclusion:


Our worship lives will not rise above our prayer lives. That is why we need to not only pray, but pray in ways that please God. The LORD chose to have this psalm preserved for us in Scripture so that it may encourage and strengthen us in the LORD. I hope my sharing has helped to spur you on and make your prayer life more like how God wants it to be!