One of the recurring themes in Scripture is redemption, rescue and renewal.
Over and over, just when it seems things can only get worse, God steps in and crafts an unexpected and beautiful story from the broken bits.
The challenge for we who are trapped in time is to remain patient and hope-filled in the waiting.
Read the rest here: Advent: The Righteous Branch
I love to read familiar verses in different translations or paraphrases.
It helps my heart hear what I might otherwise miss because familiarity DOES breed a form a contempt even when considering the Word of God.
Recently, on my way through verses on HOPE I copied out Lamentations 3: 19-26.
A couple of the verses are ones most of us have seen or heard often:
But back up a little bit, and read it in a different version ( the VOICE) and it takes on even greater meaning for those of us walking in the Valley of the Shadow of Death.
Read the rest here: New Mercies
One of the recurring themes in Scripture is redemption, rescue and renewal.
Over and over, just when it seems things can only get worse, God steps in and crafts an unexpected and beautiful story from the broken bits.
The challenge for we who are trapped in time is to remain patient and hope-filled in the waiting.
Israel had plenty of practice.
I do too.
But God doesn’t leave us without promises to hold onto while we wait.
Jeremiah is often called “The Weeping Prophet” because the messages God have him were full of gloom. Judgement and destruction were on the way. There was no escape and Jeremiah had been commissioned by the Lord to tell folks all about it.
Yet woven throughout the verses detailing all the awful, God spoke hope to the heart of His people:
14 “‘The days are coming,’ declares the Lord, ‘when I will fulfill the good promise I made to the people of Israel and Judah.
15 “‘In those days and at that time
I will make a righteous Branch sprout from David’s line;
he will do what is just and right in the land.
16 In those days Judah will be saved
and Jerusalem will live in safety.
This is the name by which it will be called:
The Lord Our Righteous Savior.’ “
Jeremiah 33: 14-16 NIV
These words speak hope to my heart too.
Dominic’s death is the most devastating thing I’ve ever endured. It was not only the earthly end of him, it was the earthly end of me in many ways. All the things I anticipated for him, our family and the future were cut down in one fell swoop.
So when Jeremiah promises that even though all that’s left of David’s progeny is a pitiful stump, God will raise up a glorious and most Righteous King, I hear that redemption is possible.
And because Jesus DID come, I know that redemption is guaranteed.
Advent reminds me that even when waiting is long and in the dark, God is working.
Just as He raised up life from a (humanly) lifeless bit of wood in the ground, He will raise my son and redeem my pain.
QUESTIONS:
PRAYER:
Father God,
It is so, so easy to be discouraged and disheartened. Truth is, life is hard and often seems headed in the direction of becoming harder.
I’m tired and sometimes I want to give up and give in. Not only is there no end in sight, I can’t even imagine an end that would be worth waiting for.
But I will choose to trust in Your unfailing word. I will rest in Your everlasting love. And I will take hold of every single promise You have made. Help me trust that You are working-even when I can’t see it-to redeem, restore, rescue and rewrite my story.
Let me remember that You are the God of new things, the God who transforms death into life.
Amen
No matter how much we love someone, we will eventually fail them somehow.
I know I recite my failure as a mother quite often-usually when I’m tired, weak, stressed and especially burdened with this grief I haul around like a bag of bricks every day.
So it’s hard for me to comprehend the unfailing, faithful, never-ending, compassionate love of God.
But it’s true whether I can wrap my mind around it or not: God’s love never fails.
Read the rest here: https://thelifeididntchoose.com/2019/08/09/scripture-journal-challenge-when-i-cant-trace-his-hand-i-trust-his-heart/
If you find your heart limping through Scripture instead of gaining strength, may I suggest you try a different Bible translation for a bit? Sometimes familiar words-even the words of God or His prophets-just fall flat.
I can read them and not digest them at all.
So lately I’ve been reading and copying from the VOICE translation and it has helped me see old passages in a new light.
Here’s one of them. I think those of us walking through the Valley of the Shadow of Death have a lot in common with Jeremiah.
❤
I love to read familiar verses in different translations or paraphrases.
It helps my heart hear what I might otherwise miss because familiarity DOES breed a form a contempt even when considering the Word of God.
Recently, on my way through verses on HOPE I copied out Lamentations 3: 19-26.
Read the rest here: https://thelifeididntchoose.com/2019/01/20/new-mercies/
No matter how much we love someone, we will eventually fail them somehow.
I know I recite my failure as a mother quite often-usually when I’m tired, weak, stressed and especially burdened with this grief I haul around like a bag of bricks every day.
So it’s hard for me to comprehend the unfailing, faithful, never-ending, compassionate love of God.
But it’s true whether I can wrap my mind around it or not: God’s love never fails.
That’s the message Jeremiah was tasked to deliver to Israel in the midst of some very awful circumstances.
They had really messed up. And they were going to reap the consequences of their sin.
It was going to hurt.
But God had not abandoned them. He had not forgotten them. He had not stopped loving them.
31 For no one is cast off
Lamentations 3:31-33 NIV
by the Lord forever.
32 Though he brings grief, he will show compassion,
so great is his unfailing love.
33 For he does not willingly bring affliction
or grief to anyone.
The God I serve and Israel served is a compassionate God.
He is so very compassionate (which means to suffer alongside) that He chose to send His Son to take our sins, to receive our punishment, to pay the penalty and redeem us for Himself.
Grief is part of this life.
Before Jesus lived on earth, suffered, died and was resurrected, grief was part of the ongoing penalty of sin.
So Israel was punished when she turned from her true Husband and ran after idols and foreign gods.
Now, the penalty has been paid. Yet grief remains.
Our enemy the devil works evil in the world. People’s sinful choices result in death and destruction. The whole earth groans under the general burden of sin which means genes mutate, disease runs rampant and our bodies fail.
God does not always intervene.
But He always comes alongside.
He always offers comfort and promises that grief doesn’t last forever.
He takes those evil things, the broken things, the painful things and the hard things and weaves them into a beautiful tapestry that will eventually reveal His faithfulness, goodness, love and glory.
QUESTIONS:
PRAYER:
Father God, Thank you that I live this side of Calvary!
Thank You that although this life is filled with sorrow and pain I can rest assured that if I’ve received Your gift of forgiveness through Christ You are not punishing me for some forgotten sin. Thank You for your unfailing, faithful, compassionate love.
Help me to remember in the darkest moments, the most desolate path, the deepest pit You are there. Over and over and over You remind my heart that I am not alone. When I can’t comprehend how You might weave the next dark thread into the tapestry of my life, help me trust You anyway.
You are the Master Weaver. You are the Potter. Give me a willing heart to yield to Your work in my life.
Amen
I
I love to read familiar verses in different translations or paraphrases.
It helps my heart hear what I might otherwise miss because familiarity DOES breed a form a contempt even when considering the Word of God.
Recently, on my way through verses on HOPE I copied out Lamentations 3: 19-26.
A couple of the verses are ones most of us have seen or heard often:
But back up a little bit, and read it in a different version ( the VOICE) and it takes on even greater meaning for those of us walking in the Valley of the Shadow of Death.
Jeremiah (the author of Lamentations and known as the “Weeping Prophet”) is overcome with grief. He uses words I understand to describe how relentless sorrow and despair drag a heart down, down, down.
He’s bitter, he’s crippled, he can’t move forward or even move at all.
Grievous thoughts of affliction and wandering plagued my mind—
great bitterness and gall.
Grieving, my soul thinks back;
these thoughts cripple, and I sink down.
And, stopped in his tracks, he waits.
He knows he needs hope if he is to get up again.
So he turns his heart to the only One Who can help.
Gaining hope,
I remember and wait for this thought:
He remembers that God’s love never runs out. God will never suffer from compassion fatigue because the Lord is loyal, steadfast, inexhaustible.
God’s faithful love is new every morning!
As reliable and obvious as the light that spreads across the eastern sky and chases the darkness from every corner.
How enduring is God’s loyal love;
the Eternal has inexhaustible compassion.
Here they are, every morning, new!
Your faithfulness, God, is as broad as the day.
Repeating that truth brings a heart courage to face even the most frightening or dismal circumstances.
No one can stop the sun!
No one can stop the unfailing, loyal love of God from breaking forth!
Have courage, for the Eternal is all that I will need.
My soul boasts, “Hope in God; just wait.”
I can boast (make much of, speak boldly about) about my hope in the Lord because He never, ever fails. I will not be put to shame.
I am not left alone to my bitter thoughts and my affliction will not be forever. When I seek Him with my whole heart, He lifts me up and carries me through the darkest night.
It is good. The Eternal One is good to those who expect Him,
to those who seek Him wholeheartedly.
It is good to wait quietly
for the Eternal to make things right again.
God will not allow injustice to reign forever.
Sorrow will not have the last word!
It is good to wait in full confidence, trusting that the Lord I love, loves me and will redeem and restore everything the enemy has stolen.
“The sun comes up
It’s a new day dawning
It’s time to sing Your song again
Whatever may pass
And whatever lies before me
Let me be singing
When the evening comes”
Matt Redman 10,000 Reasons
I am not a fan of church signs.
Most of the time they try to be cute and reduce eternal truth to a few words that often leave room for [mis]interpretaion.
But I saw one today that I DID like: “Dig the well before you are thirsty”.
Read the rest here: Dig the Well BEFORE You are Thirsty
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