For the Day of Trouble
How the Lord delivered me from severe depression and my own hypocrisy.
Years went by and the attractions of the world had caught my eye, and I was trying to have it both ways, trying to have my cake and eat it too. To flirt just enough with sin to have fun, but not be too guilty… Not that I was doing that intentionally. It was just a matter of not being intentional. That’s when I got myself into trouble and one thing I did learn, you can’t honestly walk the straight and narrow and the wide path at the same time!! It’s sort of like doing the splits! At one point or another, we just have to choose!
Matthew 7:13, 14, “Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.”
Affairs of the Heart
Although I’d been growing, another huge loss came in my life and I was depressed and just in a dark fog. I the only thing that helped me recover was trying to cling more unto God in newly inspired ways I declare! It also helped that I was still in church and thus around other believers who would assure me that they were praying for me… and in fact, did. It was an amazing comfort as they surrounded me, put their hands on my shoulders and prayed out loud for me, prayers for God to comfort me with His unfailing love. Lesson: It really does make a difference to stay in Christian fellowship!
One loss that happened was a miscarriage. After finding out from the doctor, I came home and just bawled my eyes out. I held nothing back. After feeling like I could cry no more and had it out of my system, the Lord asked me this question: “Do you trust Me?” That question made me realized that trusting God is ALWAYS what everything boils down to, whether we will or whether we won’t. Or for me, it was whether I would, or whether I wouldn’t. It didn’t take me too long to look back at my life and be reminded how much He’d worked in my life, and so I made the faith step and said yes.
Then I got up and washed my face. As the Lord would have it, that evening was our weekly Bible study group, but instead of studying we had planned to just have a dinner together. People noticed my husband and I were quiet and when we told them why, they surrounded us with prayer. That was exactly what we needed!
God tells us not to lean on our own understanding, so when a loss occurs, I don’t think the best question is to ask the Lord why.
God has used several people in my own life to encourage and pray for and just love me with the love of Christ! And tell me just what I needed to hear, just when I needed to hear it!
One was a gal I didn’t know very well at all, and as she noticed what kind of music I was listening to, she kindly came along side me with an interesting challenge. It was to take 3 weeks and listen only to Christian music and then see what a difference it made in my life. I thought that sounded easy enough, so I did it and was simply amazed at what happened. Instead of the old words and lyrics that used to cross my mind… when music did cross my mind, I was instead having my faith fed and encouraged as the words I was thinking about were instead about the love of God, the only love which never fails! This has made such a huge difference in my life, it’s something I’ve never stopped doing, and I’d like to pass along her challenge to you as well, if that already is not your practice. If you’d like to hear some recommendations of musicians I found, I’ll list these out later.
I used to think that being a Christian was just striving to ‘be good’. What does that mean anyway? It really does get tiring! And how can you know if you’re ‘good enough’? God warns us in Proverbs 16:25, “There is a way that seemeth right to a man and appears straight before him, but its end is the way of death.” God tells us in Hebrews 10:6, “ But without faith it is impossible to [walk with God and] please Him, for whoever comes [near] to God must [necessarily] believe that God exists and that He rewards those who [earnestly and diligently] seek Him.”
I know from personal experience that trying to be good on your own power is very exhausting, (because it’s impossible) as I’d try often have to hide what I was REALLY thinking and how I was REALLY feeling! Plus, it requires no faith, whatsoever!! It just requires a whole lot of self-delusion! But when you are aware of what the Bible says we will be judged for, it really blows the attempts to fool others, right out of the water!!! But we can NEVER fool God! Psalm 94: 9, “He who made the ear, does He not hear? He who formed the eye, does He not see?”
He knows when we are broken because we live in a fallen world, vs when we are doing something wrong, whether we are trying to or not. God knows our motives, and praise His name, He is still willing to help us out of the messes we get in!!!
The Bible describes the lies of the enemy as a firey dart. Ever been taken down by a doubt or a lie? It is by reason of use that we get better at using the weapons of our warfare and are more able to distinguish God’s truth from the lies. And what would inspire us to need spiritual self-defense lesson in the first place, I ask you?
Spiritual Self Defence
Receiving the gift of salvation was bought and paid for by the blood of Jesus Christ. It was by His good works that we are saved in the sense of receiving eternal life. To us, salvation is free. Being born again, made a new creation and being given eternal life. But for God, it cost everything. This is called justification. Positionally, we are right with God.
Sanctification, on the other hand, is a word used to describe the salvation we also need, after we are justified. It has to do with the spiritual defense we need, hopefully gaining victory so we can grow in our faith. You might think of it as the maturation process after being born, either physically or if and when we choose to be born again.
Consider how the Hebrew people were brought out of the bondage of slavery in Egypt. God did all the work to deliver them… or to save them out of Egypt. But if you know their story, they sure needed a lot of help, or saving after they’d been freed. That might be thought of more as sanctification. It was THEIR journey with all kinds of opportunities to be changed them from slave into warrior!
The Change from Slave to Warrior
So too, when we are saved, we are set free from bondage… the bondage of sin. We finally have the freedom to not have to let it rule over us anymore. Sort of like the journey through our own wilderness of life!! Pastor Mark Biltz of El Shaddai Ministries.us reminds us every week that when the Word entered the world, freedom entered the world! We can’t even have a shot to hunger for righteousness and truth without the Holy Spirit creating those desires within us!
Genesis 4:7 in the Amplified, the version which I really like, states, “… And if you do not do well (but ignore My instruction), sin crouches at your door; its desire is for you, (to overpower you, or some versions say to rule over you) but you must master it.” Now THAT is a motivating truth!! Have you ever thought about sin as something that rules over you?
