Tonight I want to talk to you about Job. If you've never read the Book of Job, I encourage you to do so. I will try to shorten this as to get to the heart of the message. In Job Chapter 1, Satan comes before God. When God asks Satan what he's doing, Satan replies, roaming to and fro on the Earth. God replies to Satan, "Have you considered my servant Job, he is blameless and upright, one who fears God and shuns evil, there is none like him on all the Earth". This happens twice. The first time God tells Satan, " take all that he has but do not touch his person, he will still serve me. Satan then takes away all that Job had. His money, his family, his herds, EVERYTHING he had, except his wife. All of this happens at the same time. When told about it, Job falls on his knees, tears his garment and says, "The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away, blessed be the name of the Lord. Satan then returns to God and says, but what will a man give for his health. God answers and says, You may touch his body, but you cannot kill him. Job is then struck with boils and horrible disease, so that no one would be around him. In all of this Job never blamed God or cursed God, although Satan left him his wife, his wife did not hold his hand or pray with him, she just told him, "Why don't you curse God and die". After MONTHS of this, although Job never cursed or blamed God, he did start to whine about his situation and question why God was doing this to him. God then answered Job and basically in a nutshell told Job in a whirlwind, "did you make the Earth and all that is in it?'There's much more that God asked Job, but what He was telling Job was that, " I am God, and I am Sovereign, why are you questioning me?
So here's my message:
We all have situations, some we just dont like, some that seem so insurmountable we'll never get through, days where we ask God, "WHY GOD??" Why am I having to go through this??? Guess what, we may never know why God has us go through things. Job never did know, Job never knew that everything he went through was a test between God and Satan. Satan said to God, if I do all of this to Job, "He will surely curse you to your face". God said , no, he won't. God, of course was right. We have to get the mind set that whatever we are facing, whatever we are going through, God will bring us through it and will "bless us for our trouble". We do not know God's reasons, the Word says, "His ways are not our ways and his thoughts higher than our thoughts". The Word also says, "We count them blessed that endure." What we do have to do is TRUST Him, and know that "the testing of our faith produces patience." If you're like me, I'm like, "OK God, i think that's enough!!" It will be enough, when God says it's enough. Plain and simple. The one thing I do know, is that we are to praise him in our circumstance. The Word says he desires our praise. When we do something nice for someone, especially our children, we want them to say Thank you. That's what God wants, us to be thankful and TRUST HIM! I saw a picture on Facebook today that said, "What if you woke up today, with only the things you thanked God for yesterday. Blew my mind!! What did I thank God for yesterday? Did I thank him for anything, or did I just moan and groan about my situation? And to be perfectly honest, I think that's all I did yesterday. Can you say 'Eye Opener'??!! Of course, in the end, God restored back to Job all he had had lost multiplied!!!! Job persevered in a major way! So much so that years and years later James wrote in James chapter 5 verse 11: Indeed we count them blessed that endure. We have all heard of the perseverance of Job and seen the end intended by the Lord- that the Lord is very compassionate and merciful."
Please let me stress this part: the END INTENDED BY THE LORD!! God had our life planned out, he knows what he wants us to do, what he planned for us to do, its a matter of persevering though times that we don't understand, praising Him and trusting that he is in total control!! Casting all of our care, our stress, our anxiety and frustration at his feet, because He loves us and he has a plan. We were not born into this world by accident, regardless of how we were conceived, we are here because God put us here. Each unique with our own personal gifts and callings. We all have a purpose here, but to get to that purpose we must run the race set before us and fight the good fight of faith. The Bible refers to it as a fight and it is. But the Word also says "We are more than conquerers in Christ Jesus: So my challenge to myself and each one of us is to completely trust Him, and to praise Him and thank Him every day for the things he has done, the things he is doing, and the things his Word promises he will do!!!
God is a good God, and his mercy endureth forever!
Much love,
Diana
So here's my message:
We all have situations, some we just dont like, some that seem so insurmountable we'll never get through, days where we ask God, "WHY GOD??" Why am I having to go through this??? Guess what, we may never know why God has us go through things. Job never did know, Job never knew that everything he went through was a test between God and Satan. Satan said to God, if I do all of this to Job, "He will surely curse you to your face". God said , no, he won't. God, of course was right. We have to get the mind set that whatever we are facing, whatever we are going through, God will bring us through it and will "bless us for our trouble". We do not know God's reasons, the Word says, "His ways are not our ways and his thoughts higher than our thoughts". The Word also says, "We count them blessed that endure." What we do have to do is TRUST Him, and know that "the testing of our faith produces patience." If you're like me, I'm like, "OK God, i think that's enough!!" It will be enough, when God says it's enough. Plain and simple. The one thing I do know, is that we are to praise him in our circumstance. The Word says he desires our praise. When we do something nice for someone, especially our children, we want them to say Thank you. That's what God wants, us to be thankful and TRUST HIM! I saw a picture on Facebook today that said, "What if you woke up today, with only the things you thanked God for yesterday. Blew my mind!! What did I thank God for yesterday? Did I thank him for anything, or did I just moan and groan about my situation? And to be perfectly honest, I think that's all I did yesterday. Can you say 'Eye Opener'??!! Of course, in the end, God restored back to Job all he had had lost multiplied!!!! Job persevered in a major way! So much so that years and years later James wrote in James chapter 5 verse 11: Indeed we count them blessed that endure. We have all heard of the perseverance of Job and seen the end intended by the Lord- that the Lord is very compassionate and merciful."
Please let me stress this part: the END INTENDED BY THE LORD!! God had our life planned out, he knows what he wants us to do, what he planned for us to do, its a matter of persevering though times that we don't understand, praising Him and trusting that he is in total control!! Casting all of our care, our stress, our anxiety and frustration at his feet, because He loves us and he has a plan. We were not born into this world by accident, regardless of how we were conceived, we are here because God put us here. Each unique with our own personal gifts and callings. We all have a purpose here, but to get to that purpose we must run the race set before us and fight the good fight of faith. The Bible refers to it as a fight and it is. But the Word also says "We are more than conquerers in Christ Jesus: So my challenge to myself and each one of us is to completely trust Him, and to praise Him and thank Him every day for the things he has done, the things he is doing, and the things his Word promises he will do!!!
God is a good God, and his mercy endureth forever!
Much love,
Diana
I had to read this one yet again today, It speaks volumes!
ReplyDelete