Why am I ever panting for help?
Every day, life leaves at my door
Deals I can’t reach without help.
Every step that I must take
I stand in need of more than I have.
Is this the lot of all or is this chart
My cross alone? Do others stand like
Me in constant need of help or am I
So dependent I must always be helped?
Food For Thought: Pressure could be painful but it is one sure way to extract the juices out of life. Crushing circumstances bring out what’s inside us, good or bad. Pressure is neither an excuse nor escape from error. It is a mirror that reveals our status and qualifies us for either promotion or demotion. What do you see and say when you are under pressure? If what you see and say is godly, congratulations! If it is not, you need to understand its purpose – to birth deliverance and move us up the scale. The revelation of our weaknesses is not to shame us and should produce repentance which qualifies us for restoration and recovery, not contrary. Don’t let the shame of failure drive you into self-defense or covering what God is bent on exposing to make an end of. When we accept God’s dealings with meekness, then our hunger for Christ-likeness or God’s best becomes so desperate we can’t wait until tomorrow- we gun for change now! We can take those crushing impacts and turn them into uplifting forces, make meat of circumstances threatening to swallow us and extract sweetness from devastating experiences. Yes, we can! When we count it all joy, patience is sure to deliver our faith confessions. I have seen God turn my tears to joy and my fears to toys. People we admire are not those who ruptured under pressure. We hail those who stood against all odds, overcoming threats to emerge as winners in the fierce battles of life. The hotter the fire they went through, the greater their reward and influence. Don’t forget that God will not allow things beyond our capability to come at us. It therefore means that whatever He allows to come our way has been tested, proven and stamped ‘possible’ in His register. God sees you as a conqueror. He knows you are capable of dealing with these issues. If God says you can, why believe and react like you can’t? Whose report are you working with? May we face challenges with, ‘I can’ attitude, knowing truly that we can do all things through Christ who supplies eternal strength and strategy, before which nothing can stand, amen.
Scripture: I will lift up my eyes to the hills – from whence comes my help? Psalm 121: 1.
Prayer: Dear Lord, help me to be strong; strong enough to carry my cross, strong enough to help others, yet never strong enough not to need Your help every step of the way, amen.