I am a Christian, a retired teacher, a mother and a grandmother. I love to read and I love the Lord Jesus Christ! Unless otherwise specified ,all visual illustrations are from the YOU VERSION APP of the Bible.
When someone says this phrase, “spiritual maturity” it generally makes me cringe because I know I am not there yet. And I am also aware that according to the standards of others, I may never be “there.” But where I am is seated in my recliner, reading my Bible and devotionals and praying for God to speak to me. One of the things He used this morning was a devotional from Faith Gateway by Dana K. White. Here’s a line from it:
“My level of spiritual maturity is the level of control I’ve given over to the Holy Spirit. It’s the opposite of an achievement. It’s knowing and accepting the truth that anything I understand, I understand only because God’s Holy Spirit gave me that understanding.”
So, maybe it’s my definition of spiritual maturity that needs to be honed. I have kept trying to achieve something, much like passing a test in school, but that is not it at all. Did you hear my sigh of relief? I can quit striving and just give over the wheel to the Holy Spirit. Here’s the link to the devotional if you would like to read it in its entirety. It is well worth the few minutes that you will spend doing so and I hope that it frees and enlightens you just as it did me.
Let’s just close with scriptures to ponder so that we can grow together today in the Lord.
All things…everything. Sounds like getting mature in the Lord to me. And we just have to relinquish control to the gift of the Holy Spirit whom Jesus promised us.
When we confess that we cannot do this Christian walk alone, maturing ourselves all by ourselves, then we are on the road to admitting that the One who is strong can use our weaknesses to teach us how to be more like Him. And isn’t that part of being spiritually mature?
I hope that your day is blessed so that you can be a blessing to others. 🙏🏻
From the YouVersion Bible App Devotional, “Reconnection”
Day 3: Trust
Let’s talk about hesitation for a minute. Without trust in God and his promises, we end up hesitating so much more, right? We hesitate and wait when we should be trusting and moving. Sometimes I wonder how many of Jesus’ disciples would have dropped their nets and followed him if they’d been able to check him out on Instagram before he showed up. Would they have even gone out to hear him speak if they’d watched all his YouTube sermons and read the negative comments left by people who critique sermons full-time?
Hesitation is a consequence of believing we are in control. When it comes to God, since we have so many answers at our fingertips in Google, we crave more tangible assurance of God and his ways. And when the proof isn’t evident and doesn’t show up right away, what do we do? We start grasping at control to give us a false sense of safety. And our phones provide the means of that control. But while we’re waiting for all the answers we need to fall into place or endlessly researching the bottomless pit of information and opinions that is the internet, we end up frozen. Not moving. Not risking. Waiting for blessed assurance before we take one step toward where we were supposed to be going in faith a long time ago. . . .
If you’ve been waiting for “the right time” to trust God and do the next thing, my question to you is, how much time are you spending in his Word versus your phone? Listen, I am the king of spending time with my phone, so I ask the question with no judgment. However, I do ask it with plenty of experience, and here’s why: when we aren’t connected to the world 24-7, we actually have to exist in a place of trust.
Prayer
Father, I have often tried to have control over things that should only be in your hands. Please forgive me for not trusting you, and please prompt me to turn to you in all things. Amen.
My Thoughts
The author of the devotional is spot-on about my unending desire to control and to know what I want to know instantly. I use a search engine a lot, to check on meds and their side effect, to look up possible places to stay when we travel, even to check what the “hottest” gifts will be in case I want to purchase one before they are sold out. I had never thought of it before, but I can’t do a search on the reality of God. He is who He says He is and no search engine can convince me of that. It’s a heart thing. So, instead of hesitating and not moving when God tells me to, I need to trust and do what He says. I don’t think that there is any manmade search engine that has the Holy Spirit as its source, so trust won’t come from searching for it on a device. Trust comes from action, from doing the last thing God said to do and moving on to the next thing and the thing after that. I find when I am stuck in a rut and not moving closer to God, it’s because I am not trusting Him to go ahead of me and prepare the way. I want to control and He has control, so there is no contest about who will ultimately win that battle. The truth is that there should never be a battle between hesitating and moving forward with trust. I am not at the place where I trust all the time, without question or hesitation, but I will say that I am making progress, at least sometimes. I am more likely to hear that small voice say, “Trust” these days than I am to hear the other voice that says, “Does God really want you to do this?” I would like to say that I have arrived, but I am a work in progress.
There Was Jesus: In the Waiting (You Version Devotional, “There Was Jesus” by Zach Williams)
One of the things we all can agree on is that, as a culture, we’re not good at waiting; we’ve invented so many ways to get out of waiting in lines, waiting on food to cook and waiting for paint to dry. I’ll admit, I’ve been conditioned to expect things quickly and right when I ask. When I read a verse like Isaiah 40:31, where it lists out the wonderful things that can happen when we wait on God, it’s challenging to follow through, especially when times are tough. I believe our impatience comes from our need to remain in control. It’s scary and goes against what we naturally want to do in most situations; hold tight and only trust ourselves. God has given us guidance on the best way to live, and sometimes, the best way to allow God to have control of a situation is to wait on Him. It requires existing in a space that feels unknown, trusting in His process, and believing that He has a plan for our lives. Easier said than done, right? What should we be doing during the waiting? Romans 12:12 tells us to be “constant in prayer.” While we’re waiting on God’s timing, prayer helps connect us to Him and helps us to focus our faith. Ephesians 4:2 tells us that we should spend our time loving others, being gentle with each other, and to “walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called.” Basically, God has asked us to trust Him with the timing, but to walk along with Him in the meantime.
Waiting on God doesn’t mean we’re separated from Him. He’s always right alongside us. Exodus 14:14 tells us, “The Lord will fight for you, and you have only to be silent.” He’s fighting for us and with us in the waiting and the searching, every minute and every moment.
My Thoughts
I don’t know about you, but waiting is hard for me. I am not so much “in an instant”as in my own timing. I don’t like to wait because, as the author of the devotional wrote, it means I have to relinquish my control over something. Change and waiting throws me, every time. I try to be in prayer and wait, but I get anxious, and my blood pressure soars. I try not to be anxious, but that doesn’t work because in trying not be anxious, I get more anxious. It’s like I am on a Ferris wheel, stuck on the top and unable to get off or to make the thing move and get me back down to the ground. So, I am working on learning to calm my thoughts and think about Jesus walking beside me, or even sitting in that Ferris wheel next to me, holding my hand and asking me to tell Him about my day. I’m glad that He is patiently still working on me.
This morning, I got up early and got ready for my appointment with my neurologist. Every year since my stroke, I have to go in to get a Doppler on my carotid artery. The procedure isn’t painful so it’s not a big deal. That is, until an hour and a half before I am supposed to leave, the doctor’s office calls, says there is a problem with today’s schedule and wants me to come in tomorrow. You would think that I would roll with the punches, as they say, just write down the new time and move on. Well, instead, I had to juggle another appointment to take my car in for brake work and there were two changes to the schedule this week already. Not bad, right? Unless you have my body and my mind which has its own way of dealing with change and waiting…my blood pressure soared and I had to take my extra pill that is only for such occasions as this. As my husband says, I am not conditioned for change because change in my home growing up meant my mom would get angry and I would be the target. I have basically spent my whole life trying to avoid change, but then along comes God who wants me to get accustomed to it so He can teach me that change is not a bad thing. I am now putting myself into His capable and loving hands and praying for my BP to regulate so my head will stop pounding. I am doing my deep breathing exercises and reading my Bible while I also pray. There is no magic formula for me to de-stress when change happens, but believe it or not, I am getting better at accepting the waiting part of change. My body still reacts physically, but my heart is calmer, knowing that the Lord is right beside me. He is waiting, too, for me to be calm enough to listen. So, appointment tomorrow…no problem! Car on Wednesday, not a big deal. God’s got this and me, in His hands and He is molding me to be more like him. After all, that is what I have been praying for. And if this change and waiting stuff is what it takes, then I am ready to fight that stress battle with the Lord holding my hand and speaking in my ear!
Sometimes, in the storms of life or even in the everyday hustle and bustle of routines, we may have a tendency to forget that God is still working out His plan. This week, in the midst of breathing treatments and remembering to take medications at the right time and adequately spaced from other meds, I got so preoccupied with my illness that God has been there, but I was not paying a lot of attention to what He has been doing in my life. This morning when I awakened for the first time in over a week without coughing, I was reminded of His great power and His control over all. It’s not that I forgot to give God thanks. I did that. I acknowledge Him every day, but my priority has been on getting better and breathing. And it’s not that my priority is bad…it’s just not the most important thing in my life. That would be God…the God who made me and everything else.
It’s hard for our finite minds to conceive of God, an omnipotent and loving God who was there before the mountains were even formed. Because we have a beginning on our birthday and an ending on the day we die, we seem to try to put everything into that same box. Long before I recognized that there is a God who created and sustains life, God was there. He didn’t need me to acknowledge Him in order to be. He just was and is.
Today in my devotional, I read about the destruction of Babylon, part of God’s plan. God used Babylon to judge the sins of many nations, including Judah. When His plan was completed, He sent Persia against Babylon and Babylon ceased to exist. I don’t pretend to understand how God raises up and destroys world powers, but I do know that He is in control. In this election season, when the world seems to be rocking and pivoting to hear all of the words of the latest candidates, we need to be mindful of the fact that no one gets into power without God’s allowing it and no one stays in power without God’s blessing. We may not like the current administration (I don’t; I think it is one of the most evil ones we have ever had), but God can use the leadership to speak to a nation that needs to repent. It’s not the words that leaders say that give us insight into what their motivations are. It is their actions, their deeds. If we have a leader who lies and is greedy, then can we not learn that this is the condition of the heart of our nation? Fretting about the election will not put your guy in office; God does. If the last election was fraudulent, God allowed it to happen. I am not saying that God controls every last part of every election, but I am saying that if He wants to, He can. We have to allow God to be God, of our lives (including our health) and of our out-of-control world.
What do we do as Christians when we see what is happening on college campuses? What do we do when we see such anti-Semitic fervor in a nation that has been an ally of Israel for decades? We pray! God is right there watching all of this roll out and He is not caught by surprise or wringing His hands in anguish. He has a plan, a plan to restore people to Him, and He is working out His plan little by little. We may not see it, but it is happening. Like awakening this morning and breathing more freely, the work has been going on but I didn’t see the evidence of it until I could take a breath without gasping. Likewise, one day we will see the evidence of God’s work in our world, in our nation, in our families and in ourselves. We have to hold on and continue to pray. And when we are praying, our prayer should be that God’s will be done, in Israel and in all of the world. What God has said will come to pass. He is the everlasting Father who spoke the world into existence. Nothing is too hard for Him!
When unexpected events happen in my life, it is then that I find out what parts of my life I have not yet surrendered to God. That is when the anxiety that is always lurking and ready to attack surfaces and I have to be ready to give it all to Jesus again. This week, I found myself anxious about our grandson Tyler’s appointment with the surgeon. But because God had reassured me repeatedly that He is taking care of Tyler, the anxiety did not get the best of me. Rather. I prayed and then waited for word from my daughter. Normally, I would have been texting repeatedly about the time of the appointment, the outcome of the appointment, the exact words of the surgeon. Instead, I rested in the assurance of the Lord. The results weren’t all that I wanted, but they were enough to let me know that God has the situation under control and He doesn’t need my help to manage it. The surgeon told Tyler that the fracture of his clavicle is severe and is taking a while to heal. He took him out of the brace and the sling but cautioned him that he cannot lift anything. He also gave him gentle exercises to do as he showers in order to get strength back into his left arm that he hasn’t used since August. Finally, he wants to see him again in a month. The clavicle has moved back into the correct position, so that is a big praise and a huge relief! God is good, even when we try to rush Him or move Him quickly towards our desired outcome. He moves in His time and with His purpose. So, the anxiety that I had felt before this week, leading up to the appointment, did not do anything but make me uncomfortable. I had to hand things over to the Father to handle and then I felt the “ahh” relief that comes from knowing that although I couldn’t do anything, God could and was working on Tyler’s behalf.
Letting go and letting God is freeing and brings rejoicing, maybe not immediately or during the circumstances, but in the end, the rejoicing comes.
Just as the ocean washes away the debris from the beach, so God is washing away my tendency to be anxious. He wants me to relax and trust Him and every day is a new day to try to do just that. Last week was Tyler’s appointment. Who knows what this week will bring? But as I texted Tyler, nothing is going to happen to me today that God and I cannot handle together. God is making sure that I know that and I’m looking forward to see where He will lead me next in my quest for total trust and assurance in Him.
Have a blessed day, filled with rejoicing and the knowledge that God has everything under control!
I heard a news story this morning that made me gasp in dismay. Dr. Oz was interviewed on Fox News and said that the most vulnerable population may have to shelter in place until the virus is completely gone. I started to get upset about not seeing my children and grandchildren for a year or more. Then, I read my Bible and God spoke peace to my heart. After all, He is in control.
No matter what is happening around us, we can have complete and total confidence in God. He is the light in our darkness, the song in our hearts and the whisper in our ear in the quiet of night. Let God speak peace to you today and be blessed by His presence!
No matter what is happening around us, we can have complete and total confidence in God. He is the light in our darkness, the song in our hearts and the whisper in our ear in the quiet of night. Let God speak peace to you today and be blessed by His presence!
Vickie's Book Nook and Meditation Corner 