Another good weekend. I'm more and more thankful for weekends with every passing one. Good time to relax, be with friends, catch up on studying...lots of catching up on studying. I have become a more determined person since my last post on bio-organic chemistry thanks to much praying, and encouragement from the wonderful, uplifting people in my life. I've been convinced and have come to the conclusion of: I can do it!
Church yesterday what such a blessing, as usual. We're going through Philippians at the Vista, and I've already learned so much. I'm grateful to be a part of such a loving body here and have a pastor who teaches the word (a necessity that I have noticed often does not happen at some churches). God's provision is so good!
"...The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice. Yes, and I will continue to rejoice, for I know that through your prayers and the help given by the Spirit of Jesus Christ, what has happened to me will turn out for my deliverance. I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that now as always Christ will be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death." -Philippians 1:18-20
Paul. He is definitely a fellow that I would love to have coffee with.
He doesn't know where God is taking him, he is in prison AGAIN, he has endured so much yet he doesn't expect God's deliverance from the tortures of his life...he is confident. Confident in the prayers of the Philippians and most importantly, confident in the Spirit of Jesus Christ. As I have grown in my faith in Christ, I have also (as to be expected) have grown in my confidence in him, but gosh, my confidence is teeny compared to that of Paul's! I can think of many times in the past when I expected God's deliverance, however, my idea of deliverance was extremely different that Paul's. He had "sufficient courage so that Christ would be exalted in his body, whether by life or death." My idea of deliverance was "God will rescue me because I am his child." I'm not sure, but I don't think God ever promises us that he will rescue us, or free us from the pain and turmoil that we suffer on earth, besides through salvation, leaving earth and going to heaven. I know that God doesn't tell us that life as a Christian will be painless, consisting of no suffering, but often times that is what I expected. My idea of deliverance was not one of confidence in Christ or courage, rather one of my troubles and pain simply being taken away. I don't expect to ever have to go through what my past consists of again, but I pray that when other struggles and hardships come along I will be confident in Jesus and I will desire to exalt him through living or dying.
Because either way, as believers, we're living.
3 comments:
no, i don't think that God promises to rescue us from circumstances.
but He does promise us abundant (overflowing) life. that's something i learned last week, that abundant life doesn't mean happy, easy life. it means life to the fullest, and whether we experience happy circumstances or scary ones, they are all an opportunity to let Christ live through us, and that is exciting!
so i think that in a way, God promises us excitement if nothing else!
I think our rescue occurred at the cross. So even in suffering, we are HIs--we are rescued. But at the same time are being rescued from our selfishness and such as we aim toward holiness.
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