270 - “He Is Here” Zephaniah 1-3

The Lord is Mighty to save.  He will save us!
He will be God to us!  He will be our All!
The Mighty One!  For the least of all.  For the worst of all.
The Lord is in our midst, Zephaniah 3:17
the Mighty One to save.
He will rejoice over us.
No matter what has happened to us---what shame, contempt, dishonor---
the LORD will honor us.  He will take care of His own.
In this life there will be tribulation.
Many are the troubles of the righteous,
but the LORD delivers him from all.
We can always rejoice in the love of our God.
No matter what befalls.

PHOTO:  The ocean.  Thinking about whatever befalls, we can always rejoice in God's Love.  That can never be taken away from us.  

269 - “God’s Way is in the Whirlwind” Nahum 1-3; Habakkuk 1-3

                                      

No better prayer for you today.
"Lord, I have heard of your fame;
    I stand in awe of your deeds, Lord.
Repeat them in our day,
    in our time make them known;
    in wrath remember mercy."
Remember mercy on each of these dear ones.
And,
I will wait patiently for the day of calamity ...
and though the fig tree does not bud;
and though the crops fail; 
and though the fields produce no food;
and though no cattle in the stalls . . .
"yet I will rejoice in the Lord,

The Sovereign Lord is my strength;
    he makes my feet like the feet of a deer,
    he enables me to tread on the heights."
Habukkuk 3:17-19

 The prophet looked back upon the experiences of the church in former ages and all the beautiful things that God had done for them. Matthew Henry says that recovered him. 

Here it is. A beautiful outpouring of God's Mercy & Grace to those who put their trust in Him. The Lord is good to those who are good, and to them He will be a stronghold in the day of trouble. Nahum 1:7. But to those who turn their back, who distance themselves and choose evil ways, there is outpouring of wrath, of justice. This story is about Nineveh. 100 years before this, Jonah prophesied and the Ninenvites repented. Their city was saved. But, it happened again. They returned to evil and lived worse than before. Now, another prophecy of "irreversible doom." The same Almighty power exerted for the terror of Nineveh protects and comforts His own people. But the most beautiful metaphor is Nahum 1:3: the Lord has His Way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of His feet. God speaks out of whirlwinds (Job). God descends in storms (Mt. Sinai). God rides chariots (Deut 32) to our help---the clouds are his chariots He rides swiftly. The clouds are like the dust raised by a multitude of horsemen riding full speed---an army in full march---at the head of which was the Lord Himself, ordering, directing, succeeding, before Whom None can stand. Have your way, O God!  

The Lord is Good.
A Stronghold in the day of trouble.
He knows those who take refuge in Him.
Nahum 1:7.
That's it.  All I have to do is climb into His arms.
So, how do you do that.

268 - “Pray To Be Delivered From Your Selfish Soul Rather Than Your Circumstances” Micah 1-7

                                 Sometimes,                I wonder if we have this afffliction thing upside down. We pray like crazy to get out of the bad circumstances---Paul didn't. Dr. Luke pens a direct quote from Paul in Acts 21:13: “What are you doing, weeping and breaking my heart? For I am ready not only to be imprisoned but even to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus.” And the people finally concluded: Let the will of the LORD be done.

Somehow, we talk about seeing our children graduate from college and get married and have babies. LORD, let me be there. We pin our happiness on things turning out right. Paul pens his happiness on the will of the LORD. 

Prophets cry "Peace" when they have something to eat. Micah 3:5
But do those same prophets cry "Peace" when they are treated poorly and good withheld.
No, those prophets "Declare War" against him who puts nothing in their mouths.

May we all pray like crazy not to be delivered out of our circumstances
but to be delivered from our selfish souls.

LORD, 
Thy Will be done
Our wills be undone.

PHOTO:  Nothing matters more than the will of God on Earth.

266 - Amos 6-9; Obadiah 1

 

Are we trying to have the best life here?  Everything falling into place in our world.
Days are coming.
The plowmen will overtake the reaper.
It's the day we all live for---the coming of the LORD for His people.

"Woe to those who are at ease in Zion,
and to those who feel secure on the mountain of Samaria." Amos 6:1
What is my security in.
The themes mesh---Isaiah wrestling not to follow King Uzziah.
Amos wrestling with the feel of security.
What does that look like in all of our lives?

Peace and personal comfort.  It's usually what most go after.Amos 7:7 - God showed me this vision: My Master was standing beside a wall. In his hand he held a plumb line.  "Read Amos and tremble.  God has dropped a plumbline to expose our wickedness---which is in all of our hearts, our relational sin.  Read Amos and tremble with the consciousness of your relational sin.  Worship that leaves UNCHANGED the way you relate to Me and to others is false worship.  I will not cooperate with any pursuit of spiritual maturity that leaves unrecognized and undisturbed your hidden energy of self-protection and self-enhancement.  You are wrongly conscious only of your unsatisfied desires in the Presence of My seeming indifference.  When you remain blind to your guilt, you seek Me for your purposes."  66 LL.

Amos 8: You give little and take much and never do an honest day's work. You exploit the poor, using them, and then, when they're used up, you discard them.  

"Without deep consciousness of relational sin, My people then and now feel falsely complacent in My Presence, unaware, and therefore, untroubled by how far short their style of relating falls below Mine" 6:1.  That is a very telling statement.  Complacent in God's Presence, unaware and untroubled by how far short our relating falls before a Holy God.   How have I changed in the past year, months, weeks, days? Worship that leaves unchanged the ways I relate to my husband, my kids, my friends, (and for me, especially to those who have hurt me deeply) is f.a.l.s.e.

Somewhere in my thinking, I believe I can get away with stuff.

I mean, I don't want to.

But it comes pouring out of me, shocking me to no end.

"As you have done, it shall be done to you;
your deeds shall return on your own head." Obadiah 1:15

One of the commentaries shared it this way:

Sin, thus looked upon in the glass of the commandment, will appear exceedingly sinful. Those will have a great deal to answer for, who are idle spectators of the troubles of their neighbors, when able to be active helpers."

The glass of the commandment.  We see through the glass to read the promptings.  And the Word sees through the glass right back at us.  

PHOTO:  Colorado Springs. Flying up in clouds at sunset. Do we live like we are 30,000 feet in the air or are we present on the ground?

265 - 'The Lion Has Roared" Amos 1-5

Another prophet in the picture.

While Isaiah is dealing with his strongholds, Amos is saying this:

The lion has roared;
who will not fear?
The Lord God has spoken;
who can but prophesy?”

Amos 3

So speak to to those strongholds.

They must go.

They have no hold on me.

Wrestle well.

You know what is right to do.

COME BOLDLY:  Timeless Prayers

O Father, may we hear your Voice saying this is the way walk in it.  May we grasp a little more deeper this day that You are roaring in our lives for goodness, for justice, for love.

PHOTO:  Santa Rosa Island.  In those quiet moments today, may we move to do away with the strong holds on all our lives.  Those strongholds that stop the very blood flow of life to us.   

264 - “Rend Your Heart” Joel 1-3

                                      

"Yet even now,” declares the Lord,
    “return to me with all your heart,
with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning;
13     and rend your hearts and not your garments.”

Joel 2:13.

Return to the Lord your God,
    for he is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love;
    and he relents over disaster.
14 Who knows whether he will not turn and relent,
    and leave a blessing behind him.

One of the lowest points of my life. 

I went to my friend Larry for help. 

He referred my impossible situation to God. 

He told me to go to another room and just listen.

He said I was way too frantic.  

Sitting alone in a very unfamiliar place, 

I randomly opened the Bible to the Book of Joel. 

I put my bony finger on the page and

it landed on Joel 2:13. 

I'll never forget the moment. The Presence of God. 

And the same thing happened tonight. 

Fighting back tears, I sat alone at a restaurant and read:

Joel 2:13.

And the rain came down on my soul. Poured down!

How do I rend this heart of mine?

PHOTO: The rain clouds are about to burst in my heart. 

263 - "Come, O God, Like The Rains" Hosea 7-14

A picture of life, at times.

Desolate, Drought, Devastating.

Bend Down, O God, and hear our prayer.

"Ephraim has hired lovers.  Even though they hired allies among the nations.  They multiplied altars for sin... They forgot their Maker while multiplying fortified cities."  Hosea 8:8-10.  
They played the harlot and loved the earnings. 
There's a point here. 
God's Words, His Story of Hosea and a harlot represents a welcome, a wooing, a wonderful invitation for more.  More than what this old world offers.

God yearns your way.
From the days of old, your very first days, He was there.
"Yet it is I who taught Ephraim to walk,
I took them in My arms;
But they did not know that I healed them...
And I bent down and fed them.  Hosea 11:4
But they were bent on turning from Me.  Hosea 11:7
Am I bent on my own will?
Do I feed on the wind? Hosea 12:1

The Lord is His name.
Therefore, Return to Kindness and Justice.
Wait for your God continually.  Hosea 12:6
Expect Him to do much.  He has.  He is.  He will.

"You will be irresistibly drawn to My Love and able to give it to others when you discover in your own experience that the love I have planted in your heart can never be destroyed by rejection, betrayal, criticism, or any other form of unlove you receive.  True love reveals itself as the strongest of all passions when your impulse to hate those who hurt you is fully felt."  66LL

Come, O God, Like the Rains.

Unannounced.

Unnoticed.

So Needed.

She followed her lovers and forgot God, even when she was married.  Consulting wooden idols.  Asking diviner's wands to inform them.  "Playing the harlot, departing from God."

God says:  He will go away until you acknowledge your guilt and seek His Face.  He does not say when you learn to be grateful or once you are doing well or when you do the right things.  No, it's when we acknowledge our guilt and seek His Face not seek changed lives/changed behavior.  He will come back when we repent not when we just recall good things, count our blessings.  

Hosea 6:1 - “Come, let us return to the Lord.

For He has torn us, but He will heal us...

Let us press on to know the Lord.

And He will come to us like the rain,

Like the spring rain watering the earth."

Hosea 6:3

Hosea 14:1-3 - "You're down but you're not out."  66 LL talks about how these verses are the model for repentance, for crying from your heart as you lay in the ditch of your sin.  "Requiring relief from your pain is wailing on your bed. 

What is the greatest good of my life?  I've so hung on to my reputation, my recognized ministry, my worth as an individual based on what others think...but, no, I must "let go" of demanding any good other than the good of knowing my God.  What is my greatest good this day?

Hosea 14: 7-8  "God is the One Who answers me and satisfies me.  Everything you need is to be found in Him."

Hosea 12:6 - What am I waiting for?  Wait and Expect God to show up.  You are waiting for God not for any man to do anything.  Don't ever give up on Him.  

May we owe no man anything but to love them.  

PHOTO: A picture of life.

262 - "A Door of Hope" Hosea 1-6

It's a Beautiful God Who pursues us when we are unlovely.

"I will allure her and bring her into the wilderness,

and speak tenderly to her."

And I weep.  

There.

I will give her a door of hope.

Hosea 2:14-15.

And I will have mercy on No Mercy.

And I will say to Not My People, You are my People."

Hosea 2:23.

So stirring.

May Hosea be ever so real in each of us.  

May we cry from our hearts for what affects us so this day.  

No wailing from our beds, O God!  

Help us to truly repent as the Great Story beckons.  Help us to find You.  

Oh! Laodicea, you thought you were doing okay.  But, no.  You talked your way right into heaven but you didn't end up there: "I am rich and have become wealthy and have need of nothing." Rev 3:17.  And, God spits you out of his mouth.  Don't you know that you were wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked.  Yet, where we are today, we cannot easily say those kind of statements or we miss the revelation of our purpose here.  The whole Bible is revelatory. 

PHOTO: Outside my classroom door for 15 years. Common Grace is always here. Redeeming Grace is forever mine. 350 

261 - "Go Your Ways to the End of Days" Daniel 10-12

White and Tried. 

This life.

Daniel 12:13 - But go your way till the end of all days. And you shall rest and shall stand in your allotted place at the end of the days.”

"Amid the crash of matter and the wreck of worlds,
the Lord Jehovah will preserve His own." C. Spurgeon
We need not fear.  Let us go on our way.
Find rest for our souls.  This world knows so little.
When have we truly been at rest in our souls?

White and Tried.
This life.

This we know.
This world will end.
May we live fully alive.

Go.
Rest.
Stand.
This is your lot.
This is your life.
No fiery furnace.  No den of lions.
Can keep us from walking with God.
May we become a parade of pleaders who won't let go, who will keep on.
To the end of our days.

Father, we pray the words Charles Spurgeon wrote over 100 years ago for this day:
May we live - "calm resolute in duty, brave in conflict, patient in suffering,
let us go, keeping to our road, and neither swerving from it nor loitering in it." (Spurgeon)

PHOTO:  Thinking about the end of times, the mountains laid low, the earth burned up.  And like that fiery furnace---there will be no smell of smoke on those who trusted to the end.  

260 - "May We Be Caught Praying" Daniel 7-9

Our names.  

Our Acts of Faith.  

Our Decisions to Overcome Evil with Good.  

Our Moves to Owe No Man Anything But Love.  

What We Did With our Lives---and How Aware we were of our Sin.    Daniel 7:10

Oh may we be caught praying! "While I was speaking and praying, confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel, and presenting my plea before the Lord my God, while I was speaking in prayer, the man Gabriel, whom I had seen in the vision at the first, came to me in swift flight at the time of the evening sacrifice." Daniel 9:21. We may never ever see an angel deliver our prayer, but we hold fast to the very Word of God for His Precious Promises are all "yes." And we wait in prayer.  Confessing our own sin.  Daniel pointed the finger at himself first.  He is dealing with what stirs inside of him---though pale in comparison to the depths of sin surrounding him. 

And the angel clarified: "At the beginning of your pleas for mercy a word went out, and I have come to tell it to you, for you are greatly loved." Daniel 9:23.  And how the Promises and the Passion of being greatly loved just melts our hearts. 

This prayer life intrigues and invites.  Make me want to set a hundred Bell Tower alarms as reminders to pray.  

Oh Father, teach us to pray.  Every day, I say the "Our Father," hallowed be Thy Name.  Give us today our daily bread and forgive us like you do for the Daniels of the world who are so in touch with the darkness that lurks within---right smack dab in the middle of all the Goodness. Send your Mercy. Make us Good.  You Alone are Good!  We long for You, Our Father.  

PHOTO:  Watching the Texas sun rise in the sky. Thinking here about being "greatly loved" and what that really means for me today.