James 4:7-10 Submit yourselves then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.
This morning, I woke up thinking about answered prayers. I thought really hard about what I have been praying for, for myself and my wife, and our life together. Yesterday was a day of answers, some very large answers.
While I would love to report that God gave us the answers that we were praying for, He did not. I am not sure why, but I am sure of this, that I will submit myself to God.
We will together resist the devil. He is very real, and he tries very hard to drive deeper wedges between you and God, especially when there are moments that you must, absolutely must humbly submit yourself to the will of God.
In those moments, you can come near to God, and He will come near to you. In that way, you wash your hands of sins, you can't change the past, nor your wrong expectations. You purify your heart by not being double-minded, not trying to figure out why God did not give you what you wanted, when you said you were leaving it to God's will. Either you left it to God's will, and are just humbly satisfied that He continues to sustain you, or you try to rationalize the reasons for not getting the desires of your heart, and stubbornly cling to your double-mind.
God's answers are final. And, regardless of your faith, regardless of your heart's desire, regardless of your comfort and safety, God gives you what He desires for you. God is love, God is good, He does not tempt, nor does He give harm. Even when we cannot see it, in His wisdom, in His plan, we are where we are intended, every day that we allow Him control.
That is a potentially scary ride. Even the deepest of faith cannot take away the concerns of the world completely, when it feels illogical. The Devil works even harder then, and continually puts people in your path that demand a logical answer, that demand a quantification that makes sense to them and to the balances of the world. And, they do not accept the simplest of truth, that you are only in God's hand and you are following the path He laid on your heart.
There is not logic there, that is easily glimpsed by the worldly. And it confuses and frustrates them. I actually got asked about one issue that I received a very clear answer about, "How did you think this was going to help me?" The person was convinced they were helping me and I had hurt my own effort. That person was not and is not in a place to accept the clear statement. "I had no desire to help you, I had only the desire to do as God commanded me, for me."
Perhaps some think it is disobeying God not to just give that answer, regardless. I do not feel it right, nor fair, to hold a conversation about my faith journey with someone that is not there, that does not comprehend, and add that confusion, tension and difficulty to the existing issue. Were they to ask me to denounce the decision, I would say clearly that I could not. If pushed, I would say clearly I can only do what God laid on my heart, and nothing there tells me to take back anything I have done.
How do you get through this, especially in a world that does not understand the greater value in your soul than in your bank account? Submit, resist the Enemy, come near to God and the godly, wash, purify, grieve, mourn, wail, and humble yourself.
Because then, when it is truly not about you, not about wants, not about the world, not in response to the Enemy, not anything except obedience and desire for the heart of our Lord, God will lift you up. In Jeremiah, God says that He has loved us with an everlasting love. No turmoil, trial or temporary issue here in our lives mattered in all of the time before this moment, because God loved us through all of that time. And, nothing about today will matter in all the time from this moment on, because God will never stop loving us, ever.
Everlasting love, or petulant bitterness because the answer I prayed for was not the answer God thought best for me? His ways are not our ways, and we can never know the depths and reach of His heart. We either decide He is for us, or live the wretched life of living against Him.
That was maybe the lesson God hoped I got yesterday. It was the lesson I have taken away so far. Perhaps in months, years, there will be a different lesson I see in the tapestry I weave in my life. Until then, I will continue to trust in the answer God gave, and I will continue to listen to what He laid on my heart. Because He loves me, and that means it will be eternally right, and eternally good. Tomorrow is here, and yesterday will never again come. Everlasting love for a man trying to submit humbly to the will of the ultimate and the everything. That, that is an answer in every prayer, that you find in yourself every day. I pray that you do, it is not your job to make life right. That belongs to God. Let go and let God.
GLYASDI
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