Act justly, love mercy, walk with God - Micah 6:8

During a dinner with friends last week, this question came up:

Can you really know and do God's will?

 

Don and I were able to share times when we didn't understand why, but we knew God was directing us.  Sometimes we were directed by wise counselors, sometimes by His word, sometimes in prayer, but always with faith resulting in obedience to what we believed He was directing us to do.  In our Precept study this week on Covenant, we understand that when we believe, our responsibility is to act in faith which results in obedience.  By the way, it also results in blessing!  And peace!  And rest!  And His pleasure!

 

Micah, the prophet, was trying to answer a question with a question about what true religion was.  The questioner wanted to believe if they sacrificed enough that would be their ticket.  Micah reminded the people God had already shown the Israelites through history what was required...they didn't need a new revelation as much as they needed to obey what He had already told them.

 

Don has preached many times that 90% of God's will for us - those in covenant relationship with Him - is known to us in His word.  We just want something else - more current, more fun, who knows why we want something else!  Listen to Oswald Chambers (6/3):

 

If we are saved and sanctified God guides us by our ordinary choices,

and if we are going to choose what He does not want, He will check, and

we must heed.  Whenever there is doubt, stop at once.  Never reason it out

and say --'I wonder why I shouldn't?'  God instructs us in what we choose,

that is, He guides our common sense, and we no longer hinder His

Spirit by continuallly saying-- 'Now, Lord, what is Thy will?'.

 

Micah reminds us to simply --

--Act justly -- be honest and fair in all things

--Love mercy -- do more than is required; be kind even when it's not easy

--Walk humbly with God - keep in step with Him; know Him and His word and act on it;

    keep Him as your focus and do not allow the world to tell you you are the boss!

 

Yes you can know and do God's will.  He has given you His Spirit to show you how.  Who are you walking with today?

 

For further study:  Psalm 40:6-8; Psalm 143:8-10, Matthew 6:9-13 and 26:39, Romans 12:1-2, Ephesians 5:17, Philippians 2:12-13, James 4:13-17, 1 John 5:13-15

 

Be blessed in your understanding of God's word.

 

Love,

Holly





Blessed are all who wait for the Lord - Isaiah 30:18

Of all the promises in the Bible, I find this one of the most comforting.  Waiting is not easy, but it is something you have to believe in...implicit in this promise is the faith of the one waiting...faith that the Lord will do the blessing...however that blessing looks.  I had a computer glitch this week...all my Word documents changed so that I could only open them by purchasing a new program...3 years of Word documents!  I got on a virtual chat with someone at Microsoft and she said it had happened within Microsoft and she could fix it, but she would have to "enter" my computer.  With some fear and trepidation, I allowed her "in" and the cursor began moving around as she did her work. I sat back and watched it happen! Well, lo and behold, it worked!  I had to be patient and trusting that she was who she said she was and that she would "bless" me with success!  If we will wait, the Lord who created us will "move our cursor around" and bless us!!  What a promise...in my own words, of course. 

There is a wonderful hymn "There Shall Be Showers of Blessing" written by Daniel Whittle.  Not "There Might be Showers..." but the promise that there "shall be"!  In THEN SINGS MY SOUL by Robert Morgan, he tells a story of a pilot whose plane was shot down in Vietnam and he was taken to a concentration camp.  In that camp, of course, he was deprived of all spiritual books or resources, so he reached deep into his soul for months bringing up the hymns he learned from childhood.  One night it started pouring rain and with the darkness all around him, he sang:

Showers of blessing, showers of blessing we need!

Mercy drops round us are falling, but for the showers we plead.

 

He wrote: "All this talk of Scripture and hymns may seem boring to some, but it was the way we conquered our enemy and overcame the power of death around us."  He lived to write a book of his experiences and we can live to tell of the blessings in our lives.  I love to tell people in the midst of trials: "watch for the blessings".  I have been there and the promises of God are true...He will bless if we will wait for him.

 

For further study:  Numbers 6:24, 2 Sam. 3:18, Psalm 1:1, 2:12, 84:5, Ezekiel 34:26, Luke 12:35-48, 2 Cor. 12:9, 2 Tim. 4:16, Titus 2:13, James 1:12

 

Be blessed in your understanding of God's word.

 

Love,

Holly

It is good to praise the Lord - Psalm 92:1

STREAMS IN THE DESERT has a story attributed to Henry W. Frost of his being in a very dark place after receiving some bad news from home while away in China.  He prayed and tried to force himself into a better place but the "shadows only deepened".  He then tells of entering a missionary's home and seeing these words on the wall: "Try giving thanks".  He says, "so I did and in a moment every shadow was gone, never to return."  I realize this doesn't always happen, but it is a very good attitude to try.

You could substitute the word "bless" or "thank" for the word "praise"...they all come from the same root.  The psalmist was reminding us that it  is a good thing to say thanks to the Lord...good, because the Lord longs to hear that from us; good, because we will be the ones blessed when we do; good, because others will be helped when we do; good, because it will have a beneficial effect not only in our own lives, but in others' as well, and most especially good, because He is worthy of praise!

My favorite new Christian song is "This is Amazing Grace" by Phil Wickham.  Listen...

This is amazing grace; this is unfailing love

That you would take my place, that You would bear my cross

You laid down your life that I would be set free

Jesus I sing for all that you've done for me.

 

Between last week and this I week I'm doing a lot of singing...you should try it...it might work for you!

 

For further study:  Deu. 32:3, 1 Chron. 29:10-13, Psalm 1:1, 147:1, 150:6, 1 Thes. 5:18, Hebrews 13:15, James 5:13

 

Be blessed in your understanding of God's word.

 

Love,

Holly