A Quote by Charles R. Swindoll
God does not dispense strength and encouragement like a druggist fills your prescription. The Lord doesn't promise to give us something to take so we can handle our weary moments. He promises us Himself. That is all. And that is enough.
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Despite trials, worldly confusion, and caustic voices, we can trust in the Lord and go forward with happy hearts, knowing that with every challenge or problem, there's the strength to go on. Why? Because we know His promises are real, that He does know us by name and has a plan for each of us. He will help us learn what it is and give us joy in doing it.
Praise causes the presence of the Lord to come into our midst. Even though God is omniscient, He manifests His authority and rule in our environment when we praise Him. When we praise, God comes in and leads us forth... He does not just visit us, but He abides and aligns Himself with us to walk with us into the path that He has chosen for us.
The Bible is full of God's promises to provide for us spiritually and materially, to never forsake us, to give us peace in times of difficult circumstances, to cause all circumstances to work together for our good, and finally to bring us safely home to glory. Not one of those promises is dependent upon our performance. They are all dependent on the grace of God given to us through Jesus Christ.
God never promises exemption. He does promise companionship, which is better. He does not promise do deliver you or me or any other individual from pain, sorrow, or economic disaster, but He does give assurance the He will help us through and that there will be compensations. "I will not leave you comfortless, I will come to you." These are the words of Jesus.
God never promises to remove us from our struggles. He does promise, however, to change the way we look at them.
The law of giving and receiving is fundamental, and relates just as much to God as it does to us. As we go through the door of giving ourselves to God in worship we find that God comes through that same door and gives Himself to us. God's insistence that we worship Him is not really a demand at all but an offer-an offer to share Himself with us. When God asks us to worship Him, He is asking us to fulfill the deepest longing in Himself, which is His passionate desire to give Himself to us. It is what Martin Luther called "the joyful exchange."
One of my favorite scriptures is Proverbs 3:5-6: “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and don't lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will direct your path.” That's a perfect example of trust. Sometimes you can trust and hope that everything is going to be rosy and God doesn't promise that. He promises that He's got our backs and He's prepared a place for us.
Mind how you pray. Make real business of it. Let it never be a dead formality...plead the promise in a truthful, business-like way...Ask for what you want, because the Lord has promised it. Believe that you have the blessing, and go forth to your work in full assurance of it. Go from your knees singing, because the promise is fulfilled: thus will your prayer be answered...the strength [not length] of your prayer...wins...God; and the strength of prayer lies in your faith in the promise which you pleaded before the Lord.
God is ready to give more quickly, and to give more than you ask; yea, he offers his treasures if we only take them. It is truly a great shame and a severe chastisement for us Christians that God should still upbraid us for our slothfulness in prayer, and that we fail to let such a rich and excellent promise incite us to pray.
Lord, enlighten thou our enemies. Sharpen their wits, give acuteness to their perceptions, and consecutiveness and clearness to their reasoning powers: we are in danger from their folly, not from their wisdom; their weakness is what fills us with apprehension, not their strength.
But why should we not place implicit confidence in God and rely upon His word of promise? Is anything too hard for the Lord? Has His word of promise ever failed? Then let us not entertain any unbelieving suspicions of His future care of us. Heaven and earth shall pass away, but not so His promises.
Give us, O Lord, a steadfast heart, which no unworthy affection may drag downwards; give us an unconquered heart, which no tribulation can wear out; give us an upright heart, which no unworthy purpose may tempt aside. Bestow upon us also, O Lord our God, understanding to know you, diligence to seek you, wisdom to find you, and a faithfulness that may finally embrace you; through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Give us grace and strength to forbear and to persevere. Give us courage and gaiety, and the quiet mind. Spare to us our friends, soften to us our enemies. Bless us, if it may be, in all our innocent endeavours. If it may not, give us the strength to encounter that which is to come, that we may be brave in peril, constant in tribulation, temparate in wrath, and in all changes of fortune, and down to the gates of death, loyal and loving to one another.
Strength, strength for us. What we need is strength, who will give us strength? There are thousands to weaken us, and of stories we have had enough.
Sometimes we want things we were not meant to have. Because he loves us, the Father says no. Faith trusts that no. Faith is willing not to have what God is not willing to give. Furthermore, faith does not insist upon an explanation. It is enough to know His promises to give what is good-he knows so much more about us than we do.
God will give us the strength to be able to handle things. I mean, you can try to do it on your own, and sometimes you can pull off some stuff, but in the long run, it's much easier with Him by our side.
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