When the Sail is Broken

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Yesterday I received a delivery. The young delivery man appeared to be unbalanced – nervous, twitchy, inattentive to details about the delivery process and payment – and aloof. I had never encountered such a delivery experience before. My heart became sensitive to his inner turmoil. Ultimately it was time to start talking about the solution. He listened. He received the gift of Salvation through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and left my home revived. In the midst of all his turmoil God is present and ABLE to save.

 

 

Psalm 34:18 NASB declares “The LORD is near to the brokenhearted And saves those who are crushed in spirit.”

 

 

Humiliation breeds resentment. Face it, when a situation occurs that is a direct blow to your pride (ego) your immediate response is subversion – get rid of this thought, issue, desire, person, place or thing that is attempting to destroy you.  If you can remove the threatening element yourself and keep your pride in tact, your ego is fueled. But if you are unable to thwart the process of humiliation then you are faced with a pierced ego/broken heart.

 

 

The Hebrew word for “BROKENHEARTED” is derived from shabar (unto them that are of a broken) and leb (heart). David describes that of a broken mind. The breaking process is likened to a ship wrecked in a stormy sea.

A Nonsuch 30' under sail
“Without Him life would be drifting like a ship without a sail.”

Picture a sail boat gracefully gliding across a body of water. Instantly a violent storm produces winds and lightening that ultimately destroys the large sail on the boat. The storm then moves on leaving the boat stranded in the water unable to navigate the waters because the sail is broken.

 

How precious it must have been for David when he realized this process of humiliation yielded a closeness to The LORD.

 

Jehovah – “the self-existent One, He that is who He is, the eternal I AM; a special relation of Deity, in His Jehovah character, to man, and all Scripture emphasizes this; the redemption name of Deity, a beautiful type of the righteousness provided by the Lord God through sacrifice (Romans 3:2125 http://www.biblestudytools.com/nas/romans/passage.aspx?q=romans+3:21-25); 

 

in God’s redemptive relation to man, various compound names of Jehovah are found which reveal Him as meeting EVERY need of man from his lost state to the end {Jehovah-jireh – the Lord will provide – Jehovah-rapha The Lord who heals and Jehovah -shammah – the Lord IS PRESENT.” (the Scofield reference Bible, pg.117)

 

 

God has our entire existence in His hands. Humiliation gives rise to the reality that you are in need of Him. The flesh laments in the disdain of ego assassination but the spirit is primed for God’s Heavenly intervention. “He saves those who are crushed in spirit” The “saving” implies a significant force or power behind the action. God saves us at the level of our spirit through the power of the Holy Spirit. It is an inside job!  Humiliation of the flesh crushes the spirit of a man in such a way that he/she is WILLING to receive DIVINE INTERVENTION or HELP in the time of trouble. My experience with the deliveryman demonstrated how IMMEDIATELY God can restore. Your circumstances outside of you may not change right away BUT God’s Word changes the condition of your heart and fortifies you, equips you with the strength, courage and wisdom to navigate through the difficulties with grace, love, peace, hope and perseverance.

 

 

You can’t tell HELP how to HELP. You can only ASK for HELP. When HELP shows up just RECEIVE IT. To my surprise the deliveryman asked for a solution to the angst of fear, uncertainty and heartache attached to him. His inquiry surfaced after hearing the Word of God.  All that was happening up to that point was God’s Sovereign hands preparing the way for this young soul to receive the message of God’s Saving power.

 

 

When the sail is broken, God is present to help restore you, revive you, rebuild you from within. It is then obvious that His presence was in effect during the humiliation process evidenced by His grace. If you are honest with yourself you can realize that your humiliation could have been a lot worse. The fact that you are still alive, able to realize His presence and receive His power is the proof that He Is.

 

 

Embrace humiliation and get into the solution. David’s pronouncement of the Lord’s nearness generates hope in times of hopelessness, strength in times of weakness, power in times of powerlessness. OUR LORD JESUS SAVES to the UTMOST.

 

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Get Tested! It Saves

Posted on by conquerorshots

Jordon river
Jordon river (Photo credit: swortman53)

I know someone who is desperately afraid of going to the doctor. His apprehension subjects him to incredulous fears associated with the process of finding out the status of his health. Day after day he experiences physical symptoms that force him to contend with the fact that his body is in need of medical attention. Yet his fear allows him to stay nestled in the confines of uncertainty. He continues to go on about the daily routines his life has constructed. Amidst all the vocational, social, political and ecclesiastical activities he fervidly attends to during the course of  weeks and months that have passed – with an astounding zeal for life, the fact of a physical struggle continues to plague him. He lacks a willingness to get honest and get tested.

All around the city of Atlanta there is an advertising campaign for children and adults to “Get Tested” for HIV. Billboards, TV commercials and print media all serve to push this message socially . The ad seems to present the point from the perspective that it is better to “know your status” and be treated rather than NOT know and do more harm to yourself and others.  A life of promiscuity and/or sexual irresponsibility, compounded with the guise of sexual crimes, all seem to give rise to this fear and more and more people are physically,mentally, emotionally and spiritually spent. The rippling effects of this crippling dilemma is rectified IF there is a willingness to get honest and get tested.

We can understand how medical testing yields physical, mental and emotional treatments BUT what testing applies to spiritual treatments?

The answer:

LIFE ISSUES i.e. TRIALS i.e. PROBLEMS i.e. HARDSHIPS i.e. DIFFICULTY i.e. UNCERTAINTY i.e TRIBULATION

The human race deems life issues as a NEGATIVE and not a POSITIVE. This is largely due to how the world order views these guaranteed life phenomena. The world has developed a safeguard to greatly support the negative associations with “life issues” so much so that when they materialize in a person’s life, an immediate barrier presents itself between him/her and the world.

For example, when someone is plagued with sickness –  PROBLEM – she not only has to deal with the mundane processes associated with treatment and the pursuit towards wellness. The issues magnify with the steady stresses of the employer, finances, loss, dissociation from society and certain peer groups and family and all the fears of loneliness. Meanwhile, people continue to make the world “go around” with their selfish and self-centered idealism towards preservation, progress and upward mobility while isolating themselves from the sick and shut-in. It is selfishness to the core that makes an associate retreat and withdraw from a person plagued with illness while being fully aware of their own ability to offer the sick with the resource of certainty – a certain affirmation that you will do all that is within your power to support the sick. That ideology is now absent in several American cultures today – and sadly, the church (without naming denominations) is in this number. It would seem obvious that they (the local church) would be inclined to serve the sick, poor and widowed most willingly. This is not to say that the existing church programs are not serving “Life Issues.” Oh no! Their service history supports the blatant reality of a need for more involvement from their neighboring local church bodies thereby exposing the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace that Paul clearly addresses.

Ephesians 4:2(NET) with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love,
4:3 making every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

At the end of the book of Joshua, the author makes a compelling appeal to Israel before his apparent death.

Furthermore, Joshua was prophesying to Israel that they would need to have courage and consistency in dealing with “Life Issues” in the future.

English: The Walls of Jericho Fall Down (Josh....
English: The Walls of Jericho Fall Down (Josh. 5:16, 6:1-10,13-19) Русский: Падение стен Иерихона (Иис. 5:16, 6:1-10,13-19) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Joshua 23:6-11 (NET)
(6) Be very strong! Carefully obey all that is written in the law scroll of Moses so you won’t swerve from it to the right or the left,
(7) or associate with these nations that remain near you. You must not invoke or make solemn declarations by the names of their gods! You must not worship or bow down to them!
(8) But you must be loyal to the LORD your God, as you have been to this very day.
(9) “The LORD drove out from before you great and mighty nations; no one has been able to resist you to this very day.
(10) One of you makes a thousand run away, for the LORD your God fights for you as he promised you he would.
(11) Watch yourselves carefully! Love the LORD your God!”

His instruction is concise: “REMEMBER WHAT GOD HAS SAID, WHAT HE HAS DONE AND CHOOSE HIM DAILY – in war and peace”  One example is pertinent here – JERICHO. Jericho was a city that Israel needed to go through to get to the Jordan River. It was God’s Determined will that Israel would cross the Jordan River and enter the Promised Land. Jericho was an immediate “Life Issue” to Israel because of its great army and wall that was designed to protect its inhabitants. Israel was ill-equipped to handle Jericho’s might militarily. However, Joshua was in complete relationship with the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob who meticulously brought the Israelites out of Egypt, through the Red Sea and preserved them in the wilderness. The story concludes with the Israelites marching silently for 6 days around the wall as God instructed them. Victory prevailed on the 7th day as they marched silently, blew the trumpet and began to shout on Josh’s command. Simultaneously, the walls of Jericho tumbled down. God permanently dealt with the barrier.

The Israelite‘s  testing i.e. “Life Issue”  in the Old Testament offers Bible readers a glimpse into God’s character. The tests were all designed to get them to line up with His will for them. Israel’s history with God gives rise to the importance for humans to practice willingness to be honest and get tested.

Every “Life Issue” has a Divine purpose. Get Tested! It saves.

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