When prayers are not answered…

The promise of God is that His people are “like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers” (Psalm 1:3) and that as “we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.” (2 Corinthians 3:18)

This is evidence of the Spirit-filled life. In that place where Jesus reigns, sin cannot, but if I have unconfessed sin that I know about and have not taken it to the Cross, God can bestow no other blessings, no matter how much I desire them and fervently pray for them. Today, I’m thinking about the need for purity in my life takes priority over God answering all my prayers. As one writer says, the temple must first be made pure before the King will come in to reign there!

For example, when severe famine hit and God’s people suffered, He sent Joseph into Egypt — sold as a slave, suffering all the way and “the word of God tested his faith” until the ruler who had food “set him free and made him lord of his house and ruler of all his possessions, to bind his princes at his pleasure and to teach his elders wisdom.” (Psalm 105:17–22)

It was not the prison life with its hard beds or poor food that tried him, but it was the word God had spoken into his heart in the early years concerning his future that was always on his mind. It must have seemed totally impossible at times but after this man grew through the testing, then he was fit for the the task of dealing with his wayward brethren, with the love and patience of the Lord.

I will not experience what Joseph did, but as I pray for what God promises to do, for myself and for those that I pray for, and yet the days go on and He does not do it, that is truly hard. Yet I see that this is a discipline of faith for me also. It brings me into a knowledge of God which would otherwise be impossible.

What does this look like? Oswald Chambers describes it with spiritual disciplines, calling them habits. He warns that as I become more virtuous, patient, even godly, these are only stages and if I stop there, I can easily strut as if I’ve arrived. What God wants is that those disciplines be practiced so they are not conscious habits at all, because they are lost in the life of Christ.

In other words, God wants spiritual discipline to be such a part of me that I do the right things without even thinking about it. Yet I could make a god out of my little Christian habits, and if that happens, the Lord will upset the habit to show me what I’ve done.

Yesterday, before sitting to devotions, an interruption came and it upset me — I wanted to be reading the Bible and praying when God wanted me to be eager to help. Had I made a god of my spiritual disciplines? Likely.

Chambers says love means invisible habits. That is, unconsciously doing whatever God puts before me in grace and being ‘at home’ with it, not upset because an interruption messed with the practice of ‘my’ habit. Jesus is my example. No matter what came along, He was at home with God and not disrupted by anything.

This partly answers why God focuses more on my shortfall than on answering all my prayers. I am not yet ready to live with the answers because I realize how many demands they could make on the current habits of my life. 

PRAY: Jesus, this is huge. I knew that any interruption to my plans needs to be met with grace and godliness, but not only did my frustration miss that, it also missed the point Chambers makes, that I can put even my spiritual disciplines ahead of what You are calling me to do, making them my god rather than You. Thank You for this conviction and I do confess the root of how I reacted. Forgive me for thinking a virtuous habit is more important than hearing You in the midst of even that. Help me be a better listener, doing it because that is who I am.

Being who I am . . .

Most parents are dismayed if they see their children put on different personas, depending on who they are with. We tell them to “be yourself” forgetting what peer pressure is like and how we all struggle with our identity from time to time. It can happen to adults too. I remember a couple of teens telling me that when their father answered the phone, they could tell who was calling just by the way he talked.

Peer pressure happens to Christians too. One pastor retired and became an insurance salesman. I remember him saying that people talked to him differently than when he was a pastor. He was shocked; the difference was extreme.

Back in the early church, a group that called themselves Christian were pressuring others to be circumcised. This was a mark of faith for the Jews and this group became insistent. They influenced Peter to the point that he changed his behavior when they were around. He had no problem fellowshipping with Gentile believers, but if one of that group was around, he would not do it. Paul rebuked him . . .

But when Cephas (Peter) came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. For before certain men came from James, he was eating with the Gentiles; but when they came he drew back and separated himself, fearing the circumcision party. And the rest of the Jews acted hypocritically along with him, so that even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy. But when I saw that their conduct was not in step with the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas before them all, “If you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you force the Gentiles to live like Jews?” (Galatians 2:11–14)

My first thought is the courage of Paul, a relatively new Christian, to confront and correct one of the original twelve disciples. This reveals how important the Gospel was and still is. Better to risk a rift than to compromise the truth. Yet this did not cause a rift. Paul went on . . .

But if, in our endeavor to be justified in Christ, we too were found to be sinners, is Christ then a servant of sin? Certainly not! For if I rebuild what I tore down, I prove myself to be a transgressor. For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose. (Galatians 2:17–21)

He makes sense and speaks logically in his rebuke. He humbles himself to admit that he was crucified with Christ and now lives only because of Christ and faith in Him, the One who gave His life for Him. His righteousness is not his own but a gift from God.

The stronger thought for me today is to behave according to who I am in Christ. If I live according to the flesh, I am not only sinning against God, but confusing people. The flesh is a prideful monster that will put forward my best foot and hide my shortcomings and weaknesses. If I say I am saved by faith and crucified with Christ as Paul did, then behaving otherwise brands me as a hypocrite.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Lord Jesus, we are driving south for a funeral, seeing cousins that I’ve not seen for a while. This is an important time to be transparent and walk by faith, as is every other time! Fill me with Your Spirit and grant grace and wisdom to represent You well. Help me to say and do what will most honor You and bless these family members as we say goodbye to one of us.

Today’s thankful list . . .

Safety on the road; we are halfway there.

A nice visit with my sister who is unable to travel with us.

Talking to both my brothers this morning.

Good conversation on the drive with my hubby.

Not raining too much.

Chocolate eclairs!

Integrity = doing and being are aligned!

A friend once said, “Sometimes, to think right you have to do right.” She was responding to my statement that God wants our motivation to be behind what we do and our thoughts in line with our actions. I was convinced of that because of these verses:

I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. (Romans 12:1–2)

Yes, our bodies belong to God and what we do with them is to be an act of worship, yet the transformation starts with a renewed mind that can discern the will of God. It seems to me that I cannot obey the will of God unless I can figure out what it is and put my mind on it.

Tozer says that the Holy Spirit makes this happen. He gives us the ability to offer ourselves as a sacrifice set apart to serve God. Tozer also says we are in danger if we think we are delivered from sin but have only moved from one sin to another.

My first thought is about a small quilt that I just finished for another person. It was a sacrifice for me because it took time and effort and was not a design I would have picked to make for the sheer enjoyment of making it. Yet during the process of this ‘sacrificial’ action, I’ve noted pride. I’m proud of my sacrifice — moving from the selfishness I thought I’d abandoned to pride about doing it.

In a broader sense, this shift from sin to sin can happen to those who are not saved but start going to church. Tozer warns that we can think we have become Christians yet in reality, we have only changed location. He compared this to once “sinning in the far country among the swineherds but now chumming with religious persons” which might make us more respectable in appearance but not actually transformed by the power of God through His redemption.

Tozer adds that a saved person is convicted of sin, but also of sinfulness. God wants me to know that it is not just what I do that makes me need Christ; it is what I am. Doing is a surface issue; the root of it is in my being. That is, I cannot do a wrong thing, confess it, and be transformed without considering what motivated that doing. He calls me to dig deeper.

^^^^^^^^

Jesus, while this quilt-making seems a little thing, it reveals how much I can make myself the center of even a small sacrifice instead of doing it out of love for You, love for others, and to glorify Your name. I bow my head in need of forgiveness and the grace to live according to the new creation that You say I am.

Therefore, we can shine

Consider the difference between, “You are a tidy person” and “You ought to be a tidy person.” I’ve raised three children and interacted with insecure and very secure people and found that all of them resist the “you oughts” but respond well to being told what is true about them. Their performance shines when told they are doing well. With that in mind, I look again at this verse…

You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. (Matthew 5:14)

We spent a long time in one church where the pastor was strong on the “you oughts” and threw in only enough of the “you ares” that we stayed (too long). Now we are in a church that focuses more on what God has done and much less on what we should do. We are much more committed to following Christ as we rehearse what the Gospel has accomplished.

Being told (or harped on) continually about how I should live puts attention on myself and I’ve been a Christian long enough to know for certain that myself is useless. I cannot do that which God has done for me. If I could, I would not need Him. Since He has done it, then I cannot live as if He had not. Such a response demonstrates lack of faith.

Paul wrote to the church at Corinth with much admonition about their worldly behavior, but he also said to them…

You yourselves are our letter of recommendation, written on our hearts, to be known and read by all. And you show that you are a letter from Christ delivered by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts. (2 Corinthians 3:2–3)

They no doubt knew they were not living right in many ways and deserved the rebukes Paul gave them. However, these two verses must have been a great encouragement. The New Testament is full of positive statements like this -- telling Christians what we have in the power of Jesus Christ and because of God’s grace. Paul told his readers over and over what had already been accomplished by their Savior.

As today’s devotional writer says, we have fallen on different times. The language addressed to churches is not, “You are…” but, “You ought to be,” and instead of walking in confidence, we are burdened by self-effort that can lead to self-righteousness but eventually despair.

The people whom Paul addressed had been heathen and therefore the changes in them would have been more obvious than in the conversion of an “ordinary nice guy” yet the Gospel changes everyone who believes it. Grace is a powerful thing. Instead of being the old person, Christians are made new.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. (2 Corinthians 5:17)

The Gospel means I can say to “the profane and the pagan” people of the world, “You ought to be humble followers of God.” However, they need to hear the good news as well, that Jesus Christ came to seek and to save, to make such humility and following possible. He did it, so they do not have to struggle or strive, but simple accept and believe what He has done in order to be people who can humbly follow Him.

The Gospel also means that I can say to true Christians these words of certainty, “Do not be fearful. You are the salt of the earth, you are the light of the world.”