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Posts Tagged ‘#notmywill’

Brokenness

Posted in Faith, life, Walking with God, WONDER, tagged #brokenness, #evenif, #evenifgodisstillgood, #godisstillgood, #godredeemsbrokenness, #hiswillnotmine, #mystoryishisstory, #notmywill on October 16, 2018| Leave a Comment »

Are you feeling broken?

If not today, there have been days, there will be days, when we all feel irreparably broken. Moments, days, years when it feels as though the very flesh of our heart is irreparably broken and you cannot imagine how it can still beat for the pain you feel.

Maybe it is a deep heartache of love lost, or the news from the doctor, or the academic goals that seem out of reach, or more bills than money at the end of the month, or the struggle of your child, your spouse, your parent, your friend, or the heavy darkness that simply

will
not
lift

or …

And you feel as though life as you know it … is gone.

And you cannot imagine it ever returning.

And you wish you could do something. Willing to do anything.

“Sweat, wrung from him like drops of blood, poured off his face.”
Luke 22:44

And you look in the mirror, at your hands … for you know, at this level of brokenness, that one can indeed sweat blood.

“Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me …”
Luke 22:42

And, like Christ, you have prayed, you have asked and begged that God would take whatever this horrible thing is, from you. That you would not have to face this news, heartbreak, fear, discouragement or rejection. That you would not have to face tomorrow.

” … yet not my will, but yours be done.”
Luke 22:44

How did Christ say those words? How could he submit to what he knew would end his life? How could he end that life, apart from his Father?

He was walking the walk of the broken.

Like Daniel who with “Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego replied to him, “King Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from it, and he will deliver us from Your Majesty’s hand. But even if he does not, we want you to know, Your Majesty, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.” (Daniel 3:16-18). Some have interpreted the verse to “but even if he does not, he is still good.”

Matthew Henry would said, “true devotion calms the spirit, quiets and softens it” …

there is nothing like brokenness to prompt us to raise our hands in defeat, in weakness, in forfeit, and give up … or confidently let someone else take over, accepting that, in doing so

it is not our will, but his …

and even if he does not intervene, we will still serve him

and he is still good.

When I am broken, and I have experienced brokenness, the only thing that keeps me going is the hope, the belief, that God is in the business of redemption. That it is through our darkest nights, through our deepest pits, through our heaviest heartaches that he makes something new and beautiful from the devastation in our lives.

I want my brokenness to be birthed into his redemption story.

But, before redemption, before re-birth into wholeness, there is the labor of the brokenness. There is submission to his will, his plan. Finally there is the acknowledgement that he is good, even if …

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Does Prayer Make a Difference?

Posted in GOD, life, Walking with God, WONDER, tagged #beaaron, #doesprayermakeadifference, #gethsemaneprayer, #ipraytochangeme, #jesustaughtustopray, #notmywill, #prayerchangesme, #prayerisrequest, #prayforothers, Prayer on August 9, 2018| 5 Comments »

FullSizeRender It is an age old question …

Does prayer, does praying, make a difference?

I heard a line in the movie Shadowlands, many years ago, that has become my own understanding and belief for why I pray:

“I pray because I can’t help myself. I pray because I’m helpless. I pray because the need flows out of me all the time, waking and sleeping. It doesn’t change God. It changes me.”

Though I cannot find evidence of CS Lewis actually saying those words, Lewis does lead us to a model for prayer: “for most of us the prayer in Gethsemane is the only model.”

It was in the Garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus prayed “my Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass me by. Yet not as I will, but as you will.” (Matthew 26:39). His request, offered up, to his God and Father, was offered up three times, and was denied. This reality of God not answering Jesus prayerful request, is a reality that we must remember, for if God would deny Jesus … we too will sometimes be denied.

Lewis also reminds us, “prayer is request. The essence of request, as distinct from compulsion, is that it may or may not be granted.”

At Gethsemane, Jesus also gives us an example of how to make such a request to God in saying “if it is possible” and “not as I will, but as I will but as you will.” I believe that this is what the author of Philippians is referring to when he wrote, “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 2:5). We need to seek to have the mind of God as we pray, acknowledging that he is the author of life, that his plan is sovereign.

Even those things that we pray that we think could have only a ‘yes’ response, for it to be the ‘godly’ outcome. I remember laying on a hospital bed, awaiting just one more sonogram. I remember praying that God would allow us to see that heart beat, to show his power, to allow us to praise him for a miracle. The following day, recovering from surgery to remove that heart that remained still on the sonogram, as I looked up to the sky, I tried to gripe and complain to him … about his denial of my request, but all I could say were the same words from Gethsemane … “not my will, but yours”.

I can think of recent times when it seemed as though God was silent in response to my crying out to him. Yet, in the days and weeks and months that past, my prayers were indeed being answered, by other people, who God has used as vessels for encouragement, to meet real needs, to cheer on and to be the hands and feet of him. These people, being our Aaron, holding us up to God, so that the enemy would not have the victory.

God’s mind, his will, is never for the enemy to be victorious.

Prayer makes a difference.

It causes us to acknowledge God’s sovereignty.

It is request … and we have to accept that the response to a request is in the hands of the one we ask.

It is submission to the answer.

Prayer of others, for us, is the support that keeps us from failing, that keeps the enemy from victory.

It is an evolution of our human minds to God’s own mind.

I pray to change me, to change my heart and mind and will, but not change the unchangeable God.

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