October 17
God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; Though the waters thereof roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof. Selah. There is a river, the streams whereof shall make glad the city of God, the holy place of the tabernacles of the most High. God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved: God shall help her, and that right early. Ps 46:1-5 (KJV)
Beloved, according to” Message Version” of the above passage in verse four it said, in the city where God lives, the streets are safe and God Himself will be at your service from crack of dawn. Is someone shouting alleluia! Please I will encourage to read yesterday devotional because of the topic in focus; is so fundamental to our prayer life.
In our strength we can do nothing, in our weaknesses we are made strong in Christ; He can never fail us. Are you so concern about the matter you are presenting to God that you are yet to receive an answer to it; listen child of God, peradventure what God is saying now, is for you to wait a little while He finish what He need do in life so that you will shine forth better or He just needed to get you to the point where you will appreciate His blessing, gifting in your lives better. Come and see that He is the fountain of life:
“With Thee is the fountain of life.” Psalm 36:9
There are times in our spiritual experience when human counsel or sympathy, or religious ordinances, fail to comfort or help us. Why does our gracious God permit this? Perhaps it is because we have been living too much without Him, and He therefore takes away everything upon which we have been in the habit of depending, that He may drive us to Himself.
It is a blessed thing to live at the fountain head. While our skin- bottles are full, we are content, like Hagar and Ishmael, to go into the wilderness; but when those are dry, nothing will serve us but “Thou God seest me.” We are like the prodigal, we love the swine-troughs and forget our Father’s house. Remember, we can make swine-troughs and husks even out of the forms of religion; they are blessed things, but we may put them in God’s place, and then they are of no value.
Anything becomes an idol when it keeps us away from God: even the brazen serpent is to be despised as “Nehushtan,” if we worship it instead of God. The prodigal was never safer than when he was driven to his father’s bosom, because he could find sustenance nowhere else. Our Lord favours us with a famine in the land that it may make us seek after Himself the more.
The best position for a Christian is living wholly and directly on God’s grace—still abiding where he stood at first—”Having nothing, and yet possessing all things.” Let us never for a moment think that our standing is in our sanctification, our mortification, our graces, or our feelings, but know that because Christ offered a full atonement, therefore we are saved; for we are complete in Him. Having nothing of our own to trust to, but resting upon the merits of Jesus—His passion and holy life furnish us with the only sure ground of confidence.
Beloved, when we are brought to a thirsting condition, we are sure to turn to the fountain of life with eagerness. That is what learning to “wait” on the Lord achieves for us read further:
“I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I put my hope. My soul waits for the Lord more than watchmen wait for the morning, more than watchmen wait for the morning.“ (Psalm 130:5, 6) (See Psalm 5:3; 130:5-7; 17:14; 37:7, 34; 38:15; 119:84)
“WAIT” (Author Unknown)
Desperately, helplessly, longingly, I cried: Quietly, patiently, lovingly God replied. I pled and I wept for a clue to my fate, and the Master who gently said, “Child, you must wait.”
“Wait?” You say, wait!,” my indignant reply. “Lord, I need answers, I need to know why! Is you hand shortened? Or have you not heard? By faith, I have asked, and am claiming your Word.
“My future and all to which I can relate hangs in the balance, and You tell me to wait? I’m needing a ‘yes’ a go-ahead sign, or even a ‘no’ to which I can resign.
“And Lord, You promised that if we believe we need but to ask, and we shall receive. Lord, I’ve been asking, and this is my cry: I’m weary of asking! I need a reply!”
Then quietly, softly, I learned of my fate, as my Master replied once again, “You must wait.” So, I slumped in my chair, defeated and taut, and grumbled to God, “So, I’m waiting… for what?”
He seemed, then, to kneel, and His eyes wept with mine, and He tenderly said, “I could give you a sign. I could shake the heavens, and darken the sun. I could raise the dead, and cause mountains to run.
“All you ask me I could give, and pleased you would be. You would have what you want – but, you wouldn’t know Me. You’d not know the depth of My love for each saint: You’d not know the power that I give to the faint.
“You’d not learn to see through the clouds of despair: You’d not learn to trust just by knowing I’m there; you’d not know the joy of resting in Me when darkness and silence were all you can see.
“You’d never experience that fullness of love, as the peace of My Spirit descends like a dove; you’d know that I live and I save… (for a start), but you’d not know the depth of the beat of My heart.
“The glow of My comfort late into the night. The faith that I give when you walk without sight. The depth that’s beyond getting just what you asked of an infinite God, who make what you have last.
“You’d never know, should your pain quickly flee, what it means that ‘My grace is sufficient for Thee.’ Yes, your dreams for your loved one overnight would come true. But, Oh, the loss! If I lost what I’m doing in you!
“So, be silent, my child, and in time you will see that the greatest of gifts is to get to know Me. And though oft’ may My answers seem terribly late. My most precious answer of all is still, ‘wait.'”
I hope this message is ministering to someone’s need tonight, therefore brethren, if know anyone who need these words of comfort, please forward it and you will not lose your reward from your Father, Who is at in Heaven.
Remain in blessed in Lord.
Evang. Ifeoma Ohondu
