Essential Truths and Promises

Our Friday Devotion comes to us from Council Member, John:

THE ESSENTIAL TRUTHS AND PROMISES FROM GOD'S WORD WE NEED TO ABSOLUTELY KNOW, BELIEVE AND TRUST IN WITH ALL OF OUR MINDS, HEARTS AND SOULS IN TIMES WHERE WE FEEL OVERWHELMED, CRUSHED AND HOPELESS

Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, is real. He is all-powerful and absolutely faithful to His Word.

Our Lord is, in the most absolute sense, all loving, all knowing, all powerful, eternal, always present, and His love, mercy and grace endure forever.

"By His Almighty Power, He "spoke" the entire universe into existence (with its billions of galaxies, stars and planets, including our own), and He had already conceived each of us individually and uniquely before the first planet ever came into existence and all of the days of our lives have already been written in His Book. Psalm 139:13-16

Not surprisingly, He also has the power to overcome death itself and to give everlasting life.

This very same all-loving and all-powerful God has clearly told us to "Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and ALL these things all the things we need to sustain us in this life shall be added unto you." Matthew 6:33 NKJV

Therefore, this devotional goes out this morning especially to those who are crushed and heartbroken by circumstances that are extremely painful, stressful, discouraging, frightening and beyond our human ability to either control, or even seemingly to endure.

It is in the very midst of our greatest suffering, despair and desperation that our Lord wants us to cry out to Him, in absolute faith and dependence, recognizing that He is the only One who can, and will, save us in our times of total desperation.

I don't begin to understand why, but I do take God at His Word when He says that we cannot share in His eternal glory and treasures unless we also share (during mercifully short periods of time in this life) in His suffering. (For the Glory that was set before Him, He endured even crucifixion and the sins of the entire world.)

Or, as someone aptly phrased it, "We can't really know that Christ is all we need until Christ is all we have."

As King David wrote (based on Christ seeing him through all of his great trials and tribulations), "God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble." Psalm 46:1

Therefore, I would sincerely urge each of us who are in the midst of extremely difficult, discouraging and trying circumstances to look up and pray out loud one or more of the following scriptures (which have, and continue to, encourage me):

Psalm 25:16-22
Psalm 34:4-7
Psalm 34:17-22
Psalm 46:1-3
Psalm 55:4-8
Psalm 55:16-22
Psalm 91:9-16
Psalm 107:10-22
Isaiah 41:9-24
Isaiah 42:1-9

As Jesus spoke through the prophet Isaiah:

"I [our Lord Jesus] have summoned [called] you by name; you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you and when you pass through the rivers [floods] they will not sweep over [overwhelm] you. When you walk through the fire [fiery trials] you will not be burned, the flames [troubles] will not set you ablaze [consume you]. For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior." Isaiah 43:1-3

In these most trying of times, I pray the Lord's love, grace, mercy and peace will fill you, sustain you and deliver you.

In His Name,
John Adams

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