Sovereign God, Loving Father – Knowing Him Purity 1439

Welcome to the MT for Christ 247 podcast. I'm M.t. Clark, and this is today's photo. Today's photo— well, to see today's photo, go to mtforchrist.com or follow me, M.t. Clark, on Facebook or Twitter, or watch us on YouTube. Good morning. Today's photo of the Oswego West Pierhead Lighthouse at sunset comes to us from Celestial Blue Photography as Rocco Seja shared this glorious scene on social media on August 23rd with the profound reminder that each day is a gift. Amen. Uh, Rocco is right, each day is a gift. But while we are blessed to know that simple truth about life, we're even more blessed when we know the gift giver, Sovereign God, our Heavenly Father, who made everything and sent Jesus Christ to show us the way to be with him forever. So enjoy today's gift of life. Uh, make sure you will take it with you into eternity by trusting in and following Jesus. And thank God it's Friday. While I am looking forward to, uh, quitting time at the end of the day and the 3-day Labor Day weekend ahead of us, I know of some, me included, who are experiencing some struggles. Me, while I am able-bodied enough to go to work, I am still dealing with mild cold symptoms even though I am prayed for healing and thought I was miraculously healed, but wasn't. Uh, I have also taken plenty of water, vitamin C, zinc, and over-the-counter remedies that have normally been quite effective when combined with prayer to send sickness packing. But as much as I would like to name and claim good health, I'm humbled and confounded by the fact that the Lord has not brought 100% healing on my time schedule. Other than me, I have a friend who has suffered an unexpected loss and a client who is going through a season of continual rejection as he tries to make some positive changes in his life, only to have his hopes dashed time after time. So what are we supposed to do when the Lord doesn't heal us, we lose things that are dear to us, and God is not making a way when there is no way? Well, as a Christian life coach and fellow traveler on the path of Christian discipleship with a rich history that includes illness, injury, trials, rejection, and loss, I have learned that the remedy to disappointment is gratitude, depression is praise, and anger is forgiveness. However, to simply list those Christian disciplines or coping mechanisms like a shopping list really won't help you unless you need unless you not only know how to apply these strategies to our sorrows and pains, but you need to know who you are in Christ, and you need to know God. And when I say that, when I say that, I mean you have to love God. Uh, yesterday I tried to offer my best advice, uh, for dealing with trials through these means by instructing someone to really develop their daily spiritual practice of going through the Who I Am in Christ list, and by being able to, uh, being sure to practice gratitude and appreciation each day. When we start out our day reflecting on the truth of who we are in Christ and spending that time in God's presence giving him thanks, we become more emotionally resilient and more prepared to deal with the things that don't go our way. However, doing these practices once a day in the privacy of your prayer closet still isn't enough. Because in the heat of the moment, we could easily forget about the joys of our quiet time at the beginning of the day. We have to continually renew our minds with these truths as we go about our day by walking and talking with God. Our prayer life should be a conversation with our Heavenly Father that does not cease. Instead of talking to ourselves like most people do, we should talk to God. And when I say talk to God, I'm talking about the one true God of the Bible, not some genie in the bottle who is there to just bless your socks off. As we go through the troubling things we face in life, we need to know that God is both sovereign and loving, because he is, and because it will help us to process the things that we don't understand and draw close to him even when our hearts are broken. God's sovereignty means that he's— he is in charge. Jesus taught about, uh, this in Matthew 10:29, where he said, are not two sparrows sold for a penny, and not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father? So every sparrow in the entire world is under God's sovereign control. Not one of them dies on his watch without his knowing about it, and by implication, allowing it. To put that on the flip side, the author of life calls all things into eternity. While we on Earth question why people have to die when they do, why there is evil, and the manner in which people die, God is aware of their entrance into eternity and, and is waiting for them when they get there., to either welcome them into his kingdom or to deliver the really bad news that is worse than the fact that they died. Uh, if we draw this out, while we could debate the issue endlessly and agree to disagree on various situations of happenstance and the Lord's will in it, we can conclude that nothing— and I mean N-O-T-H-I-N-G— Nothing happens without the Lord's knowledge and thus his quote unquote approval. Approval is in quotes, of course, because a lot of evil things happen that the Lord would rather not happen because he is loving, but they happen all the same. These are some hard truths, I know, but we have to understand a few things about God and existence to not draw the false conclusion that God is evil. He made everything, okay? So he calls it into existence, and when he determines, he calls them into eternity. Well, we wouldn't exist without God. He gives us the gift, the gift of life, and the opportunity to take that life into eternity with him if we seek him, recognize the truth about him, and love him because he's worthy. So because he is the author of life and because those who seek him find him, we don't get to say that God is unfair, unloving, or unjust. He just takes back what is his and puts them in the place they want to go. Those who reject God wouldn't want to live with him anyway, so they don't get the privilege. Now that's, is, uh, the ultimate life and death scale. Seek God, find Jesus, and you live. But these facts of God's sovereignty play out in every situational aspect according to the will— to his will as well. In other words, whatever happens, God knows about it, allows it for his purposes, and will settle any injustice— injustices in eternity. Nobody gets away with evil. Either they find forgiveness in Christ or they perish. And as for the dashing of our desires or the suffering of loss, God uses these calamities for his purposes too, to strengthen us, to mature us, to test us, and to draw us to him. If we believe that God uses all things together for good, we have to understand that even the seemingly senseless or tragic things that happen in life have a purpose, always to draw us to him. Everything we experience in this life, this gift of life, is intended to do that. From the joys of living to the sorrows of suffering, everything should send us to give thanks or receive comfort from God, or both. Everything has a purpose to draw us to God. So when, when I wonder why I haven't been completely healed yet, or when my friend questions why they are suffering loss, or a client is upset over rejection, I could tell us all that God is aware of our suffering and he is using it for our good to draw us closer to him. When we understand these things, we get a great sense of God's love for us. In the end, God will make all things right, and in the meantime, he will use all things to draw us to him to grow to mature, and to really experience this gift of life he has given us. And we thus in turn should be eager, we should be very eager to obey Jesus's great commandment in Matthew 22:37, where he teaches us to love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. We can love God because he loves us and gave us life to experience it. So whether we are having a joyous time in life or are being challenged in a season of trials, remember that God loves you. He will make everything right, and he has given you this gift called life to know him. Keep on walking and talking with God, and he will see you through all the joys and sorrows of this letter. Today's Bible verses come to us from the Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling by John G. Cruis. This morning's meditation verses come from the section on forgiveness of sins, and today's verses are Ephesians 5:25-27, which say, husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her having cleansed her by the washing of the water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. Today's verses are the first of three passages of scripture that fall under the 16th point of our Counseling Reference Guide's resource section on the forgiveness of sins. That 16th Point is, in love, Jesus died to make us holy. We are without blemish. Today's verses talk about our relationship with God and how it is analogous to the intimacy and love between a man and wife in matrimony. It also puts forth a reason for our relationship with God and the purpose for marriage: to make us holy. God, God comes into relationship with us to love us, sure, but also to purify us and to make us holy. Our sin has warped and defiled us, so God sent Jesus to wash us clean with the forgiveness of sins found in his blood, but also to give us an example of what we are supposed to be— holy. Marriage is supposed to be this, that way too. God is supposed to be at the center of marriage, with husband and wife learning to be like Jesus toward one another. Where other than in marriage will we learn to love, serve, and forgive someone to the extent we will in the life transitions between a husband and wife? Nowhere. And so God's word shows us that while we should experience love in our marriage relationship with him, we should also be washed clean and made holy from being with him. As always, we encourage everyone to go to mtforchrist.com, where we always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist our brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk. Today we continue sharing from According to Your Word: Morning and Evening Through the New Testament by Stephen F. Alford. And in Alford's devotional, he prompts us to read a chapter of scripture. Uh, today's chapter is 2 Timothy 2, and from 2 Timothy 2, he shares a portion of verse 24, which says, a servant of the Lord must not quarrel but be gentle to all, able to teach, patient. Here, and Stephen Alford writes, here are three definite qualities which should not be lacking in the true servant of the Lord. He must not quarrel but be gentle. This is a fruit of the Spirit, as indeed are the other two. Gentleness marked the life of the Lord Jesus. When he was reviled, did not, did not revile in return, but committed himself to him who judges righteously. Be able to teach. Ability implies adaptability, and the thought here is that the servant of the Lord is one who adapts himself to all opportunities. And be patient. This is love on trial. Tribulation produces perseverance. And Alfred ends by praying, oh, to be a servant of the Lord. Amen. A true servant of the Lord. Amen, amen, amen, amen. And, uh, so yeah, we're supposed to be gentle, be able to teach, and to be patient. And I get the gentle part because sometimes we want to teach someone and, you know, like, don't you get it? Don't you get it? But, uh, you know what, they don't necessarily do get it. Unfortunately, this— our church culture sometimes takes the profound things of God and makes it, you know, overly simple or ritualistic to the point where you don't really understand the idea of a relationship with the Lord where we walk and talk with him on a daily basis. Unfortunately, our Christianity in many circles has been reduced to a weekly worship service, and we go there, you know, pay homage to God, give him a nod, and go on our way. Uh, it was never intended to be this way. Uh, we were supposed to love the Lord God with all our heart, soul, and mind and strength, uh, for an hour on a weekend. Uh, we're supposed to be a reflection of his love. We're supposed to be made holy through our relationship with God, and that's supposed to change us. And that, you know, to be able to teach means we'll have to learn some things through life, and sometimes the school of hard knocks is the best way to learn. Uh, a lot of my learning has come from trial and error. I wouldn't be here today if it wasn't for all the mistakes I made that led me to finally seek the Lord. Um, so I learned from those things, and that's why I do the podcast and the blog and the other ministry stuff I do, is to teach people, because the stuff I've learned is valuable, and I need to let people know how good God is and how loving he is and how great it is to follow him into the life that he has for us. Um, so that's why we teach. And that patience thing, that's— we learn patience through suffering. So never, you know, as my wife and I say, never pray for patience because God will give you trials to make you patient. And right now I have a minor cold, and that's sort of a trial because usually I, usually I go to the Lord in earnest, pray, you know, hydrate do some vitamins, and wow, suddenly I'm healed. It happened in the past, you know, call it, you know, combination of faith, um, and works of, of, uh, you know, some good health practices. But it's worked in the past, it's just not working for this current cold, which is very disappointing. And, um, my wife reminded me last night that, you know, basically, uh, yeah, God's making me patient. You know, that I can't force healing, uh, that I have to wait for, um, for him to work it in my body, or for my body to work it. I forget what she said, but you know, it was basically, haha. Um, I discovered yesterday my wife can grin without— my wife can grin without moving her mouth. Um, she could have a straight face and I can see her gritting, and I love her for it, because she's gentle. And that's the third thing that, you know, she doesn't beat me up with the fact that I'm, you know, being silly. She's gentle and kind, and she's a great reflection. And she makes me, you know, that marriage thing is supposed to make us holy. So it all fits together somehow in the end. Anyway, the way you get everything to fit together is by surrendering to the Lord's will and to recognize recognizing the fact that whatever happens is somehow part of his will. Thus, should we resist it, rage against the machine, or should we accept it and try to learn from it and draw close to God from it? Um, that's what happens when you surrender, like fully surrender to God. You become accepting and maybe even content, uh, with the things that happen in life. Um, you know, it's a— on a case-to-case basis, of course. Some situations are supposed to draw you to action, other things you're supposed to suffer through. Which is which, uh, go to the Lord, draw close to him, and find out. Um, when you surrender to him, he will lead you in the way you should go. And, um, one of the things he's led me to do is to be a support, a teacher of sorts, at the Celebrate Freedom support group. That is a Christian Recovery and discipleship group, uh, that meets at Starpoint Church in upstate New York at Clifton Park. Uh, so if you're in the Capital District or anywhere and want to What— learn how to walk in the Spirit, learn how to live this life according to your faith in the power of the Holy Spirit, and overcome your hurts, habits, and hangups. Come to Celebrate Freedom. I'll see you there, 6:30 next Wednesday. Um, beyond that, uh, we usually point to our YouTube channel, um, or at least we are now. Um, we also teach online, but our class is closed out, so I'm not going to continue to point people to try to register for a class that isn't there. However, my podcast teachings are available, um, on our YouTube channel. We've done studies on The Bondage Breaker, The Victory Over the Darkness, Freedom in Christ. They were all done in 2021. And last year we did a, a short series called the Celebrate Freedom Discipleship Course, uh, that we did in 2023. So, uh, those are all there. We've also done a, a study on Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Discipleship if you want to see me walk through that. Um, but, uh, uh, we, we do all these things because these teachings helped me become free in Christ. And, you know, if you want to find or increase your freedom in Christ, we, we, we, we, we encourage you to become a quote-unquote podcast student, uh, of, uh, Empty for Christ. Anyway, uh, that's all the messages for today. We're looking forward to, uh, the weekend. And we always ask, are you empty for Christ too? And what does that mean? Well, it means you're surrendered to the Lord and you're waiting to be filled by his Holy Spirit and be led into the abundant life that he has for us. So if you're empty for Christ, that's great. Keep on walking and talking with God. If not, pray to the Lord, seek him, and you'll— and you will find him. And surrender to the Lordship of Jesus Christ and ask him how you should live your life, uh, because when we did that, we eventually found peace, joy, healing, and freedom. So, uh, we encourage that. And, uh, our life of lifestyle of faith is 24/7, or at least we try to make it that. And Big part of that is our prayer life. So let's pray. Lord God, Heavenly Father, thank you for another day in your kingdom. Lord, we thank you so much for the gift of life that you've given us and the gift of eternal life that you've given us through Christ alone. Lord, we, uh, we pray for anyone watching or listening today's message, Lord, that they would draw close to you, to know you, uh, to love you, and to learn how to process the, the problems of life through their faith and, um, and to grow, uh, in their faith, Lord. We also pray for you to do that with us too, Lord, because we need continual growth, um, and guidance and strength. So please, we just pray for you to go before us today, open our eyes to the things you want us to see, and lead us in the way we should go, because all we want to do is represent you and your kingdom, Lord, and we definitely need your help with that. Lord, we thank you, we praise you, we love you, and we pray all these things in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.