encouragement

FRIDAY January 18th

Good morning! I hope everyone is doing well this morning.

It’s cold here… cold, damp and icy. We have heaters running everywhere trying to keep the “chill” off. Even electric blankets all night! ?

Somehow, when it’s cold, it’s hard to get those bones of mine warm! Even when it starts getting more into the “Spring” season, it still takes quite a few weeks of very warm weather to penetrate into this ole’ body and make my sensory perception realize, “Hey, it’s warm!”

Spiritually speaking, this can have the same effect. There are people who are have been out in the world, away from God so long, that when the “warmth” hits them, they’re unsure what it is! They like the “feeling”… and may bask in it for a time. But the lure of worldly ways and that “numbness” of sin soon turns them away from the “fire of God”. Sadly, they haven’t realized that God’s Word is the “fire” that will burn away the impurities if they just get close enough!

The verse today is Psalm 85: 9. “Surely his salvation is nigh them that fear him; that glory may dwell in our land.” This verse doesn’t have anything to do with “fire”, but I have an example that I’m going to “steal” from my husband when I heard him preach from this portion of scripture.

The words “is nigh” in this verse… means, very simply and literally, “close.” When I read this first the very first time, I saw it said “salvation” is nigh them. I puzzled over that and read it and hubby did a verse check in the Hebrew. The “salvation” here is not the salvation we receive when we ask Christ to come into our hearts and accept Him as our Saviour. This salvation is referring to “assistance”… “help”… “guidance”. So, God’s help is “close to” those that “fear him.” The fear we see in this verse is not a trembling, scary fear. This is the reverent fear of The Almighty God! Putting God on a pedestal… and making Him first place. When we make God “first” in our lives, His “help” is close to us. How can we “put God first?”

James 4:8: “Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you…” WE’VE got to make the first move.

The example my husband uses for this verse is one that hits home to me.

We love to go camping. And back in the “OLDEN DAYS” we didn’t use our RV to go camping, we used a tent! Since we worked full time at a church the only time we were able to go on vacation was “off peak season”… ? so we would go in October or in April. Believe me, the nights got pretty cold! So in the morning, my husband, the “Fire Man”, would get up and start the fire out on the fire pit. Me? Not on your life! I waited until I could hear the crackling of that fire before I would begin to rouse!

Now, if I stepped out of that tent (and of course, zipped it up again like a good camper should), when I turned around to see the fire about 10 feet away what would I have to do in order to get warm? You got it!!! I would have to “get closer!” The closer I got the warmer I got! Here is where we sometimes get sidetracked in our daily lives. As we get ‘closer’ to the Fire of God’s Word, we start to feel His intense heat burning away things in our life that have no spiritual value. Attitudes, worldly ways, imagined spiritual frailties start burning off. When I would get close to that fire, I would usually put my hands out toward the fire, first. For some reason, when my hands get cold, the rest of my body freezes! The same also is true about heat… when my hands start warming up, the rest of me starts becoming toasty. So the first thing I do when I come close to a fire like that is put out my hands. As I get closer to the fire I do what my husband calls a “rotisserie warm up.” I just slowly turn so that my whole body can get warm!

The Fire of God’s Word is like that camp fire. However, God’s Word never moves… never changes. With God’s Word we don’t have to worry about “kindling the fire”, because the Word is ever hot, ever burning. It is up to us to “draw nigh”. If we want God’s “salvation” (help, assistance, guidance) through our daily lives, we have to get close enough to the Fire so that we feel the impurities burning away. Once we take the first step and start “drawing nigh”, God says He will draw nigh to us! What a blessed thought! But it’s up to us to make the “first move!”

Don’t be afraid of the heat! After a while the heat engulfs us and the worldly ways we embraced will seem strangely cold and foreign. Glory will “dwell in our land” when we draw nigh to Our God.

“…my heart surrendered and my conscious cleared. So great a joy my tongue can scarcely tell… Oh what a joy to know… that all…. Is well.”

Have a wonderful and Fruitful Friday!

Karen

SATURDAY