When You Feel Forsaken

From: Christian Broadcasting Network, Brooke Keith, Author

Have you ever gone through a time in your life when you weren’t feeling particularly spiritual? When it took work to pray. When it was too painful to cast light into the shadowy corners of your heart?

I know I have certainly found myself there — the feeling of being forsaken.

I’ve doubted God and I’ve wrestled with Him when I didn’t like His plan for me. I’ve become angry when my prayers were answered but in the way I didn’t desire. I have wondered where He was; if He was. I’ve been incredibly prodigal. But fortunate enough for me, God has never stopped coming to look for me.

It brings me comfort to know that even our Savior had human feelings. The art of Roman crucifixion was an evil genius – it was the perfect tool to bring about the most inhumane of human sufferings. Tendons torn. Body aching. Eventually, you had to arch your back to find balance. This created ever enlarging wounds in the feet. This continued on until the body’s lungs would fill with fluid. The heart became compressed.

As his heart compresses and his body aches, Jesus cries out in wonder, “My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken Me?” This verse we often overlook in worship services, it is often left out of passion plays – because we don’t like the thought of our Savior hurting. We don’t like to consider the pain our sins caused Him nor do we like to ponder why our Savior, so very sure of His Father, could even consider the possibility He’d been forsaken.

But really, these words were brilliant. They connected us. These words were necessary. This was the moment our brokenness reached deep within His spirit. They bound us to our Father like the tiny hand of a newborn curls around his mother’s finger. Jesus became sin so that we could be free from it. In becoming our sin He had an incredibly human experience — multiplied by the lives of every being the Father had ever created. He echoed the very heart-wrenching words our heart cries out silently when life gives us lemons, when we have shaken off every reasoning and can find no reason, when we simply don’t understand, when we are tempted to consider our Father has forsaken us, leaving us to suffer alone.

“My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken Me?” These words assure us of every struggle, every valley, every circumstance being vindicated, corrected and justified on the cross. These are the words of our own heart – these words wrapped within His.

I find it poetic that our sins were compromised because his heart compressed. What more proof could a nerdy girl need than that of the Author and the Finisher of her faith metaphorically and figuratively giving her His heart?

We can be sure that God had to turn His head when Jesus suffered. But because He turned His head, He could look upon our suffering and hold us through it. Never budging, completely enthralled with the purchase He had bought at the highest cost imaginable.

At about three o’clock, Jesus called out with a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” which means “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?” (Matthew 27:46)

“Am I My Brother’s Keeper?”

By Oswald Chambers

None of us lives to himself… —Romans 14:7

Has it ever dawned on you that you are responsible spiritually to God for other people? For instance, if I allow any turning away from God in my private life, everyone around me suffers. We “sit together in the heavenly places…” (Ephesians 2:6). “If one member suffers, all the members suffer with it…” (1 Corinthians 12:26). If you allow physical selfishness, mental carelessness, moral insensitivity, or spiritual weakness, everyone in contact with you will suffer. But you ask, “Who is sufficient to be able to live up to such a lofty standard?” “Our sufficiency is from God…” and God alone (2 Corinthians 3:5).

“You shall be witnesses to Me…” (Acts 1:8). How many of us are willing to spend every bit of our nervous, mental, moral, and spiritual energy for Jesus Christ? That is what God means when He uses the word witness. But it takes time, so be patient with yourself. Why has God left us on the earth? Is it simply to be saved and sanctified? No, it is to be at work in service to Him. Am I willing to be broken bread and poured-out wine for Him? Am I willing to be of no value to this age or this life except for one purpose and one alone— to be used to disciple men and women to the Lord Jesus Christ. My life of service to God is the way I say “thank you” to Him for His inexpressibly wonderful salvation. Remember, it is quite possible for God to set any of us aside if we refuse to be of service to Him— “…lest, when I have preached to others, I myself should become disqualified” (1 Corinthians 9:27).

The Advance Team

From: Our Daily Bread

 February 14, 2018 

Read: John 14:1–14 | Bible in a Year: Leviticus 15–16; Matthew 27:1–26

My Father’s house has many rooms; . . . I am going there to prepare a place for you. John 14:2

A friend recently prepared to relocate to a city more than 1,000 miles from her current hometown. She and her husband divided the labor of moving to accommodate a short timeline. He secured new living arrangements, while she packed their belongings. I was astounded by her ability to move without previewing the area or participating in the house hunt, and asked how she could do so. She acknowledged the challenge but said she knew she could trust her husband because of his attention to her preferences and needs over their years together.

In the upper room, Jesus spoke with His disciples of His coming betrayal and death. The darkest hours of Jesus’s earthly life, and that of the disciples as well, lay ahead. He comforted them with the assurance that He would prepare a place for them in heaven, just as my friend’s husband prepared a new home for their family. When the disciples questioned Jesus, He pointed them to their mutual history and the miracles they’d witnessed Him perform. Though they would grieve Jesus’s death and absence, He reminded them He could be counted on to do as He’d said.

We can trust God to lead us through difficult times.

Even in the midst of our own dark hours, we can trust Him to lead us forward to a place of goodness. As we walk with Him, we too will learn to trust increasingly in His faithfulness.

Help me, Lord, to lean on You when my life feels uncertain and hard. You are trustworthy and good.

We can trust God to lead us through difficult times.

The Blessing Bowl

From: Our Daily Bread

  February 13, 2018  

Read: Romans 1:1–10 | Bible in a Year: Leviticus 14; Matthew 26:51–75

 

 

I thank my God every time I remember you. Philippians 1:3

The familiar bing of an arriving email caught my attention while I wrote at my computer. Usually I try to resist the temptation to check every email but the subject line was too enticing: “You are a blessing.”

Eagerly, I opened it to discover a faraway friend telling me she was praying for my family. Each week, she displays one Christmas card photo in her kitchen table “Blessing Bowl” and prays for that family. She wrote, “I thank my God every time I remember you” (Philippians 1:3) and then highlighted our efforts to share God’s love with others—our “partnership” in the gospel.

Who can you thank today?

Through my friend’s intentional gesture, the apostle Paul’s words to the Philippians came trickling into my inbox, creating the same joy in my heart I suspect readers received from his first-century thank-you note. It seems Paul made it a habit to speak his gratitude to those who worked alongside him. A similar phrase opens many of his letters: “I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is being reported all over the world” (Romans 1:8).

In the first century, Paul blessed his co-laborers with a thank-you note of prayerfulness. In the twenty-first century, my friend used a Blessing Bowl to bring joy into my day. How might we thank those who serve in the mission of God with us today?

Father, help us to intentionally bless those who serve alongside us.

Who can you thank today?

Put Your Trust In God

Trust Me

From: Our Daily Bread

  February 12, 2018  

Read: 1 Kings 17:7–16 | Bible in a Year: Leviticus 13; Matthew 26:26–50

Do not worry about tomorrow. Matthew 6:34

After graduation from college, I had a low-paying job. Money was tight, and sometimes I didn’t even have enough for my next meal. I learned to trust God for my daily provision.

It reminded me of the prophet Elijah’s experience. During his prophetic ministry, he learned to trust God to meet his daily needs. Shortly after Elijah pronounced God’s judgment of a drought in Israel, God sent him to a deserted place, Kerith Ravine, where He used the ravens to bring Elijah his daily meals and refresh him with water from the brook (1 Kings 17:1–4).

God supplies all our needs—one day at a time.

But a drought occurred. The brook shrank to a tiny stream, and slowly became a mere trickle. It was only when the brook had dried up that God said: “Go at once to Zarephath . . . . I have directed a widow there to supply you with food” (v. 9). Zarephath was in Phoenicia, whose inhabitants were enemies of the Israelites. Would anyone offer Elijah shelter? And would a poor widow have food to share?

Most of us would rather God provided in abundance long before our resources were depleted rather than just enough for each day. But our loving Father whispers, Trust Me. Just as He used ravens and a widow to provide for Elijah, nothing is impossible for Him. We can count on His love and power to meet our daily needs.

Faithful Father, thank You for knowing exactly what we need before we even ask. Help us to trust You for our daily needs.

God supplies all our needs—one day at a time.

Christ Bleed For Your Salvation

Everything Else

From: Our Daily Journey

Alas and Did My Savior Bleed

1. Alas! and did my Savior bleed
   And did my Sov’reign die?
   Would He devote that sacred head
   For such a worm as I?
2. Isaac Watts, pub.1707
   ref. by Ralph E. Hudson, 1885

  Feb 11, 2018  

Read:

Psalm 96:1-13
Worship the Lord in all his holy splendor. Let all the earth tremble before him (Psalm 96:9).

I once heard a speaker describe God’s unique nature in a memorable way. The word “God” was placed at the top of a PowerPoint slide, the words “Everything Else” at the bottom, and a solid line in-between. The speaker then stated that—as His creatures—we’re more like a worm or a cow than God. In His holiness, He’s separate, “above the line.”

Perfect in all He is and does, God is set apart from all creation and alone worthy of our worship (Psalm 96:8). As the psalmist declares, “Worship the Lord in all his holy splendor. Let all the earth tremble before him” (Psalm 96:9).

Yet more than once in Scripture, those who belong to God are told to also be holy—set apart—as He is holy. How can we, as created beings, reflect divine holiness? We know our own frailties and sinfulness, so it seems impossible. But Paul wrote that those “who have been called by God to be his own holy people” are “made. . . holy by means of Christ Jesus, just as he [does] for all people everywhere who call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 1:2). Those who believe in Jesus and receive salvation by His sacrifice are dedicated to God, made holy through Christ’s Spirit.

But there’s also an ethical part to holiness. By the power of the Spirit, believers in Jesus can strive to live lives that reflect the beauty and “otherly” nature of God (Romans 8:5-6,9).

Will we do this perfectly in this life? No. Each of us will still struggle with sin. But we can always turn to the One who alone is perfect. May we worship Him for His greatness, beauty, honor, and majesty (Psalm 96:4-6). And may we pursue His holiness as the Holy Spirit provides all we need to be set apart for our “glorious and strong,” holy God (Psalm 96:7).

God Is Everywhere

Everywhere and Nowhere

From: Our Daily Bread

  February 10, 2018  

Read: Psalm 139:7–12 | Bible in a Year: Leviticus 8–10; Matthew 25:31–46

Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? Psalm 139:7

A family friend who, like us, lost a teenager in a car accident wrote a tribute to her daughter, Lindsay, in the local paper. One of the most powerful images in her essay was this: After mentioning the many pictures and remembrances of Lindsay she had put around their house, she wrote, “She is everywhere, but nowhere.”

Although our daughters still smile back at us from their photos, the spirited personalities that lit up those smiles are nowhere to be found. They are everywhere—in our hearts, in our thoughts, in all those photos—but nowhere.

Our greatest comfort in sorrow is knowing God is with us.

But Scripture tells us that, in Christ, Lindsay and Melissa are not really nowhere. They are in Jesus’s presence, “with the Lord” (2 Corinthians 5:8). They are with the One who, in a sense, is “nowhere but everywhere.” After all, we don’t see God in a physical form. We certainly don’t have smiling pictures of Him on our mantel. In fact, if you look around your house, you may think He is nowhere. But just the opposite is true. He is everywhere!

Wherever we go on this earth, God is there. He’s there to guide, strengthen, and comfort us. We cannot go where He is not. We don’t see Him, but He’s everywhere. In each trial we face, that’s incredibly good news.

Thank You, Lord, that You are present with me here, right now. Teach me to lean on You.

For help with grief, read Life After Loss at discoveryseries.org/cb131.

Our greatest comfort in sorrow is knowing God is with us.