Daughters of promise

The LORD preserves the simple; when I was brought low, he saved me. Psalm 116:6

Reading King David’s words, I wonder what he felt as he played his harp for the demented King Saul.  A little earlier, David had been anointed king.  He knew God chose him for the throne, but at that moment in time, he was a palace musician, not a king.  He was asked to serve the very one who wore the crown that had been promised to him.  When God makes a promise, it is often hard to believe it’s still true when it feels like we’ve taken two steps backward.

How has God brought you low?  Do you feel like you’ve gone backward instead of forward?  Are you being asked to serve someone who is jealous of you?  Pray for someone who despises you?  Work for someone who takes advantage of you? 

God teaches two things when He brings His child to a low place. 

1.) Humility. It is imperative for me to learn to serve others as Jesus served. 

2.) The nature of evil.  Seasons in which I’m asked to draw close to someone who has it in for me give me an ‘up close and personal’ experience with ungodliness.  It makes me street-smart about those who will cross my path in the future.  If I can see this time as being in God’s schoolroom, learning life skills that will be life-saving, then I will find peace. 

When I see the wilderness as punishment, this is spiritual immaturity.  God never takes His child backward.  The journey is always upward and steady.

Teach me humility through obedience and wisdom through observing.  Amen

One thing God has spoken, two things I have heard: ‘Power belongs to you God, and with you, Lord, is unfailing love.’  Psalm 62:11

God is a kind Father.  He is also gracious.  He is a whispering God, and His voice is heard in the wind of the Holy Spirit.  He is an encourager and patient with us as we grow.  He is specific in His instruction, enabling us on to make decisive and wise decisions.  My experience of Him as Abba encompasses all of this.  Even when He has had to correct me, I have known Him to be kind. 

I am puzzled when a brother or sister in Christ says, “I’m just hard-headed.  God has to hit me upside the head to get me to listen.”  The manner in which this is communicated makes it seem as though this kind of stubbornness is a badge of honor.  Perhaps Jesus would want to ask, “Wouldn’t you want a whispering Father instead?” 

The question may be posed, “Doesn’t God deal differently with different types of people?”  I’m sure that’s true in many respects.  There are larger-than-life personalities.  There are wall flowers.  There are strong-willed saints.  There are compliant believers.  Each could, I guess, require a different approach from their Heavenly Father.  Yet my question is this ~ If each of us is called to be humble before God no matter who we are or how we’re wired, wouldn’t His whisper suffice?  I recall that the prophets who encountered the revelation of God fell on their face and were undone. 

The word humility comes from the word ‘humus’ – meaning ‘dirt.’  That does not mean we are worthless as dirt, but we are face down in the dirt as we are prostrate before a holy God.  

To whom will the Lord be revealed?  The one who walks humbly with their God.  Elijah, the larger-than-life prophet, heard God in the wind.  He exemplified Deuteronomy 8:6. It’s paramount that you keep the commandments of God, your God, and that you walk down the roads he shows you and reverently respect him.  The Message

May You never have to raise Your voice to my stubbornness.  Amen

He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge.  Psalm 91:4

Mention God’s wings, and I think of Ruth. 

Her life had taken some dark turns, and loss had become her companion.  She had no husband, no heritage, and no children.  She lived in a land as a vulnerable widow but one day, she looked up from her circumstances long enough to cry out to the one who could redeem her story.  She approached Boaz as he was sleeping on the threshing floor to protect his store of grain from being robbed.  She startled him, and then did something outrageous.  She asked him to spread the edge of his garment over her.  It was an intimate request.  To be under His garment, his tallit, was to be united to him in covenant love.  In Hebrew, the account reads like this ~ ‘She pulled his wing over her.’ The four corners of a Jewish man’s tallit symbolize being under God’s wings.

Move forward in Jewish history. Jesus’ tallit was touched by many who were sick and they became well.  He spread his garment over Jairus’ daughter and raised her from the dead.  The woman with the issue of blood touched the fringe of Jesus’ tallit and in doing so, she was healed.  And the good news is this ~ God makes this covering available to me.

These days, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed.  God’s tallit beckons.  He lifts me up out of the shadows and hides me under His wings, a place of protection, perspective, and healing. 

David said, “I will stay in Your tent forever: I will trust in the cover of Your wings.”  Psalm 61

There is an invitation to dwell under God’s wings.  In doing so, I am lifted from tortuous thoughts to praise.  He lifts me up to the cliffs, away from the carnage of the valley, where the billows of His wings descend upon the shoulders of the afflicted. 

Jesus, I’ve learned not to just make a visit to the shelter of Your wings; I’ve learned to live there.  I am hidden in You.  Amen 

Whoever is wise, let him understand these things; whoever is discerning, let him know them. For the ways of the Lord are right, and the righteous will walk in them. Hosea 14:9

These are God’s final words in the book of Hosea. After all is said and done, this is how He chooses to end His communication to His people. He does not punish with an abrupt ending, leaving His people hanging. He wraps up His message with grace.

The storyline of Hosea has had all the elements of a great novel. God professed His love, took a bride, and hoped for fidelity. Love was unappreciated, spurned, and tested by the sin of unfaithfulness. God has been anything but stoic throughout these pages. He has been generous to express His heart. He showed them He is a God who feels intensely. He loves, hurts, weeps, longs, reaches, and forgives. He aches to bless, restores when there is repentance, and is willing to put the past behind His back.

In His closing thoughts, we are to grasp the truth that there is a difference between understanding the ways of the Lord and knowing them. God differentiates by saying, “If we are wise, we understand His ways. If we are discerning, we know them.” I don’t want to miss the implications of this important signature.

• To ‘understand’ something is cerebral. I take a precept apart, study it, and mentally grasp the truth of it.
• To ‘know’ something is to experience it. I make the precept a part of my life. I put it to the test and experience what it’s like to live by it.I am not a babe in Christ. Believe me, I know what He is saying about the differences between that which is cerebral and that which has been proven by experience. The first brings casual interest. The latter brings passion.

Oh God, I make a vow to You today. I will never go halfway. Once You reveal a truth, I will do more than study it. I will make it part of my experience. The story of our love has read like this novel. You called me Your side before my love was awakened. You made a covenant with me even though I was barely interested. You took care of me when my back was turned. I turned to many other lovers and broke Your heart. Ah, but then I heard Your voice. I thought it was too late but You kept calling my name. I repented. I came home. My eyes were opened to the beauty of Your love. Now, I hang on every Word. Amen

Shall I ransom them from the power of Sheol? Shall I redeem them from death? O Death, where are your thorns? O Sheol, where is your sting? Hosea 13:14 

Every single believer should ascribe to Christ’s triumph over death. I have said goodbye to my father and my mother. Both died of cancer. I have said goodbye to my son who took his life in his late thirties. While their loss ushered in profound grief, death was bittersweet because I knew that they were in the presence of God. There is no doubt in my heart about that. 

However, while I could say that God was victorious over death, I have not been as willing to put Him to the test regarding other kinds of death in my life. I have known what it is like to be the ‘living-dead’; dead to myself, dead to my dreams, dead to the experience of Jesus, dead to my past and my future. Can God triumph over these kinds of death? 

How do I know if there are dead places that need a resurrection? I will live frantically, preventing reflection. I will answer a penetrating question with, “I don’t want to talk about that.” I will fear being by myself for long periods because there are things from which I am running. I will be wordless about certain past, painful experiences. 

God is not bound by the grave, whether it be physical or spiritual. He said through the prophet Ezekiel, “You will know that I am the Lord when I have opened your graves and caused you to come up out of your graves.” Until I allow Him to touch every dead thing and commence a resurrection, I will not fully know that He is the Lord! How do I begin to appropriate His eternal life? God reveals the secret in Ezekiel 37. “Prophesy over these bones and say to them, ‘Hear the word of the Lord’.” I must speak the Word over myself, act on its truth, and allow the Spirit, God’s breath, to infuse my being with life that transcends the physical. He is the Word, He is the breath, the Spirit.  And He brings life to the grave. 

I stand at attention to Your Word today. I adjust my breathing to Yours. Touch every part of me that languishes for life. Amen 

I have been the Lord your God since the land of Egypt. Hosea 12:9a 

Our family has moved many times over the years. We, like many of you reading this, have had to learn how to make different kinds of places ‘home’. We have been involved in various kinds of churches, assorted in denomination. While we enjoyed making new friends, there was always a challenge. The new affiliations we made didn’t know our history. They didn’t know the places where we grew up; the schools, teachers, and life experiences that shaped us. They didn’t know our parents. They never walked the grounds of our childhood home. Their ability to really understand how we were wired was compromised by lack of history. That was isolating and lonely. 

I can never accuse God of not understanding my life. He was involved from the beginning, which started even before my conception. He knew my story even before I lived it. He was an active participant throughout my lifetime even while I was in the land of Egypt. He knew I would become a slave for many years and how I would respond internally to imprisonment. He took note of it all and with every seeming step backwards, He wrote redemptive opposites into my storyline. 

I am still under a transformational work. There are things, even today, which puzzle me about myself and why I respond to life like I do. But now, I know who to run to. “Reveal myself to me, Lord”…is a prayer that started turning my life around some years ago. Because He has been my God throughout the course of my entire life’s history, He has divine insight into what makes me the person I am. He is gracious to say, “The reason you did that was because……” It is a comfort to be in the embrace of One who not only knows me, but loves me. 

Some are intimate today with those who know too much about them and use the information against them. Oh, they are not like God. We must be careful to make God our refuge. Only He deserves the abandon of childlike trust. Only He should be given the power to write and shape our identity. 

I rest in the comfort of our history. I give You all the power to re-write my past and reveal my future. Amen 

They make for themselves molten images, idols skillfully made from their silver, all of them the work of craftsmen. They say of them, “Let the men who sacrifice (their children) kiss the calves.” Hosea 13:2 

Hosea saw some pretty gruesome practices. In ancient Israel, human sacrifice usually meant child sacrifice. Hosea watched as men sacrificed their children at pagan altars. Consider their twisted values. A craftsman would make a metal god, men would sacrifice their offspring and beg for the god’s help, and then the ‘live’ animals who matched the representation of the graven image were worshipped. Children were thrown away, animals were exalted. 

In some ways, our values today are similar. We can be bent to save whales but discard the unborn. We can prize a pet and ignore our own child. We can worship a god made with our hands but forget that in the end, it will burn in the fire. When we cease to actively worship God, our values distort in front of our eyes. What should be treasured no longer appeals. What should be abhorred becomes appealing. If, at that point, we don’t recognize the perversion of our affection, we will feed the wrong appetite. 

I know what it is to love something that was not good for me, to prize the thing that would eventually consume me. Because my heart was engaged though, I was not willing to consider that God was calling me to wash my hands of that which was unclean. My attachment skewed my perspective. The longer I ignored the call to make corrective changes, the harder it became to do so. Keeping short accounts of my values, preferably daily, will prevent me from taking a long pleasurable journey down a road that promises nothing but heartache. Worshipping God and Him only can only promise peace and a life with no regrets. 

Jesus, I will love what You love today and turn away from everything the repels You. I am Your disciple, first and foremost. Amen 

In the womb he took his brother by the heel, and in his maturity he contended with God. He wept and sought His favor and found Him at Bethel. Hosea 12:3-4 

These verses speak to our personal life-stories.  I’ll personalize. I have walked in places similar to Jacob’s footsteps. I know what it’s like to seize control of the events of my life, the ones I find so extremely distasteful, and try to change the outcomes. I  know what it’s like to take them ‘by the heel’ and attempt to exact what I think is fair and, also, what I perceive I need. The consequences are far reaching. 

I know what it’s like to demand the attention of others in hopes of some kind of validation. While some attention was given, the desired approval remained elusive. I also know what it’s like to try to force fairness. I may have changed a few outcomes but the treasures I sought failed to gratify me once they were given under coercion. 

For any of you today who are ‘taking life by the heel’, let me encourage you to freeze in your tracks. In Jacob’s maturity, he contended with God by wrestling with the angel. He took the angst in his soul to the One who allowed it in the first place. Only One who is Sovereign can deal with such things and speak to these issues with authority. 

Jacob wept, surrendered in exhaustion, and sought God’s favor above all else. When the voice of God broke through at Bethel, it was a permanent WORD that would forever shape His future. He built a monument there, evidence of the lasting power of God’s voice. Throughout his life, he would visit that place often because of the poignancy of that one encounter. 

I have many Bethels to re-visit. And I do. They are always clarifying and strengthening. Some of you today need a Bethel. Seek it, don’t leave it until the contention with God is resolved. 

You did not make us to live conflicted. You are the Prince of Peace on the other side of the tantrums of contentious children. Lead me always to the stillness of surrender. Amen 

They will come trembling like birds from Egypt, and like doves from the land of Assyria; and I will settle them in their houses, declares the Lord. Hosea 11:11 

Earlier in Hosea, God called His children silly doves. They failed to know where there true home was. “There will come a day when they will come trembling again to their houses,” God prophesies.   He offers them a pilgrimage back to their roots. 

A woman ceases to make God her home when she no longer believes He can offer her what she needs. The promise of the abundant life doesn’t seem abundant. There can be many reasons. 1.) She has experienced too much pain in this world and she runs from the One she believes is responsible. 2.) There has been no instruction on how to make God her home so she settles in distant lands, looking for anyone who will offer her temporary shelter. 3.) Satan has taken advantage of her vulnerability and offered her some counterfeit ways out of distress. 

Whatever the reason, leaving home is rarely a short adventure. It might span the first half of someone’s lifetime. 

There comes a day when God says ‘enough’. The fog of misunderstanding about who He is begins to clear and a woman shakes her head and realizes her folly. God’s true character materializes in full blown pictures within her spirit. Hunger for His presence is awakened. She prepares for her trip back to her roots. “Before the foundation of the world, I knew you.” Ah yes, she remembers the verse now. She realizes that the only place she belongs is at home with God. She comes trembling, with awe and excitement, to the land that has always been hers. She travels back to claim it with joy. 

Home is sweetest to the one who has been homeless. Seeing the lights in the distance makes hasten her steps. Walking over the threshold brings waves of contentment. It’s home. Everything is as she dreamt it would be.

It took me over forty years to finally find my home in You. I lived many places, emotionally, even though I called You, “Father.” I will never get over the deep soul rest You provide. Amen