Psalm
30:1-5 - I will exalt You, Lord, because You have lifted me up and
have not allowed my enemies to triumph over me. Lord my God, I cried to You for
help, and You healed me. Lord, You brought me up from Sheol; You spared me from among
those going down to the Pit. Sing to Yahweh, you
His faithful ones, and praise His holy name. For His
anger lasts only a moment, but His favor, a lifetime. Weeping may spend the
night, but there is joy in the morning.
No matter our profession or the season
of life, life is filled with both joy and frustration. As Christians, we should
be expecting God to transform our frustrations into joy. My primary vocation is
to help start new churches. At one new church we were planning a special
service to license to the ministry, the new pastor, a young man just out of
college. We had invited a number of out-of-town guests and
several denominational leaders to be part of the service, and everyone was
excited. When we arrived to set up for the service, the building manager
informed us that there had been a last minute change in plans. They needed the
large room we normally used to accommodate a special meeting for the
organization’s administration, and we needed to move to a much smaller room
across the large complex. With only minutes until the service began, we moved
all our equipment to a different building and quickly set it up. With
very little time to inform the congregation of the new location, the third
floor of another building and down several maze-like hallways, it seemed like
the service was going to be a disaster. Our small core group started
calling and texting members of the congregation and guests to tell them how to
find the new location, but our hopes for a joyful celebration service were
rapidly evaporating.
However, we got everything set up and
began the service only ten minutes behind schedule. People kept trickling in as
they discovered where we were. To our surprise, we had a record attendance that
morning! The service itself went well. As we prayed over the
young man to license him, all the frustration seemed to melt away and a sense
of real joy filled the room. In the end, God got the glory, and His Word was
proclaimed during the service.
Life is often like that. Unexpected
things happen that raise stress levels. God works through them and blesses the
situation anyway. Then another challenge occurs, and God works through that
too. It happens again and again, but each time God works through the situation
and brings glory to His name. The frustrations of life are many, but so are the
joys. The joys overshadow the frustrations. If we just keep exalting the Lord,
even in the midst of chaos and sadness, joy does come in the morning.
Lord,
give us joy in the midst of the struggles of life. Amen.
This post is an excerpt from the book, The
Heavenly Mundane: Daily Devotions from Ordinary Experiences. Filled with stories of how God spoke in
big ways through small events, the book will encourage people to look for God
in the mundane things of life. Great for both personal use and to give as a
gift to friend, either the print version or the e-book version may be purchased
at this link:
No comments:
Post a Comment