From Edified!
“I obey your precepts and your statutes, for all my ways are known to you.”
Psalm 119:168
Recently I spent two weeks on a difficult spiritual trek, slogging through a swamp of mists, mud and mind-numbing darkness. I was wrestling with some serious negative issues with no discernible positive outcomes. And the negatives were amplified by my not being well physically.
While in this swamp, the Spirit challenged me to continue to use all that God has taught: praise, journaling, confession, meditation, reading the Word and prayer. Doing these took a lot of effort because I really didn’t want to do them. It was like struggling through deep mud, taking one difficult step after another without any seeming progress. Living the truth that “Knowing Jesus is enough for joy, period!” had to be done on faith, without any positive emotions and against plenty of negative ones.
One night I went to sleep meditating on Psalm 31, “I am like a piece of broken pottery, I hear the slander of many, there is terror on every side…but, I will trust in you, Lord. I say, ‘You are my God. My times are in your hands….’”
The next morning while still in the last of my dreams, Psalm 62:1-4 welled up in my mind, “My soul finds rest in you alone….From you comes my salvation…you only are my rock….” As I came out of sleep, I noted a difference: I found myself on the edge of the swamp, the Son was shining and there were the first discernable rays of joy in my heart again.
The situations hadn’t changed at all; the uncertainty was still there, the hard choices were still going to have to be made. But God’s Word proved true again: focusing on Him and obeying what He had taught brought me out of the swamp and into the light once more.
If you are struggling with something, let me encourage you to keep going to Him, processing your thoughts and emotions, offering the sacrifice of thanksgiving, thinking Truth, encouraging yourself in the Word, meditating on Scripture, knowing that He is at work and will bring you out.
“Find rest, O my soul, in God alone.”
Prayer: “Praise you, Lord, that your precepts and your statutes guide me in what is right, that they protect me from what is evil and give me light to move forward. Help me to keep on doing what is right no matter what, to keep on thinking and trusting your Word. Forgive me for my unbelief. May I bring you honor by walking in truth and obedience today. Amen.”
