TGIF
Last week’s message focused on God’s presence with us and our need to keep our focus on Him as we go through our day – every day. A few days later, October 12 to be exact, Sarah Young’s devotional that day began Learn to lean on Me more and more. I know the full extent of your weakness, and that is where My powerful Presence meets you! This made me think more about His amazing and constant strength available to me to lean on, and on my greatly limiting weaknesses.
2 Corinthians 12:9 – But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.
I am weak but He is strong. Also, he knows every detail about me, so He knows every detail about my every weakness. I cannot hide anything so why not take advantage of His presence and understanding and grace??? Why not lean on Him more and more, and take advantage of what He offers me continually – on good and routine days as well as on difficult days???
Isaiah 40:29 – He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak.
Sarah’s message continues My strength and your weakness fit together perfectly – in a wonderful synergy designed long before your birth. Actually, My Power is most effective in weakness. We form a great team, I need exactly what He offers me, and He offers Himself to me as often and as long as I ask Him and seek Him!!
Philippians 4:13 – I can do all this through him who gives me strength.
Any strength or confidence or skills that I may possess come entirely from Him. I need to recognize this fact and thank Him for making me who I am and giving me all that I have.
I also need to recognize that I need Him even on seemingly normal and routine days. Sarah offers I want you to depend on Me even when you feel competent to handle things yourself. This requires awareness of both My Presence and your neediness. I am infinitely wise, so let Me guide your thinking as you make plans and decisions. Leaning on Me produces warm intimacy with Me – the One who will never leave you or forsake you.
I need to make sure I thank Him for all my blessings on those very normal and unexciting days. It is easy to take Him for granted on days that seem easy, when I may feel like I don’t have a care in the world. But it is just as important to thank Him and praise Him on those days, because He also made them! Be sure to take time each day to smell the flowers, observe the sunrise or sunset, listen to the children laughing and playing in the schoolyard, thank Him for the unexpected phone call you received from a friend who you haven’t heard from in a long time, or for Him planting the idea in your mind (and heart) to take lunch to a shut-in or do a favor for someone you just met that day on the street. Don’t take any of these happenings for granted, thank Him who made all things possible. Be grateful that you recognize the need to thank Him – for His constant and wonderful protection of you and for all the gifts He constantly gives to us.
1 Thessalonians 5:18 – give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.
Psalm 9:1 – I will give thanks to you, Lord, with all my heart; I will tell of all your wonderful deeds.