Forty Days and Forty Nights

This week I have been moved deeply in my heart for all the families who are silently struggling right now. It’s been a while for everyone on the “stay home” orders and I cannot help but to think of how marriages are doing, how kids are doing...

Quarantine.

Jesus was tempted in the wilderness for forty days. Noah was floating around for a while. The Israelites wandered the desert. Moses fled for years before being called to save the people.

Sometimes we are forced into a period of isolation and desolation to allow our Hearts and souls to be refined.

Addictions and hidden skeletons can only last so long in conditions like these current times before they are exposed and are brought to light. The evidence can only be concealed for so long. The one who only partakes while away at work is no longer able to use that excuse. Irritability, anger, sadness, deep rooted bitterness begin to emerge as we are forced to be together 24/7.

My soul is groaning for the devastated others who are impacted by these things. Just the day before you can stand and declare, humans are not perfect, yet grieving is so very real and hard when something unfathomable happens right in your home and you feel as though the rug rips from under your feet.

How can this seem good, we wonder? How can God work in this?

I tell you from experience, there is beauty and can come from such devastating circumstances. If God can create everything from nothing, He is just as mighty to use His Spirit to mold our hearts from the biggest messes to something redeemed. Not lost, but found. Not hopeless, but full of hope. Not unrighteous but, by the work of Christ alone, stand righteous.

When we admit we cannot do it ourselves, God shows His mighty power the most. How awesome!

While my heart is very burdened by this thought, I also know from my own past addictions, 15 years clean this year, that even while we stay at home, God is not distant. He is everywhere (Psalm 139) and very much living and active through His promises and His word, the Bible (Hebrews 4:12). He pursues us, softens our hearts, and removes our earthly idols whether we like it or not (Hebrews 12:6).

A refiners fire is not painless. It is painful to be chiseled away at, tempered, and shaped. But it helps with we have hopeful and willing heart toward God’s plan. Faith is not in the seen (Hebrews 11:1) and we know this in how Peter walked briefly on the water until he turned his eyes from Jesus and saw the fear in the seas.

The journey through the mud is a part of God’s plan for you. Trust. Breathe. Rest in Him. One step forward. I never could have healed without Him, and I never could get through my struggles in my current times without Him either.

If you need prayer, please email me and I would love to pray with you.