“His lord said unto him, Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord.” Matthew 25:21

Okay, this way too  long, so I suggest you read it in a couple of settings.  I didn’t want to break it up because there would be a whole week between sections, so it is up to you to. break it up!  Thanks for your patience.

A few years back we had a memorial for one of our beloved church members, David Williams.  It was a lovely time of remembering his life and his almost 50 years with his lovely wife Virginia and their very large family.  If you want to see the memorial,  you can click here to view the whole thing.  Dave’s memorial  led me to remember another Celebration of Life I went to even longer ago.  That memorial was for my good friend James Witt and it was very touching and thought provoking.   James was the  youth leader for our four children at Emmanuel Baptist church years ago (yes, it was in the 80’s!). James was only 52 when he passed and beloved by many. He found out three months earlier what he was facing and so his fight was short, but very difficult. It was, of course, very hard on his nine children and wonderful wife, Lenae. It was also hard on the students in the school that he started and where he taught.  It was especially  difficult for the boys in the Christian Service Brigade that he had started two years earlier.   It was hard on his many friends, as well. In the two-hour service we heard from people in every one of those categories.

The service was held in the Melrose church gym that has been converted into a worship center. It was packed and there was standing room only for some of the latecomers. There was no slide show of James’ life, just testimonies. I don’t think he was too big on technology.

The service started with over a half-hour of his children and a few others combining in different groups and singing all of James’ favorite songs. It was incredibly touching. Amazingly, they all had wonderful voices and could play a variety of instruments. There were also love letters written to James from each of his children, and the love that was reflected in those letters was also reflected on the stage.  Finally, several of the individual children spoke. They all called him “Papa,” and to hear them speak of their respect and love for their papa was intensely moving.

After about an hour of testimony about James’ life, his son Timothy got up and said that James had written and recorded a message for his own memorial a few weeks earlier. Timothy said that they were not going to play it, because is seemed almost morbid in a way. But after the family buried James on a ranch that he inherited last year from a man who James had befriended, they listened to the recorded message and were blessed by it. They decided as a family to play it at the service, so they did.

It was wonderfully strange to hear James speaking at his own memorial. He spoke with love and conviction. As was his way, he did not hold back. He knew that even the hardest of hearts would probably not walk out on a dead man speaking, so he laid it all on the line. There wasn’t a person sitting in that auditorium that had excuse any longer. If they had managed to avoid hearing the gospel up to that point in their lives, they hadn’t avoided it any longer. I think the message of hope that he gave while on the cusp of death had an incredible effect on all who were there. There was no bitterness in his voice or words, only anticipation. It was truly beautiful. He ended with some wonderful verses and said good bye “for now.”  I have never experienced anything like it.

After James’ message they opened it up to those who would like to come forward and share a bit. Some of the stories were lengthy (and as usual, some people used it for a personal pulpit time that had little to do with James), but most were just short vignettes about James’ kindness and love. After that a young pastor came forward and told how he had been kicked out of houses of friends and relatives up until the age 18 when James took him in. James would get him up at 5:00 every morning and they would run two miles and talk about the Lord. The young man was eventually saved and became a pastor. It was a very touching story. Well, at that point he gave a hellfire and brimstone sermon. I mean it was an old-fashioned, “I don’t need no stinkin’ microphone” lay-it-on-the-line message. Quite unusual for a memorial, but I guess not for James’ memorial.

At the end about 15 boys went forward in their Christian Service Brigade uniforms (similar to Boy Scout garb) and sang their Christian theme song and gave their motto. So after about two and a half hours, the service ended and we went to the family meet and greet line or the food line. James was a very conservative Christian with some different ideas, none of which offset his deep belief in Christ as Savior, so it was a bit like being at an Apostolic Faith, Mennonite, or Amish gathering. Many of the females wore small head coverings and long dresses and I saw more long beards on the men than at a Duck Dynasty convention or ZZ Top concert. The whole event was what I would call serious but festive. That sounds contradictory, but that is the only way to explain it. Many parts were upbeat, but a person could never escape the feeling that everyone involved was saying, “This idea of Jesus and the afterlife is crucial. Don’t mess up.” It wasn’t that everyone was uptight, but that everyone knew that with memorials comes great opportunity.

The reason I am reliving this beautifully unique memorial is not only because our kids knew James as a youth leader (and afterwards as well), but because like every memorial or funeral it forces us to face our own mortality. There wasn’t a person sitting there that day who wasn’t asking himself at one time or another, “What will my celebration of life be? How will I be remembered? What can people say about me?” There is a wonderful poem called “The Dash” that explains that when a date appears on a headstone it records the year of birth, then a dash, then the year of death. The dates are not the important part, what was important is what took place during the dash. What I heard about James’ “dash” was life of kindness, humility, and conviction. What I mostly heard, however, was about a life committed to Christ, family, and friends.

When an unbeliever dies, people talk about his or her goodness of character (even though it may have been missing). Mourners are more or less satisfied knowing that the person was just a “good guy” during his lifetime. But as Christians we should not be satisfied with just being “good.” Our time here should be marked by our love for Christ and the actions of our life should stem from that love. Our memorials should not consist of the occasional assumption by some that we must have been a Christian because we went to church once in awhile. No one should be able to turn to another in the service and say, “Oh, so he/she was a Christian? I didn’t know that.” Our lives are to reflect Christ, so our deaths should not reveal anything less. When I spoke at my Dad’s memorial, I tried to tell stories of his life, but also tried to express, undeniably, that they were all connected to his love for Jesus. He was a simple man with simple faith, but everyone who met him knew that God was important in his life. He attended church up until it was impossible to do so and was not afraid to defend Jesus, Ronald Reagan, and gun control (in that order), to anyone who had the guts to take on a guy you could not get mad at.

I guess what I took away from Jame’s  memorial is that Christian memorials should be different from secular ones. John said that “He must increase, but I must decrease.” Our lives should reveal Christ more and more each day, so that when we reach the end there should be no doubt who we want to glorify. If our lives reflect just a passing glimpse of who Jesus is and a whole bunch of other “stuff,” even though the “stuff” is good, we will be disappointed in ourselves when see Him face to face. When most people say they want to live with no regrets, they mean they want to pile in every endeavor possible so they don’t miss out on anything. As Christians “no regrets” should mean exemplifying Christ and living for Him as much as we possibly can. We might think that sounds boring, but I don’t think we will feel that way when the family who loved us, friends who knew us, and the Savior who redeemed all say at the end of our lives , “Well done, good and faithful one.” If our lives were books, how many pages would mention Christ’s name? Would there be long stretches, maybe even full chapters, in which He never appears? Is He like the soap opera character that pops in and out of episodes every few months for convenience or is He the leading character on which the story rests?

There was no doubt at the end of the day where James’ loyalties lay. His memorial service was more about life than dying. It was more about heaven to come than earth left behind. It was, from everything I could see, an example of a worthwhile “dash” between two numbers. James died on my birthday, so it is fitting that we remember that there is a “time for life and a time for death,” and in this life we should live for Christ and in that in our death we should meet with Him, and that no one left should have any questions about either. Mark Twain once said that we should live such lives that when we die, that everyone should be sorry, even the undertaker! When famous pastor Donald Barnhouse was going to his wife’s funeral with his young children a huge truck passed them and its shadow covered half the road. He asked his children if they would rather be run over by that truck or by the shadow cast by that truck. Of course they said the shadow because it could not hurt them. He said, “That is the way it is with death. The truck represents the death, but because of Christ’s sacrifice, the only thing that touches us now is its shadow. Death can’t hurt us anymore.”

James’s lamp was not extinguished, he just doesn’t need it anymore so he set it aside. He is in the true light now. As I write the book of my life, I hope it can be entitled, “Jesus and his friend Rick.” I want Him to be the main character. I think we all hope that we will live more for Him than ourselves and that our lives will be undeniably connected in word and deed to “Him Who lives within us.”

“That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.”  Ephesians 3:16-19

Paul had wonderful apostolic prayers that he prayed for others that are also for us.  Paul understood that not only people around him needed prayer, but he needed prayers himself. The above verses from Ephesians help us to petition for our own needs and the needs of others.

There are some wonderful “whats” in this prayer followed by an even more wonderful “how.”  That is typical of God’s Word.  When He reveals a wonderful treasure to us, He doesn’t leave us hanging, but tells us where to find it and how to use it. In the verses above Paul prays that we will be strengthened 1) by the spirit 2) by being filled with the fulness of God 3) by being grounded in the overwhelming love of Christ.

If we want to experience the fulness of Christian living, we need to experience the fulness of Christ’s love.  In the same stroke of the pen, Paul says that we can comprehend the incomprehensible.  How is that possible?  He tells us that the love of Christ passes all understanding but that if we are filled with Christ, we will have the knowledge of this love. This is an example of faith in God’s grace.  We can’t understand Christ’s love but to understand it, we must receive it and then we will understand it.

In one of his sermons, D.L. Moody held up a glass and asked, “How can I get the air out of this glass?” One man shouted, “Suck it out with a pump!” Moody replied, “That would create a vacuum and shatter the glass.” After numerous other suggestions Moody smiled, took out a pitcher of water, and filled the glass. “There,” he said, “all the air is now removed.”

We cannot get the sin out of our lives by sucking it out of our own accord.  That would break us.  The only way to remove the sin from our lives is to be filled with Christ.  We can only empty ourselves by being filled.  We must allow the filling of the spirit to push the pride, conceit, false ambition, selfishness and other things that are contrary to God’s law out of our lives.

I think some try to empty themselves on their own to make room for the spirit of God.  But we cannot do that.  We must take in the Holy Spirit and allow Him to push those things out of our lives. When we are filled with Him there is no room left for those things of the flesh. Two different things cannot occupy the same space.  If we are filled with the Spirit, there is no room left for our evil desires.  The thing is, we have all the Holy Spirit, but sometimes He does not have all of us. We have all we need to push the evil from our lives, but sometimes we use more energy to hang onto the old things than we use to receive the new.

Charles Spurgeon put it well, “Without the Spirit of God, we can do nothing. We are as ships without the wind, branches without sap, and like coals without fire, we are useless.”  God has recreated us through the Son and His spirit.  We need not be useless any longer but useful.

A park ranger at Yellowstone National Park was leading a group of hikers to a fire lookout. The ranger was was so focused on the hike, he turned off his radio so there would not be any distractions. After a few hours the group was met by a nearly breathless lookout, who asked why he hadn’t responded to the messages on his radio. A grizzly bear had been seen stalking the group, and the authorities were trying to warn them of the danger.

Any time we tune out the Holy Spirit or ignore the warnings of the Bible we put ourselves and those around us in danger.

The key again, is as Paul says: “Be rooted in love” by “knowing Christ’s love” so we will be “filled with the fulness of God” and there will not be any room for anything else but Him.  Be both emptied and filled today.  Emptied of us and filled with Him.  Only then will our lives be all they can be on this earth.

• “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.” (Galatians 2:20)

Most of us will not be called on to put our lives on the line for others, but it happens every day in hundreds of ways throughout the world. The person who dives into icy water to save someone from drowning, the soldier who throws  his body on a grenade to protect his buddies, the fireman who rushes into a blazing building to save a child, a bystander that confronts a gang to extricate
an innocent person from their midst.  These are all real-life examples of people who put someone else’s safety above their own.  We like to think that we are all like this, willing to put

 thoughts of self out of the way for a moment in time, so that we can save another.

When I was attending Redwood School in Grants Pass, probably in fourth or fifth grade, the circus came to town.  As I sat in class I noticed the flag hanging in the front of the room and the small spear-like pole with a sharp tip which supported it.  I happened to be wearing my cub scout uniform that day, so I was in an especially gallant mood and started daydreaming about a lion escaping from the circus and terrorizing the school.  I saw myself jump on a desk, scale a bookcase, and pull the flag pole from its holder.  I took the flag off the pole and folded it neatly like any good soldier, oops, scout, would.  I took the pole outside and approached the lion.  Remembering lion fighting from several Tarzan shows I had seen, I held the lion at bay with the small spear.  When it became apparent the lion was going to charge, I broke the spear over my knee and jammed the longer part of the spear in the lion’s open mouth!  About that time the teacher interrupted my heroics by asking me a question.  I hadn’t heard  the question, since I was busily saving 400 kids and teachers, so I could not answer. My teacher then made the mistake of saying that since I was apparently thinking about something other than Columbus, maybe I would like to share it with the class.  That was probably a mistake on her part. Since I was saving the school, I said sure, and hustled up front to tell the tale standing straight and tall in my Cub Scout uniform.  The story went over really well with the whole class and opened the door for me to tell stories the rest of the year when we had a little extra time in class.  I don’t think was the outcome my teacher had hoped for.

Why, you might be asking, did I take this trip down memory lane and kidnap you along the way?  Well, besides the fact that I am telling a story of me saving the entire school, I am using it to illustrate that we have probably all dreamed of helping others with some heroic act during our lifetime (some of us might still be doing it!).  Seldom, however, do we picture ourselves doing something in a cowardly way. We never see ourselves as the chicken scrambling faster than his three little brothers just fresh out of the shell; or the whimpering child lying in the middle of the floor in the midst of danger sucking his thumb like a newborn, or on a sinking ship pointing out a fake Clint Eastwood to a little old lady so we can steal her life jacket.  No, we seldom say we want to grow up to be a coward someday, but in spite of this courage seems to be lacking today.  So many tend to wilt under the smallest of pressure.  We don’t like to take stands unless they are safe and we don’t speak up unless we are preaching to the choir.  Plainly speaking, in most cases, we are a bunch of weenies.

We are so concerned with our own happiness, our own wants, our own pleasures that even if we have a chance to help someone else, we probably won’t even notice him.  Eyes that are turned inward will seldom be aware of the things that are outward.  We like to believe that we would step up if needed- that we would the one in the crowd that would rush to the crashed car or the crumpled woman or the fleeing purse snatcher.  But the truth of the matter is that we have trouble even handling the smallest of deed needs- the person who needs an encouraging word, the neighbor who desperately needs prayer, the co-worker who needs to hear about Jesus, the friend who is caught up in sin, are all challenges that we seem to struggle with as much as pulling a tiny tot from the path of the oncoming train.  Thankfully, Christ did not hesitate to step it up for us.  He went to the cross knowing the pain that He would bear, but did it anyway.  He knew that He would be beaten beyond recognition, but He did it anyway.  He knew that he would face an excruciating physical death and the weight of all our sins in just a few hours span, but He did it anyway.  Why? So that we would not have to.  He went where we deserved to go, so we would not have to.  He went so that we could, in turn, have courage to do what is right- to stand in the face of great odds- to never give up and to sacrifice for others regardless of the cost.

One of the saddest but most compelling stories from WWII was about a group of about 20 prisoners under an especially cruel guard. Each day they would be required to take a shovel and go out into the prison yard and dig. At the end of each day the prisoners would come back to their barracks and line up their shovels against the wall for the guard to count. On this particular day when the guard counted, he only counted 19 shovels. “Who lost their shovel?” the guard shouted. “If the man who lost his shovel does not step forward I’m going to kill five of you at a time until he does step forward!”

It was at this point that a young 19-year-old POW stepped forward taking the blame for having lost his shovel. The evil, blood-thirsty guard immediately took out his revolver put it to the boy’s head and pulled the trigger killing him instantly. As the teenager’s dead body lay crumpled on the ground his fellow prisoners were aghast because of what had just happened.  But they didn’t know the half of it.

By mistake or on purpose, no one really knows for sure, the guard had miscounted the shovels. Twenty shovels were leaning against that barracks wall.  That 19-year-old POW knew that when he stepped forward, he was offering his life as a sacrifice for his fellow prisoners, but he did it anyway.  Nineteen years old, hundreds of miles from home, dying for something he did not do, to save men who would not be able to thank him, just a few weeks before the war’s end.  Some would call that stupid.  I would call that Christ-like.

If we were to prioritize things in our lives, how high up would our concern for others be.  Paul tells us to,  “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.”  Philippians 2:3-4  When we follow our own selfish desires to the detriment of others, and then say we are brave enough save someone else, we are fooling ourselves.

We are like the man who is asked, “If you had two houses, would you give one to the poor?”

The man replies, “Yes.”

The man is asked, “If you had four cars, would give two to the poor?”

Again he replies, “Yes.”

He is finally is asked, “If you had two shirts, would you give one to the poor?”

The man quickly says, “No.”

“You will give houses and cars, but won’t give shirts. Why not?” he is asked.

“Because I have two shirts,” he replies.

We can say that we will do all kinds of things, but the truth of what we would do in tough times is probably previewed in the way we live our daily lives.  If we live our lives for ourselves in times of leisure how can we say would sacrifice in times of danger?  It is like the man who says he would die to protect his family, but can’t take the time to talk to his kids about their day.  It doesn’t make sense. If we are Christ-like, our world will not revolve around us, but Christ.  And as our world revolves around Him we will notice others needs before our own. And finally, we will be able live a life that is not obsessed with “numero uno.”  And finally we will find the contentment we have always searched for.

“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.”  Deuteronomy 6:4-9

This portion of scripture is known quite well to the Jewish people as Shema which means “hear” in Hebrew. It is very important in Jewish family tradition.  It should be equally important to us, especially in these times when young people are being hijacked from the faith daily. But the Jews look at this passage much differently than we do, so to appropriately apply the verse to us today, we must first understand the verse.The Jews use the phrase “the Lord is one” to prove that Jesus can’t be God, but they don’t realize that this phrase actually supports our belief that Jesus is God.  We are not worshipping three Gods in God the Father, Christ, and the Holy Spirit, but one God.  In Corinthians 8:6 it says, “yet for us there is one God.”  This is important because the rest of the verses are teaching us to pass this truth down (along with the others in the Word) to those who are younger, so that they can continue to hand the truths down to those who are younger than they.  It does us no good to pass down misinformation about the Word to our younger generations.  When I was coaching I always felt it was harder to undo something wrong that players had been taught than to  take players who knew nothing and teach them what was correct.  If we are going to teach, we should teach truth.

Our first step in continuing a line of knowledge about God down through time is take seriously the admonition to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.”  If we do not love the Lord completely and without reservation, our endorsement of Him will be suspect.  If we never speak of Him or pray to Him or converse with Him and then turn around and say that He is the most important person in our lives, few will believe it, especially those who are younger.  The most important step in sharing Him is loving Him with all our being. A model is a representation of the real thing.  We are supposed to be models of Christ.  Young people around us are getting their impression of who Christ is by who we are.  I had a portly old grandpa tell me once, “we are supposed to be role models, not just models with rolls.”  That is true.

The things of God then must be “impressed in our hearts,” not just present in our heads.  They must be etched deep within us. Our knowledge of God is not enough; it must be deeply seated in our soul.  It must be the inescapable truth that we base our lives on and then we can “impress them on our children.”  We cannot impress on others what is not impressed on us.  It would be like trying to mold jello without a mould.  When the verse mentions children, it might be speaking primarily of our own children if we have them, but it also means secondarily any children we have influence over.  It can mean nephews, nieces, grandchildren, neighbors, or even children of acquaintances.  We need to take every opportunity to share the “hope which lies within us.”

When do we share?  I think Moses covered pretty much all the time when he said, “when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up.”  So in the home and out of the home, at your leisure and on the job, we are to look for chances pass our love of the wonderful Triune God on to the younger set.  It only took two generations for the people of Israel to have forgotten the wonderful miracles in the desert.  How much more quickly can a love of God disappear when it is not accompanied by incredible signs and wonders, if we don’t “intentionally” keep it alive?

As the Jews always seemed to do, they took the line, “tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads” quite literally.  Many would wear phylacteries which were small boxes containing scriptures on their hands and foreheads.  Jesus condemned this ostentatious display of false religiosity.  The phrase above meant that our love for God and our desire to pass that love on to others should not be hidden, but should be apparent in everything we do. Somewhere between a hidden love for Christ and a thirty pound cross some wear to look spiritual is the truth of what God wants from us.  God wants a love for Christ that can’t be hidden, but not a love that slaps people it their faces with its heavy-handed hypocrisy.  Ironically, the anti-christ will someday test loyalty with marks on the forehead or hands, Christ never asks that of us.  For Him, it’s what’s inside that counts.

The Jews took the words, “Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates” literally again, and it led to the Jewish practice of the mezuzah which was nailing a small container holding a passage of Scripture to a doorpost. But we must remember that hanging scripture on the wall does not make our houses Christ-homes any more than wearing a Christian t-shirt fills us with Christ. It is all about the trueness of what lies within.  The verse above has been the flagship verse for hundreds of children’s ministries and even more so, families. 

That is all well and good, but sayings on a wall do not make God’s truth reality.  We cannot pass on what we do not know.  What this verse is really telling us is, love the Word, learn the Word, live the Word and share the Word, especially to the young we have contact with.  Children are like wet cement waiting to have an impression left in them.  If we don’t leave the impression, something else or someone else will. If we love God, we must pass it on. If we do not pass Him along, He will go the route of the false gods of the past and his reality will be lost until He returns again to an unsuspecting world.  We must do all we can to protect our younger generation from that.

“Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which passes all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”    Philippians 4:6-7

I believe the Bible gives us preventative tools more than curative tools.  Unfortunately we too often use the words in the Word only when things get really bad and we are throwing darts at the problem-solving dart board.  God happens to be on the board with a host of other possible cures.  We wait until the flames are licking at our heals, head for the fire extinguishers and if the closest one happens to be prayer, we pull it down and pull the pin.  In this passage the Apostle Paul writes that we should present all things to Him, not just all big things.  After all, most of our big worries started as smaller ones.  We just usually don’t worry about praying until we start sweating a lot.  Typically, we try to handle things on our own first and then when our alternatives are all exhausted, we turn to God.  After all, why bring God in to sweat the small things?  He has enough on His plate.

Don’t ask me how, but God is the magnificent multitasker. We can’t overwhelm Him or bother Him. The instruction Paul gives us here is to take any request, concern, or worry to our Father, who is willing to listen and to give us peace.  Paul knew what he was talking about.  He wrote most of the New Testament not knowing whether the next day would be his last.  Essentially every day he spent in prison was on death row.  At someone’s instruction or even whim, he might have been taken out and executed. This eventually happened, but in the meantime, Paul wrote some of the most uplifting, encouraging, and beautiful words ever penned.  So as he wrote to the Philippians “to be anxious for nothing” and by extension is telling us “to be anxious for nothing,” he was illustrating the principle in his own life.

How do we present our concerns for ourselves or others to the Lord?  By prayer with thanksgiving.  If we present with thanksgiving, that reveals our trust in the Father.  We are thanking Him for whatever He will do, knowing that His will is perfect.  We don’t know what God will do.  Some prayers He cannot answer the way we might hope because there is an overall plan that cannot be thwarted  or it goes against His nature.  Some say that God can do anything, but that is not true.  He cannot lie or go against His nature. He cannot make a triangle with four sides, because that goes against His natural law. But within His plans there are many things that can be, and will be, adjusted according to our asking.  There are two major camps of thoughts out there when it comes to prayer, but I think both of them miss the point of the Philippians verse.  One group says the God is sovereign and everything  is planned out, so we puny humans have no say because we cannot change God’s mind.  The other group puts man in charge and if we request something, God must deliver because if we ask, He is bound by promise, to give us what we want.  In other words, on one side God is in charge and we don’t matter and in the other man is charge and God just waits for our instruction.  If these scenerios seem a little too simplified, they are, but they are, in essence, what many believe.  I believe neither of these extremes.

I believe that God is sovereign, because He is.  I believe prayer matters, because He says it does.  So the truth is our human understanding cannot understand what seems to be two diametrically opposed truths.  Since God never lies, these truths must be merged in such a way that both are true.  I believe there is a way that is actually understandable (somewhat) by our limited minds, but to go into that here would take much longer than a simple devotion (although I know some of these are very long!).  In one of the books that the apostle John gave us, he wraps up the sovereign nature of God and God’s desire to hear and meet our needs in one verse, “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and [that] your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you” (John 15:16)  See, God is in control, but He still listens to our requests.

The second part of today’s Philippians verse is so beautiful.  He will give us a  peace that passes all understanding.  When we go through trials God can give us the peace of knowing that He is there and that nothing escapes His sight.  The peace He gives is what the world can’t give.  All the self-help books, Dr. Phils and Oprahs can’t give that peace. True peace can only come through our Lord Jesus Christ. It is wonderful that the verse says He shall shall keep our hearts and minds. People today will say to follow our hearts or trust in our minds. But God’s peace shall keep them both at rest so that we may walk in truth not guided by them, but by the Word. In an earlier devotion I wrote that we cannot trust our hearts or minds because they will lead us astray, but instead we must be led by God’s Word.  With His peace through His truth we can be assured that we are not walking on our own whims or thoughts, but instead trusting in our Shepherd to “lead us by still waters.” (Psalm 23:2 ).

We need not worry because He is there for us.  The song says, “don’t worry, be happy,” but more fittingly is God’s Word that says, “Don’t worry, be content.”  I may not be happy about all things, but I can be at peace with all things because God says He will supply that peace- and I believe Him.