Hidden and Safe on Thankful Thursday

Firm Faith Needed

Lessons learned through remodeling continue to abound.  A faith firmly planted on God's Word is indispensable at times like this.  The mess is making me feel a little overwhelmed.  But, I know this "trial" is meant to teach me something. 


Redoing all the flooring on the whole main level of our home at one time might have been a little too much, though.

Reading my Bible this morning, I chewed on each verse and savored the meaning of one of my very favorite Psalms, Psalm 27.

For in the time of trouble

he shall hide me in his pavilion:

in the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide me;

he shall set me up upon a rock...

therefore will I offer in his tabernacle sacrifices of joy;

I will sing, yea, I will sing praises unto the LORD.

Psalm 27:5, 6

Now, I realize that this isn't really "trouble."  (Read this post, if you are going through a real trial.)  It's not like when I had cancer or anything.  But, sometimes blessings are more difficult "trials," because we think we should be "just fine."  In any case...


I am hidden.  Hidden away from harm.  I picture a turret (something like what Rapunzel must have lived in) within a fortress or castle.  Within that fortress, there is a tabernacle, and in that tabernacle, His tabernacle, I will be singing praises.


Throughout the day today my thoughts kept returning to that verse, and I would tell myself, "I am hidden away in His pavilion." And pondering the precious promise that I was ...safe.  Guarded.


It's easy to think when trials come, "I just have to get through this."  I don't want to just "get through" this project.  I want to ride high above the storm where all is calm.  It's not only this project.  There are 3 or 4 big things going on in my life--remodeling is only one of them--and that's about 2 too many.  Like a computer, when there are too many things required of my brain at once, it locks up.


Yesterday, my brain locked up.  Today was a better day, because of bathing my brain (and soul) with the promises of God.


It reminded me of John 15:7:

If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you,

ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.

Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit;

so shall ye be my disciples.

My deepest desire is that I will bear much fruit and be truly His disciple.

Visit Laurie at Women Taking a Stand to read other thankful hearts. Thanks, Laurie, for hosting this month!

Just on a side note, I'm hoping to be able to post my own videos on my blog in the future!  I've been not only learning heart lessons from the Lord, I've been learning new skills.  Today I learned how to edit a video using Windows Live Movie Maker.  Just the basics.  But I did it.  I don't know if I will post that one, but I have an idea for another one that I will definitely post.  So, be looking for a video soon!

"A Glimmer of Hope for Quake-Damaged Japan," Part 2

A young woman named Lisa Shoreland contacted me one day about the possibility of writing a guest post for my blog. Because of our family's connection to Japan through my husband's sister and her family having been missionaries there for the past 32 years, I was very interested to learn that Lisa grew up in Japan and her parents still live there. We have had many Japanese people in our home, and still correspond with a number of them, who we are blessed to consider our friends.  While Lisa and I were emailing back and forth, a momentous event crashed upon the world's consciousness:  a massive earthquake and tsunami hit Japan.  I knew that Lisa has a unique perspective on this event and I asked her to write a personal post.  I think you'll be touched and profoundly moved, as I was, by what she shares.  Thank you, Lisa. To read the first of this two-part guest post, go back first to Part 1, "A Glimmer of Hope for Quake-Damaged Japan."

Keep the Japanese people and the rescue workers in your prayers.

A look at the pictures or videos of the devastation is enough to bring a tear to any one's eye. In many, one can see a stretch of water--black with dirt and collecting a wall of debris--growing and growing until it moves entire houses and drowns crops and city streets. As a dual Japanese-American citizen, however, there's something about this that drives the number 18,000--the number of estimated dead--close to home.

I was born and raised close to fishing villages like the ones up north, at least one of which--Otsuchi--has lost over half of their population to the tsunami. I have felt a fraction of Mother Nature's wrath and dashed through the house after my two frenzied cats and cowered in my mother's and father's arms beneath a fortified doorway. For 18,000 people, such measures had not been enough.

A Culture of Community

My mother is a survivor of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima. She knows what it's like to grow up in a city where people are found shopping, attending school, or playing in the park one day and found dead the next.

She also knows that the Japanese are nothing if not resilient. The 350,000 people displaced in northeastern Japan will survive this with exceptional stoicism. Every day, they and citizens of nearby cities line up quietly and without complaint outside convenience stores to receive or buy food. Stores in the area have even slashed prices to help locals.

"Everyone is going through this together," my mother said over the phone one night. "This is no time for anyone to be making a buck. It would be shameful."

As with New Orleans after Katrina, the media crews that visit areas after natural disasters repeatedly cover a rise in lootings, crime, and even socio-political uprisings. There has been no such thing to cover in quake-damaged Japan.

"It's in our culture," my mother explained. "We have a history of valuing our community first and individual desires second. Many other cultures feel the opposite way. When disaster strikes, some people feel justified in 'getting theirs.' Japan has a shame culture, and nobody wants to feel the shame of looting a store or complaining about things being tough when everyone else is going through the same thing. We're taught that we are stronger when we hold together."

Not long after this call, I received word from Yasue that he had found his family. They were injured but alive in an evacuation center.

"We just have to work together," he said. "We're helping each other, and the world is helping us do it. In all this bleakness, that's our one glimmer of hope."

Bio:  Lisa Shoreland is currently a resident blogger at Go College, where recently she's been researching doctoral grants programs as well as poor credit student loans.  In her spare time, she enjoys creative writing, practicing martial arts, and taking weekend trips.

A Glimmer of Hope for Quake-Damaged Japan, Part 1

A young woman named Lisa Shoreland contacted me one day about the possibility of writing a guest post for my blog. Reading her sample writing, I learned that she is of Japanese descent and grew up in Japan.  Her parents are still there. While I considered her offer of a guest post and thought about a possible topic that would fit my blog, a momentous event crashed upon the world's consciousness:  a massive earthquake and tsunami hit Japan.  You will be touched and profoundly moved, as I was, by what Lisa has to share.  Please welcome Lisa, and come back Tuesday for Part 2 of "A Glimmer of Hope for Quake-Damaged Japan."  Thank you, Lisa, for sharing from your heart with us.

When I was 12, home alone one day after school while Mama had gone out grocery shopping, I heard the walls begin to groan around me in a low tremor--nothing unusual in Japan--but the tremor turned into an all-out rumble and my books began falling from their shelves.

My knees wobbled but I was unharmed when my panicked mother called.  I turned on the TV and saw that it had been a 7 magnitude earthquake, the strongest I'd experienced yet.

I wasn't in Japan the day a 9.0 struck off the east coast of Oshika Peninsula of Tohoku.  A mere bump of 2.0 magnitude destroyed highways, bridges, and homes, but its destruction wasn't as fearsome as that caused by the 10 meter (33 ft) high tsunami that struck less than 15 minutes afterward.


Rising Tides and Tension
I called home on Friday morning as soon as I heard about the quake.  My father frequently travels through Japan, sometimes as far up as Misawa, as part of his job with the U.S. military.  I began to wonder if he had been up north when the quake had struck.  I wondered if the tsunami had traveled as far south as Hiroshima, my hometown, and if my mother was evacuating my brother's seaside home for the mountains.  The longer the phone rang, the bigger the knot grew in my stomach.


It took seven hours, but my mother finally picked up. She had been asleep and my father, the lighter sleeper, had spent the night in his office in the nearby Marine Corps base, manning the phones while the disaster unfurled up north.  My brother, his wife, and their newborn child were safe in their home.


Closer to the Disaster
My childhood friend Yasue was not so lucky.  He lived in an apartment in Tokyo, where major power blackouts went on for days before he was able to respond to my frantic e-mail.  He was alive but scared, and his livelihood--the guitar he had played alongside famed bands on several Japanese TV programs--had been shattered beneath a fallen bookshelf in the quake.  Worst of all--worse than the radiation scares that even now have thousands of people stocking up on food or even leaving the city--was that his family had yet to call him.  They lived on the coast in Sendai, a city directly hit by the devastating tsunami.


A look at the pictures or videos of the devastation is enough to bring a tear to any one's eye.  In many, one can see a stretch of water--black with dirt and collecting a wall of debris--growing and growing until it moves entire houses and drowns crops and city streets.  As a dual Japanese-American citizen, however, there's something about this that drives the number 18,000--the number of estimated dead--close to home.


I was born and raised close to fishing villages like the ones up north, at least one of which--Otsuchi--has lost over half of their population to the tsunami.  I have felt a fraction of Mother Nature's wrath and dashed through the house after my two frenzied cats and cowered in my mother's and father's arms beneath a fortified doorway.  For 18,000 people, such measures had not been enough.

You can read Part 2 on Tuesday--Keep the Japanese people and the rescue workers in your prayers.


Bio:  Lisa Shoreland is currently a resident blogger at Go College, where recently she's been researching doctoral grants programs as well as poor credit student loans.  In her spare time, she enjoys creative writing, practicing martial arts, and taking weekend trips.

Spiritual Attack and Fretting (Part 2): Timely Tips on Tuesday

Read "Spiritual Attack and Fretting (Part 1)."

Reading from Psalms and Proverbs is excellent, but God never ceases to amaze me also by using whatever Scripture is on the schedule in my daily reading plan (I use the "Read Through the Bible in a Year" plan from Discipleship Journal) to speak directly to my heart and situation.

Help for Fretting

God also uses unique and personal ways to teach me and this is how He did it this time:

1. First, He reminded me that every time I feel truly overwhelmed, and am sure there's absolutely no way I can accomplish all I have to do, He answers my cry for help by removing some upcoming thing I've been fretting about. One or all of my responsibilities or scheduled events is canceled because of an illness, or weather, or something (e.g. "Major snowstorm shuts down all travel in Minnesota.") This has happened so often that I have almost come to expect it!  Which in some strange way has helped me not to worry!  What's to worry about if God is going to cancel everything before it happens anyway?!  But He had to remind me of this in my Quiet Time on Monday morning. Then, later in the day, He confirmed this rebuke of my fretting when He allowed my daughter to come down with strep throat! (Not that I'm rejoicing that my daughter got sick!) But, this canceled the event I'd been fretting about: dinner guests coming Wednesday night!
2. Then, on Tuesday, God sat me down and gave me a "talking-to"! And He used my very own words to do it, as I exhorted and encouraged a friend on the phone "to lean on the Lord, to trust Him to help her, to not grow weary in well-doing and to finish the course well and persevere."  Everything I needed to hear and do myself! In giving me the opportunity to help someone else, God helped me. (Isn't He wonderful?!) 
3. God finished off this lesson on fretting when He used the words of people close to me to humble me, and I felt very broken, but when I went to my knees before Him, I was now in a very teachable state, as I cried out to Him in prayer. I realized and remembered, there on my knees, that I have been asking for "grace" a lot lately, and that in the Bible, God says, "He giveth grace to the humble." ("But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble. Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you." James 4:6-7)  Instead of worrying and fretting, I needed to be humble and accept the grace that is mine through Christ, and believe that "I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me." (Philippians 4:13)  So, I thanked Him for the trials I had recently come through and the painful, humbling words I had just received, because they were the prerequisites for the grace that I'd been praying for and needed.

God was good to show me that He loves me, He has everything under control, and there's nothing to worry about!

Spiritual Attack and Fretting (Part 1): Timely Tips on Tuesday

Read "Spiritual Attack and Fretting (Part 2)".
We have had company staying with us for 10 days: my brother and nephew came a week ago Saturday, and then friends (a young couple with their 3-month-old baby) arrived last Wednesday and left this morning. My brother and nephew went to my sister's for the weekend, but came back yesterday and will be with us until Saturday. It's a little busy around here!


So, I decided this week I would re-post some articles which I have written in the past, which you may not have read, or if you have, contain messages which we need to be reminded of (me included!) and I think you will enjoy! I'll also try to post some photos throughout the week, as time permits. Please continue to comment, as I am checking my blog daily, and love the encouragement of your prayers and comments! I'm thinking about all of you and praying for you!

The following is an article I wrote last September, at a very, very busy time and one in which I was fighting spiritual attack and the temptation to fret and worry! Here is what God taught me during that time! (Thank You so much, Lord!)

"I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills,
from whence cometh my help.

My help cometh from the Lord,
which made heaven and earth."

Psalm 121:1

Sometimes I forget about spiritual attack.  I mean, I know it's there in a general sense.  But, sometimes I don't recognize it in my own life.  I don't see that that's what I'm experiencing.  ("For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places." Ephesians 6:12)

We should not be surprised when we experience an attack, especially after winning a spiritual victory or bearing much fruit. But we must remember that God is our helper and protector. And sometimes we're attacked just before God's going to use us in some important way.
 

Help in a Spiritual Attack

Our family can always expect attack when my husband is scheduled to preach. This week is no exception. (It's a reminder to me to pray for the families of our elders, who preach every week! My husband, not a full-time preacher, is filling in for Mr. T., whose son is getting married on Saturday.) I have also noticed that we can expect to be attacked in the very area about which my husband is preaching! Guess what subject he is preaching on?  Love. Yes, he is scheduled to preach on 1 Corinthians 13:  "the love chapter" of the Bible. The form that the attack has taken in my life is in discouragement, making me feel unloved by those closest to me, and feeling a failure in loving them. But, praise be to God, I have found great help in two ways:

• First, by going off to my bedroom (my "prayer closet"), shutting the door behind me, getting down on my knees next to my bed, and crying out to the Lord. This is a very important counter-attack. 

"What a Friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear,

what a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer.

Have we trials and temptations, is there trouble anywhere?

We must never be discouraged, Take it to the Lord in prayer."  

• Second, during a spiritual attack, I've found it is crucial to bathe myself in the Word of God.

It's very encouraging. Here are some passages that have helped me lately:

"As for me, I will call upon God; and the Lord shall save me. Evening, and morning, and at noon, will I pray, and cry aloud; and he shall hear my voice. He hath delivered my soul in peace from the battle that was against me..."

Psalm 55:16-18

"Trust in him at all times; ye people,

pour out your heart before Him;

God is a refuge for us. Selah."

Psalm 62:8
 

"Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord.

Lord, hear my voice:

let thine ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications.

I wait for the Lord, my soul doth wait,
and in His Word do I hope." 

Psalm 130:1-2, 5

"I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills,
from whence cometh my help.

My help cometh from the Lord,
which made heaven and earth.

He will not suffer thy foot to be moved:

he that keepeth thee will not slumber.

Behold, he that keepeth Israel
shall neither slumber nor sleep.

The Lord is thy keeper:
the Lord is thy shade upon thy right hand.

The sun shall not smite thee by day,
nor the moon by night.

The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil:
he shall preserve thy soul.

The Lord shall preserve thy going out
and thy coming in from this time forth,
and even forevermore."

Psalm 121

Looking To The World?

 In the Bible, "Egypt" is a figure of the "World," which is opposed to God's ways and the path of spiritual Truth and life.  Repeatedly, Israel is exhorted not to go back to "Egypt" or "the World" for its answers or help.  The Lord tells us to find our help in Him.  The world's "help" is really no help.  One reason that's true is because if the Spirit doesn't do the work, it's not eternal.  As I read these verses this morning, I couldn't help but relate what it says to the modern church today, and I encourage you to ask, "Is my church looking to God's Word for its answers, and for direction in everthing it does: what its vision should be, its activities or programs, what the services are like, what staff it has, etc., etc., etc. Are you, as a Christian, looking to God and His Word, as sufficient, to give answers to your problems, direct your life, and help in time of trouble?

Isaiah 30

 ¹Woe to the rebellious children, saith the LORD, that take counsel, but not of me; and that cover with a covering, but not of my spirit, that they may add sin to sin:

 ²That walk to go down into Egypt, and have not asked at my mouth; to strengthen themselves in the strength of Pharaoh, and to trust in the shadow of Egypt!

 ³Therefore shall the strength of Pharaoh be your shame, and the trust in the shadow of Egypt your confusion. 

⁷For the Egyptians shall help in vain, and to no purpose: therefore have I cried concerning this, Their strength is to sit still.

 ⁸Now go, write it before them in a table, and note it in a book, that it may be for the time to come for ever and ever:

 ⁹That this is a rebellious people, lying children, children that will not hear the law of the LORD:

 ¹⁰Which say to the seers, See not; and to the prophets, Prophesy not unto us right things, speak unto us smooth things, prophesy deceits:

 ¹¹Get you out of the way, turn aside out of the path, cause the Holy One of Israel to cease from before us.

 ¹²Wherefore thus saith the Holy One of Israel, Because ye despise this word, and trust in oppression and perverseness, and stay thereon:

 ¹³Therefore this iniquity shall be to you as a breach ready to fall, swelling out in a high wall, whose breaking cometh suddenly at an instant.

Isaiah 31 

¹Woe to them that go down to Egypt for help; and stay on horses, and trust in chariots, because they are many; and in horsemen, because they are very strong; but they look not unto the Holy One of Israel, neither seek the LORD!

What are you trusting in and relying on for your help?

Faith and Encouragement

“The Lord gets His best soldiers
out of the highlands of affliction.”
Charles Spurgeon

“Faith is deliberate confidence in the character of God

whose ways you may not understand at the time.”

Oswald Chambers 

"Should You Go First"

I mentioned in the last post that we are grieving, yet praying and trusting, as we learned recently that our dear friend's cancer has spread to many parts of her body.  I read this poem on a friend's site today, and I think it will comfort those who may be grieving today.

Should you go First

Should you go first and I remain
to walk the road alone
I'll live in memory's garden, dear
with happy days we've known
in Spring I'll wait for roses red,
when fades the lilacs blue,
in early fall, when brown leaves call
I'll catch a glimpse of you

Should you go first, and I remain
for battles to be fought,
each thing you've touched along the way
will be a hallowed spot
I'll hear your voice;
I'll see your smile,
though blindly I may grope
the memory of your helping hand
will buoy me on with hope

Should you go first and I remain
to finish with the scroll,
no length'ning shadows ahall creep in
to make this life seem droll
We've known so much of happiness
we've had our cup of joy,
and memory is one gift of God
that death cannot destroy

Should you go first and I remain,
one thing I'd have you do;
walk slowly down that long, lone path,
for soon I'll follow you
I'll want to know each step you take
that I may walk the same,
for some day down that lonely road
you'll hear me call your name

Author: A.K. Rowswell

"Strength To Meet My Trials Here"

We are grieving, yet praying and trusting, as we have learned very recently that the cancer present in our dear, dear friend, has spread to many parts of her body, and she is in intense pain. Separated by many miles, we cannot go to her, yet our prayers for her are heard by our loving Heavenly Father, and He answers.

I was comforted, even as I wept, by a post on More Than Conquerors, and the poem, "Should You Go First," and another post of hers on our anniversary, June 3, which included the hymn, Day by Day (see video below). Day by Day is a hymn that always touches me deeply, and in the valleys of my life, I have sung it back to the Lord many times. I have Swedish ancestry, and it was one of my grandmother's favorites hymns, this old Swedish tune. Because of Christ, "strength I find to meet my trials here..." is true today, as it was a hundred years ago (and a thousand years ago).

We have the promise that, if we trust in Christ's shed blood and resurrection to save us, we will see our loved ones once again, on the other side. For her, I cannot grieve because she will soon see her Beloved Savior face to face. How can one be sad when she will enjoy such joy!  I grieve only for those of us she will leave behind, and for the pain she suffers now on this side.  But she will (soon perhaps) be free from all pain and tears, and in eternal joy and peace.

1 Corinthians 15:1-6, 12-26:

 ¹Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand;

 ²By which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain.

 ³For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures;

 ⁴And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures:

 ⁵And that he was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve:

 ⁶After that, he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once; of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep. 

 ¹²Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead?

 ¹³But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen:

 ¹⁴And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain.

 ¹⁵Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ: whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not.

 ¹⁶For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised:

 ¹⁷And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins.

 ¹⁸Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished.

 ¹⁹If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.

 ²⁰But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept.

 ²¹For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead.

 ²²For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.

 ²³But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ's at his coming.

 ²⁴Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power.

 ²⁵For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet.

 ²⁶The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.

1 Corinthians 15:51-58:

"Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,

In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.

For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.

So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory.

O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?

The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law.

But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory

through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord."

How To Endure Trials: Manage It (No, Victorious in Christ) Monday

The Trials of Life 
Today is the 8th Anniversary of the day I had surgery to remove a football-size, cancerous tumor from my body, which was threatening my life. I had ovarian cancer (click on the link to read my testimony).  In the subsequent weeks following successful surgery, I received three rounds of chemotherapy, and then 24 weekly treatments of a lower dose of chemo, while participating in a voluntary scientific trial.  Following that time, I have had tests and checkups which have continued to declare me to be "cancer-free".  I am grateful to God today for life and health.
For me, this anniversary, and time of year, transports me back and I relive so many events from the past and I remember the feelings associated with that experience. For me, this is an emotional time.


Friendship 
Especially so, this year, on this anniversary, for we have just found out that our dear friend, who has battled breast cancer for 15 years, learned this week that her cancer has spread to all of her organs, and even broken a vertebrae in her back.  She is in intense pain.  I am deeply moved by my friend's situation, and concerned for them.  Our prayers go up to God for her and her family, and our thoughts are continually with them.  Yet, we give praise to God, for we don't want to withhold any of the praise and thanks that is due to the Lord, for another year of health in my life.


This morning, during my quiet time, feeling it might be helpful to listen to some solid Biblical teaching from an old familiar friend, I listened to the first sermon by John MacArthur, "Trouble to Triumph", in a series called "Benefiting From Life's Trials", a study from the book of James. (You, too, can listen free of charge to all of the sermons in the archives of John MacArthur's preaching.  You can also choose to download them onto your MP3 player, if you want, or read the transcripts. It's all free!  I enjoy hearing his voice and how he says what he says, so I like to listen through my computer.)


How Can a Christian Endure Trials?  
Quoting from the end of the sermon:
"How can a Christian practically endure trials? What is the practicality of trials? That's what James wants to hit.  It's not enough to say, 'I must persevere.' Tell me how! How do I persevere?
These are the pragmatic aspects to a persevering faith--several things are required:

• A Joyous Attitude, vs. 2:  "Count it all joy."
• An Understanding Mind, vs. 3: "Knowing this."
• A Submissive Will, vs. 4: "Let patience have her perfect work."  Let it do what it's gonna do.  Accepting it from the Lord, getting under it and learning what He wants you to learn.
• A Believing Heart:  Don't have wavering faith, vs. 6, but ask in true faith; vs. 8, don't be double-minded. A believing heart that never wavers in faith.
• Then in verses 9-11, A Humble Spirit, that is willing to accept anything.

The way to go through trials victoriously is with a joyous attitude, an understanding mind--perceiving the reality of the trial and the purpose in it; a submissive will--accepting it from the Lord, getting under it and learning what He wants you to learn; a believing heart--that never wavers in faith; and a humble spirit, that is willing to accept anything.



That's how you handle your trials."
(My goal was to strengthen myself in the Word and be encouraged; maybe it will do the same for you.  To listen to the rest of the series, click "trials".  You may also enjoy John MacArthur's series:  "7 Steps to Spiritual Stability" or other resources at www.gty.org)

"Thou shalt find thy hopes were just,

Jesus is my hope and trust."

Trials strengthen faith and trust, for the believer.  As I get older, I can look back and say, the Lord has been with me in the past through every trial, small and great, and He will be with me through whatever trials I'm going through now, or may have to go through in the future.  He is faithful. Rejoice with me and be glad. Trust in the Lord, for He is good.

Thankful Thursday: Thank You For Trials (and Rain)

Here in my midwestern city, we have had rain for days.  And though it's been cold, windy and depressing, we are very grateful, because it is an answer to prayer!  We needed it, and daily we measure just how much has come down.  The grass and trees are lush spring green, and growth is evident everywhere you look!

I couldn't help but wonder why I'm thankful, and even pray, for rain, but resist trials.

So, today I'm thankful for the trials we've experienced recently, though minor, that have caused me to lean on the Lord more and press in towards Him. I'm thankful for the obstacles to my objectives, my dreams not being realized in "my" timing, and even for strained relationships, friends forgetting about you, frustrations with choices that people are making, and people not living up to the good opinion you once had of them. Jesus experienced all of this.

"Lord, help me to be thankful for whatever You send--sun or rain, blessings or trials--knowing that both are needed in order for me to grow.  Help me to grow up spiritually, to be able to thank you for the trials--to even pray for them? Build up my spiritual muscle through standing firm while the winds blow against me. And let me be that man whose house stands in the storm, because I DO and not just HEAR the Word of God.  Amen."

Please visit Laurie at Women Taking a Stand to participate and read other thankful posts! Thanks, Laurie, for hosting this month!  (In June, Iris at Grace Alone, will be hosting.)