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Glory Seed Devotional’s, 2017: Anticipating and Experiencing Jehovah-Jireh...
A BIGGER than life God...
Shalom!
If it weren’t for problems life would be boring! I’m not sure anyone will agree with me, and to tell the truth I am not sure I agree with myself. There is however one thing I am sure of, problems makes life interesting. Author Jim Stovall in his book “The Ultimate Gift” gives us a great deal to think about when it comes to experiencing life’s little bumps we call problems. “If we are not allowed to deal with small problems, we will be destroyed by slightly larger ones. When we come to understand this fact, we live our lives not avoiding problems, but welcoming them as challenges that will strengthen us so that we can be victorious in the future.” (Jim Stovall. The Ultimate Gift: A Novel, The Ultimate Gift Series page 71. David C. Cook. Kindle Edition.
It would be great if somewhere in that paragraph (or in the book) he could have squeezed a few words about small problems, larger problems, and huge problems going away so we could have problem free lives. But from what I’ve read without problems we’d become weaker and weaker and weaker. I agree with what Stovall says up to a point but what if a problem pops up that is anything but small, like one day waking up in an ICU following quadruple coronary artery bypass surgery and not having any heart problems up to that point. Or one day you are told your youngest child has been hit with a debilitating condition that will in all likelihood create numerous big to huge problems for the rest of their (and your) life? Having said that there’s a story in the Old Testament that speaks about our attitude toward seemingly big to huge problems.
“But the other men who had explored the land with him disagreed. “We can’t go up against them! They are stronger than we are!” So they spread this bad report about the land among the Israelites: “The land we traveled through and explored will devour anyone who goes to live there. All the people we saw were huge. We even saw giants there, the descendants of Anak. Next to them we felt like grasshoppers, and that’s what they thought, too!”” (Numbers 13:31–33, NLT, emphasis mine)
Have you ever felt like a “grasshopper” against “giants”? I know I have, I was the one who woke up in ICU following heart surgery. But over and over as I began my recovery words I had heard or read before kept going through my mind, “Don’t tell God how big your problems are, tell your problems how BIG your God is!” And it worked! Somehow God whittled at that BIG problem until today it’s only a concern to me.
And now for the rest of the story, which by the way is the rest of our story as well. “Two of the men who had explored the land, Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh, tore their clothing. They said to all the people of Israel, “The land we traveled through and explored is a wonderful land! And if the Lord is pleased with us, he will bring us safely into that land and give it to us. It is a rich land flowing with milk and honey. Do not rebel against the Lord, and don’t be afraid of the people of the land. They are only helpless prey to us! They have no protection, but the Lord is with us! Don’t be afraid of them!”” (Numbers 14:6–9, NLT)
Got a BIG problem? Take it to a BIGGER than life God and let Him whittle it down to size!
“So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most.”**
Grace and PEACE,
Gary
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“Scripture quotations marked NLT are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.”
**Hebrews 4:16, NLT