Influential Ink

Who wants to come home to a place of despair? At the end of the day, home should be the place where we are most safe; the place where defenses are secure and the place where we can rest in utter peace, knowing that the walls will never be breached. Yet for many in this upside-down and dizzy world, the opposite is true. And I guess it’s because the Master isn’t home.

As a little girl, home was a strange place when Dad was on a trip. Fragmented somehow. He wasn’t coming home that day so we wouldn’t be hearing his footsteps at the door. We wouldn’t hear his voice. The house didn’t seem as safe. And isn’t it the same when there is no risen Christ? Perhaps an empty heart doesn’t really know what is wrong—but something is wrong all the same.

So the one who sets our spiritual house back in order is the ascended Christ. But here’s the next question: He chose to make our disastrous hearts His home—what must it be like for Him to live there? He is forever grieved by our choices and pained by our actions. He is blasphemed by our words and denied His rights as Master—and yet…and yet…He stays.

At the end of the day, the Christian always has a safe haven in Christ. A place to call home. But I wonder—have we bothered to make it a home for Him?

The Lord is my shepherd—my protector, provider and friend. For that reason, I will never find myself without food in my cupboard, without money to pay my bills, without proper clothes, or without the tools and means to do my job. In fact, I will often find myself with more than I can use. And while providing all this He will not neglect the needs of my soul, but will restore me again and again, strengthening me, growing me, making my spirit rise from a sapling to a cedar.

Even though there will be days without sunlight, days of pain, days filled with circumstances which I would consider to be less than ideal, I never have excuse to despair because I am not—nor ever will I be—alone. You, Lord, are with me. You walk beside me and hold my hand, warding off my attackers, bringing me back when I wander off, giving me sustenance on my journey out of food from Your own stores. I may find my path to lead me directly through the enemy camp, but not only do You protect me from the danger, but You invite my enemies to share in Your grace—and make them my allies.

I am blessed beyond any means of measure I could use. You are so extravagant that I cannot even describe it all. And I know that will be true until You bring me Home. And from then on, unfathomable blessing will surround me because you aren’t just taking me to a final destination, but to Your Home. Your House. The place where I am not a guest, but family. And there, Father, will I stay with You forever.

~Psalm 23

On Sundays, I have a Bible study with a dear friend who is old in years but young in the Gospel. And today, we talked about Samson.

No longer able to hold her own Bible, I read her mine aloud. Sometimes we have to pause over verses to explain what’s going on, sometimes they just need repeating due to her long-used sense of hearing. She had never heard the story all the way through, though. We talked through Samson’s sin; his great gifts from God; his victories; his defeats. But it was the ending of the story and of Samson’s life that amazed her.

Judges 16

²⁷Now the house was full of men and women; and all the lords of the Philistines were there; and there were upon the roof about three thousand men and women, that beheld while Samson made sport.

²⁸And Samson called unto the LORD, and said, O Lord God, remember me, I pray thee, and strengthen me, I pray thee, only this once, O God, that I may be at once avenged of the Philistines for my two eyes.

²⁹And Samson took hold of the two middle pillars upon which the house stood, and on which it was borne up, of the one with his right hand, and of the other with his left.

³⁰And Samson said, Let me die with the Philistines. And he bowed himself with all his might; and the house fell upon the lords, and upon all the people that were therein. So the dead which he slew at his death were more than they which he slew in his life.

“That was beautiful,” she told me. And you know what? She’s right. Samson is not a lovely story because of a great hero—a truly Herculean man.The story of Samson is lovely—beautiful–because of the grace of God. The grace of God that gives one more chance every time we ask.

“Most of us develop our Christianity along the lines of our own nature, not along the lines of God’s nature.

Walking on water is easy to someone with impulsive boldness, but walking on dry land as a disciple of Jesus Christ is something altogether different.

We do not need the grace of God to withstand crises–human nature and pride are sufficient for us to face the stress and strain magnificently. But it does require the supernatural grace of God to live twenty-four hours of every day as a saint, going through drudgery, and living an ordinary, unnoticed, and ignored existence as a disciple of Jesus. It is ingrained in us that we have to do exceptional things for God–but we do not. We have to be exceptional in the ordinary things of life, and be holy on the ordinary streets, among ordinary people–and this is not learned in five minutes.”

~Oswald Chambers