Gospel.com Blog

Earlier this week, Chris wrote about his reaction to a major disappointment in his personal life. He talked about his frustration with unfriendly “neighbors” and his efforts to replace that frustration with prayer and love.

Today’s devotional at Lifetime Guarantee Ministries, written by the late Anabel Gillham, deals with a very similar situation. Think about the last time you encountered a serious setback or disappointment in your life. How did you react? Anabel, reflecting on a huge personal disappointment that caught her by surprise, lays out the different ways we can respond in such a situation:

Well, we have options. (1) Go in the bathroom, close the door and cry hard. Wait. (2) Go to your room and collapse on the bed feeling like you’ve just been hit by a truck. Wait. (3) Retaliate and cause bigger problems. Wait. (4) Stuff it and feed your ulcer. Wait. (5) Tell yourself the truths that we’ve learned together and make yourself listen! He is with me. He loves me. He can handle this (I sure can’t!) He is with me. He loves me. He can handle this–one hand tied behind His back. Wait. (6) Get busy. Whistle while you work or sing while you suffer. (I whistle. My singing leaves a lot to be desired.) Wait. (7) Do something nice for someone. All the while fixing your thoughts on those things that are true and good and right. Think about things that are pure and lovely. Dwell on the fine, good things in others. Think about all you can praise God for and be glad about. Not just one time–over and over and over, etc. Wait. (8) Ask Him to tell you what to do. Ask Him to give you His thoughts on how to handle this unexpected crisis–and listen. Wait. (9) Thank Him for taking care of this crucial episode that burst into your life quite unexpectedly–having one goal–to incapacitate you or destroy you! Wait. (10) Go back to #5 and do it all over again.

I am presuming that you caught the word, “wait?” Spewing out those impulsive, angry, defensive, hurtful words on the tip of your tongue–no! Regurgitating rash, condemning statements to anyone around you–no! God tells us, “Be angry–but sin not. Meditate in your heart upon your bed, and be still” which means wait (Psalm 4:4).

Obviously, there are many different ways to respond to life crises, and different situations call for different responses. But whatever the response, it’s important that we not sin by acting rashly and emotionally. The next time you’re insulted, disappointed, or provoked, don’t indulge your instinctive reaction. Wait.

Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for him; do not fret when people succeed in their ways, when they carry out their wicked schemes. —Psalm 37:7

Whoever is patient has great understanding, but one who is quick-tempered displays folly. —Proverbs 14:29

Is it possible to exhaust God’s patience? What would it take to make God wash his hands of us completely? In this devotional from Lifetime Guarantee Ministries, Anabel Gillham looks at Biblical examples of people who put God’s patience to the test… only to find that God’s love for us is greater yet:

Can we disappoint God to the degree that He will finally say, “That’s it!” and just give up on us? I don’t think so. The children of Israel did a lot of things that disappointed God and He disciplined them for their folly but He never disowned them. David, although we sing his praises and consider him to be one of the Bible “greats,” really got into an awful mess with Bathsheba and God still called David, “A man after God’s own heart.” Peter denied the Lord but the Lord gave him another chance—which Peter took. I love the picture of Peter throwing his tunic on to cover himself then jumping into the water and running to see Jesus (John 21:6-7). It’s pretty difficult to find a well-known Biblical character that has a perfect record.

And we analyze ourselves and remember all the wrong steps we have taken’and ask, “Does His patience never, ever give out?” Yes, but losing His patience with us will never ever result in our being separated from Him. That just won’t happen. Most of us have had children who disappointed us, but we never ceased to be their parent. His patience doesn’t wane because of our errant ways, our sinful lifestyle, or our poor performance.

Read the full devotional at Lifetime Guarantee Ministries.

Our sins can frustrate, anger, and disappoint God. But the one thing they cannot do is negate His desire to see us redeemed and restored through Jesus Christ.

Do you ever worry that your sin or rebellion has caused God to completely abandon you? Have you experienced God’s forgiveness even after you were sure He had given up on you?

At the heart of the Golden Rule is reciprocity: when we do good, others will do good back to us. In a perfect world, we’d all be falling over ourselves trying to out-serve one another, but the reality is that many people are simply uninterested in doing good to each other. It’s enough to harden even the softest of hearts.

Have you ever tried to practice the Golden Rule on someone who isn’t interested in doing the same? They ignore or berate you for your friendly gestures and acts of service. It’s sometimes all you can do to not do anything negative, let alone something good.

Pastor Henning of Lutheran Hour Ministries writes in this devotional about the Golden Rule from God’s perspective. Even on our “good” days, we’re still sinful people deserving of punishment. Despite this, God offers us unending grace. While we might snap at someone for slightly inconveniencing us, God patiently endures even our worst sins. We should be thankful that he does:

When commenting on a number of the commandments, Martin Luther explains that we should treat others as we want to be treated, be it our brother or sister, father or mother, our co-worker, our neighbor, or our pastor. Now while this is a useful guide for how sinful human beings should reciprocate toward one another, it doesn’t quite capture the way a perfectly just God deals with us.

If God’s response to us was in keeping with our conduct toward Him — even on our best behavior — we wouldn’t stand a chance. His justice is beyond human comparison; it is perfect, absolute, and incapable of being satisfied by our efforts or best intentions. When we treat God with disrespect, or neglect Him and His Word, He is still patient with us. When we go out of our way to sin and scorn the very relationship we have with Him, He is still forgiving — ever ready and willing to draw us back into a genuine and healthy fellowship with Himself.

Rather than retribution, God offers grace — the unending and undeserved fount of love and forgiveness shown to mankind through the sacrificial offering of His Son, Jesus Christ, upon the cross. “For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Jesus Christ, who gave Himself as a ransom for all men …” (1 Timothy 2:5-6a).

Read the rest of the devotional at Lutheran Hour Ministries.

How do you enact the Golden Rule in your life? What does it mean to you to accept God’s gift of grace?

We’re well into Lent, but Easter remains several weeks away. Does it ever feel like Easter approaches at a glacial pace?

At A Slice of Infinity, Margaret Manning observes that Easter certainly does “take its time” in arriving—and that God tends to unveil his plans and purposes at a measured pace very much at odds with that of our frantic, always-busy modern lives. She contrasts our frenzied schedules with the pace of God’s revelation in the Bible:

The lives depicted in the Bible couldn’t be more different from our hurried lives. More importantly, and perhaps to our great frustration, the God revealed in the biblical stories is rarely in a hurry. Abraham and Sarah, for example, received the promise of an heir twenty-five years before they actually laid eyes on Isaac. Joseph had a dream as a seventeen year old young man that his brothers would one day bow down to him. Yet it was countless years and many difficulties later that his brothers would come and kneel before him, asking for food. Moses was eighty years old—long past his prime of life—when God appeared to him in the burning bush and called him to deliver the children of Israel. David was anointed king by Samuel as a young boy tending his father’s flocks, long before he finally ascended to the throne. And Jesus spent thirty years in relative obscurity, not involved in public ministry, and only three years announcing the kingdom and God’s rule in his life and ministry.

From our perspective, it is difficult to understand why God wasn’t more in a hurry rushing to accomplish the plans and purposes, not only in these individuals’ lives, but also in the plan of redemption. The Messiah was prophesied hundreds of years before he actually arrived on the scene. We cannot help but ask why God seems to move so slowly?

Read the full devotional at A Slice of Infinity.

“Why does God move so slowly?” “How long, oh Lord?” They’re familiar cries, uttered by people waiting for an answer to a desperate prayer or wishing that God would resolve a problem sooner rather than later. But the Bible—and the long slow march to Easter—can help us to understand God’s deliberate timing, and the value of patience and contentment. The promise of Easter may be a long time coming—but it will arrive!