Do our prayers really affect the plan of God? If He really is sovereign, how can He allow His sovereign plans to be affected by our prayers? Greater minds than mine have honestly grappled with these questions, and they came up with mutually exclusive answers. I am not able to plumb the depths of how the sovereignty of God and the free will of man can both exist and do not infringe on each other. However, this is clear. God had determined that Hezekiah’s time on earth was done. He warned Hezekiah through Isaiah. Hezekiah immediately pled with God for healing. God immediately sent Isaiah back to heal him. Apparently, our prayers do somehow make a difference in the sovereign plan of God.
Maybe we should be careful about how we pray. Hezekiah lived another 15 years. He accomplished two things in those 15 years. Neither was good for the nation. 1) He became proud about the position the Lord had given him. So, he showed it all off, especially to the Babylonian ambassador. He did not brag about what God had done, but about what God had given him. 2) He fathered Manasseh and failed to bring him up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. Manasseh was arguably Judah’s most morally corrupt and worst king. If Hezekiah had not prayed and received those requests, would the nation have been better off? Would God’s plan of showing the world the failure of the law been accomplished?
Part of the glory of God is that somehow He assigns the working of His sovereign plan to our participation with Him in prayer. That participation can result in either good or bad, but ultimately His plan is accomplished. That amazes me. Indeed we serve a glorious King. Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john
Psalm 127
As a freshman in college, I was taking too many classes, working too many hours and involved in too many activities. The combination resulted in too little sleep. I would study up on the fourth floor of the library in the religion section. Occasionally the Campus Crusade for Christ staff would have their morning devotions there. Frequently I would fall asleep at my study desk. On one of those occasions I awoke with a handwritten note on my open text book. It simply read, “It is vain for you to rise up early, To sit up late, To eat the bread of sorrows; For so He gives His beloved sleep.”—Psalm 127:2. It was signed by one of the CCC staff women. I was confronted with the practical fact that it is the glory of the Lord to give his children sleep. If I order my life so that I am not getting enough sleep and that happens on a continual basis, then it demonstrates that I really do not trust that He will provide for me in such a way so that I will plan to take the sleep that is needed for good health. I wish I could say that I learned my lesson then. I had to relearn that lesson in seminary. As my age is catching up with me, I think that the Lord is forcing me to learn that lesson. I can no longer keep the schedules I used to keep and remain buoyant.
There is a similar lesson to be learned in relation to making the Lord the center of our families or cities. It is the glory of the Lord to provide the grace to build into our children’s lives. I really believe that some form of consistent reading of the word as parents with children is a necessary ingredient for allowing the Lord to build our families. Where else can our children see the glory of the Lord except when we read them diligently to our children, and talk of them when we sit in our houses, when we walk by the way, when we lie down, and when we rise up. Somehow they have to hear the word and see it lived out in our lives. It has to be something that God accomplishes. He does everything through His Spirit and His Word. That is how He shows His glory! Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john
MICAH 7
A couple of weeks ago, my sister had been going through some stuff at mom’s house and came across some pictures and gave some of them to me. One was of Laura and me as we sang at my sister’s wedding, which was 2 weeks before Laura and I married. As I looked at the picture and thought of our years together, I am reminded of how beautiful my wife is. I am blessed with an excellent wife. At the writing of this meditation, we have been married 38 years, 5 months and 3 days. Most of the time when there is tension in our marriage, it is mostly my fault. I’ve done a little marriage counseling in my 30 years of pastoral ministry. I’ve met a few men who couldn’t trust their wives, rightfully so. I’ve met even more women who rightfully couldn’t trust their husbands. I’ve been an observer of the pain they have inflicted upon each other, and I’ve wished I had a magic wand that could wash away the pain. I am proud of my wife. We are now approaching the last stretch of our lives, if not already in it. One might say that now is the harvest, and we have the privilege of gleaning the years of labor which produced the fruit around us. We have two married children, five living grandchildren, one son to be married soon, two other unmarried children, one of which is still in our home. We have good relationships together. One might say that it is a good harvest that we are beginning to enjoy and hope to have many more years of enjoying it.
Micah looks at the relationship between Israel and the LORD. He compares it to a harvest of summer fruit. Fruit was that last harvest of the year before winter came. It was supposed to be a time of great rejoicing for the abundance produced by the year’s labor. If the proper mix of tending the soil, the vines and trees, rain, etc. were faithfully executed during the year, then one would normally expect a good harvest. If one or more of the elements were missing the harvest would be proportionally decreased. Micah says,
Woe is me! For I am like those who gather summer fruits, like those who glean vintage grapes; there is no cluster to eat of the first-ripe fruit which my soul desires.
There is nothing to eat, no harvest for the fall, no dried fruit for the winter. It will be a very lean time, if he doesn’t starve to death. What is the fruit for which he is looking? It is faithfulness, faithfulness among brothers, faithfulness between the governed and the governors, faithfulness with friends, faithfulness between husbands and wives, faithfulness in families and ultimately faithfulness to the LORD. Now what does he find when the harvest has come? Nothing, he is left empty, and winter is coming. What does he do?
Micah determines that He will wait upon the Lord. The lack of faithfulness is due to years of sowing unfaithfulness to the LORD. Can it be remedied? Israel is like an unfaithful wife to the Lord. She has sown a summer of unfaithfulness. What can be done? At this point the only thing that can be done is to cast oneself upon the mercy of the LORD. What hope does Micah find there?
18 Who is a God like You,I hope I have been as faithful to the LORD as my wife has been to me. But what if I haven’t? We have such a merciful God, but why do we waste the spring and summers of our lives in unfaithfulness to Him? It is His mercy to forgive us and cast our sins into the depths of the sea, but when the harvest comes, we still must live with the consequences of a lack of diligence in the spring and summer. Never-the-less I am thankful for His pardon. I delight in His mercy. I bask in his compassion. I revel in His subjugation of my iniquity! Indeed, we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
Pardoning iniquity
And passing over the transgression of the remnant of His heritage?
He does not retain His anger forever,
Because He delights in mercy.
19 He will again have compassion on us,
And will subdue our iniquities.
You will cast all our sins
Into the depths of the sea.
--Pastor john
Hebrews 4
Well now if Jesus is able to give me victory over sin, what is the mechanism by which we claim His victory? Jesus uses His word, His Spirit and our faith. As we combine these three, we enter into His faithfulness and rest in our struggle against sin. Jesus’ word, partially given by Moses, is taken by His Holy Spirit and reveals the deepest issues and sins in our lives that need to be removed. He sees into every nook and cranny of our lives. But He does so to act as a High Priest not as a judge. As our sin is revealed our first inclination is to run and hide our sin from God, others and even ourselves. That is what the nation of Israel did at Kadesh Barnea, when they refused to enter the Promised Land.
But we have a High Priest in Jesus who can sympathize with our weaknesses. We should not run from our sin but rather bring it to our High Priest. After all He was tempted in every point just as we are and He felt the full force of that temptation. Yet, He triumphed and did not sin. He triumphed and died and rose again for our sin. When His Holy Spirit reveals our sin through His word, we must deal with that sin by coming to His throne of grace obtaining His mercy and grace and the empowerment and provision for overcoming temptation through the filling of His Holy Spirit. It is obtained by faith. He is compassionate toward us and gives us His victory! Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john
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