Friday Feb 18

From Morrison:
February 18


When the Spirit Is Overwhelmed
"My spirit is overwhelmed within me; my heart within me is desolate." Psa_143:4
There are some natures more prone than others to this overwhelming of the spirit, but it wouldn't be true to say that the peril is limited to temperament. Some of the last persons one would ever dream of are prone to this hopeless sinking of the heart. I would expect it in Jeremiah, that most tremulous of all the prophets; but in Elijah—that man of iron will—I would scarcely anticipate finding it. Yet in the life of Elijah came an hour when, plunged into the deeps, his prayer was that God would let him die. There are few things that men hide so well as this inner desolation.
Sometimes such an overwhelming feeling comes for reasons that are purely physical. This is the body of our humiliation, and we are fearfully and wonderfully made. I asked a friend only the other evening if she ever experienced an overwhelmed spirit, and she answered, "When I am very, very tired." Nothing is more delicate and subtle than the interaction of the body and the soul. Lack of faith is sometimes related to lack of health which should make us very tenderhearted and forbearing in judgment towards those who are never really well.
Sometimes we become overwhelmed through simple failure to do our duty. To shirk our God-appointed task is to court the presence of despair. When Christian and Hopeful were on the King's Highway, Giant Despair was never encountered. But when they got into By-path Meadow, then they fell into the giant's clutches. And whenever anybody leaves the King's Highway, sooner or later, but inexorably, "melancholy marks him for her own." To omit the task we know we ought to do, to shirk the duty of the hour and shun the cross, to refuse to lift the burden and put selfishness in place of service—all this, in this strange life of ours, is to head straight for the overwhelmed spirit.
Times of Darkness Are Not Times for Judgment
I should like, too, to add here that we should never pass judgment in overwhelming hours. Let a man accept the verdict of his Lord, but never the verdict of his melancholy. Hours come when everything seems wrong and when all the lights of heaven are blotted out, and how often, in such desolate hours, do we fall to judging the universe and God! It is part of the conduct of the instructed soul to resist that as a temptation of the devil. Such hours are always unreliable. The things that frighten us in the night are the things we smile at in the morning. We are like that traveler who in the fog thought he saw a ghost; when it came nearer, he found it was a man; and when it came up to him, it was his brother. Overwhelming times are times for leaning; God does not mean them to be times for judging. They are given to us for trusting; they are not given to us for summing up. Leave that till the darkness has departed and the dawn is on the hills, and in His light we see light again.
Indeed, the great need in overwhelming hours is the old, old need of trust in God. It is to feel, as the hymn has it, that we are "safe in the arms of Jesus." To be assured that God is love and that He will never leave us nor forsake us; to be assured that He knows the way we take and that His wings are folded over us all the time, that is the way to keeping a brave heart when everything is dark and desolate. Plunged into such depths, there is something even deeper. There is the love of God commended in the cross. Underneath are the everlasting arms. So we endure as seeing the invisible, and then (and often sooner than we expect) the day breaks and the shadows flee away.

From James Ryle:

February 18

The Triumphant Trudge

"They shall walk, and not faint.” (Isaiah 40:31)

Deep in the heart of every person is a passionate desire to know that he or she is fulfilling the purpose for which they have been placed here on this earth. Have you found it? Found that one thing that is worthy of your one life?

Dwight D. Eisenhower said, "We succeed in life as in war, only as we are able to identify a single, over-riding objective, and then bend all other considerations to that one thing." What one thing overrides all other considerations in your life? What noble purpose has captured your spirit? What deep resolve beats in your heart? What great decision has won your full allegiance in life?

Assuming that you have indeed found it, let me now ask — how's it going? If you've been at it for any appreciable length of time then you know by now that the journey is no cake walk. It is not a stroll through the park on a blissful Sunday afternoon. No. The path has many turns – up turns and down turns, ditches on both sides, potholes aplenty, and mounds of debris inconveniently strewn all about.

There are setbacks that stall you, and obstacles that intimidate you. There are bystanders that deride you, backsliders that dismay you, and back-stabbers that dishearten you. There are days when you walk with a company of passionate pilgrims who buoy your spirit with renewed aspiration, and then there are the days when you walk the lonesome valley all by yourself. Alone.

You, my friend, are on the Triumphant Trudge! To trudge, according to Webster, is "to walk steadily, and sometimes laboriously; but ever onward." Isaiah's poetry says it best, "They shall walk, and not faint." That is, they shall not tire though the way at times be wearisome.

This will always be the case in every soul who follows Christ up Calvary's mountain. Despite the trudge of each deliberate step, an unmistakable tone of triumph attends their every move – for each move is always onward, and ever upward. And the Lord who has gone victorious before us will welcome us with open arms on the day we cross over the finish line.

And from Charles Spurgeon:

Morning

“Shew me wherefore thou contendest with me.”

- Job_10:2

Perhaps, O tried soul, the Lord is doing this to develop thy graces. There are some of thy graces which would never be discovered if it were not for thy trials. Dost thou not know that thy faith never looks so grand in summer weather as it does in winter? Love is too often like a glow-worm, showing but little light except it be in the midst of surrounding darkness. Hope itself is like a star-not to be seen in the sunshine of prosperity, and only to be discovered in the night of adversity. Afflictions are often the black foils in which God doth set the jewels of his children’s graces, to make them shine the better. It was but a little while ago that on thy knees thou wast saying, “Lord, I fear I have no faith: let me know that I have faith.” Was not this really, though perhaps unconsciously, praying for trials?-for how canst thou know that thou hast faith until thy faith is exercised? Depend upon it, God often sends us trials that our graces may be discovered, and that we may be certified of their existence. Besides, it is not merely discovery, real growth in grace is the result of sanctified trials. God often takes away our comforts and our privileges in order to make us better Christians. He trains his soldiers, not in tents of ease and luxury, but by turning them out and using them to forced marches and hard service. He makes them ford through streams, and swim through rivers, and climb mountains, and walk many a long mile with heavy knapsacks of sorrow on their backs. Well, Christian, may not this account for the troubles through which thou art passing? Is not the Lord bringing out your graces, and making them grow? Is not this the reason why he is contending with you?

“Trials make the promise sweet;

Trials give new life to prayer;

Trials bring me to his feet,

Lay me low, and keep me there.”

I certainly can't say it any better about the trials I'm going through now.  

Lord, Almighty God, bless me with Your Grace to have hope and to build my faith and strengthen my resolve to serve you more each day.

In Jesus's Holy Name, amen