In these dark days, we’re not only going to need faith to stand firm until the end. We’re going to need the key ingredient of patience. And patience will only come through an intimate knowledge of God. When we know Him intimately, we will be sure of His faithfulness. And He who is faithful is able to keep us.
Photo Credit: Autumn Farm | With harvesting ongoing as we shot. | Martin Cathrae …
When we’re going through fiery trials, it can be a challenge to maintain a heart of gratitude. Giving thanks in difficult times may be the hardest thing we’re asked to do, and yet it is the very thing that will help lift the burden of a heavy heart.
Photo Credit: File:Autumn Mist by the Lake.JPG – Wikimedia Commons
If you feel far from God, ask him to open your eyes to see the open door he has set before you. Pray for strength to stop running far in the wrong direction—to turn from where you are and to return to the God who knows you, loves you, and has the power to set you free.
Photo Credit: File:The ruined Tyn Llan viewed through the open door of the …
Sometimes we live under the notion that we’re stranded—stuck behind a door that’s slammed in our face, when all along that door would open with the slightest nudge. In fact, it’s already open, we just don’t see it. We may feel abandoned by God, but truly he’s made a way for us to be close to him. It says so in his word: “he devises ways to bring us back when we have been separated from him” (2 Samuel 14:14).
Our apartment was unusually quiet for a miraculous thirty seconds. I was in the living room, basking in the glorious silence when my puppy started scratching against the bedroom door, whimpering. When I’m home, she doesn’t like to be apart from me, even for one minute. Didn’t she know I’d left the door open for her?
Forcing myself to my feet, I trudged down the hallway to see what the problem was. Somehow, the once wide-open door had closed to a crack. If my puppy had been resourceful enough, she could have used her nose or paw to nudge her way through. Instead, she sat there, helpless—staring me down with those puppy-dog eyes as though I’d abandoned her.
Sometimes, we live under the notion that we’re stranded—stuck behind a door that’s slammed in our face, when all along that door would open with the slightest nudge. In fact, it’s already open—we just don’t see it. We may feel abandoned by God, but truly he’s made a way for us to be close to him. It says so in his word: “he devises ways to bring us back when we have been separated from him” (2 Samuel 14:14).
When God sent his son Jesus to die for us, he made a way for us to be reconciled to him. If we feel far from him, it’s not because he hasn’t made a way for us—it’s because we haven’t walked through the door he opened for us. Ravi Zacharias put it most eloquently, “I think the reason we sometimes have the false sense that God is so far away is because that is where we have put him.” God is only as far as we’ve run from him.
If you feel far from God, ask him to open your eyes to see the open door he has set before you. Pray for strength to stop running far in the wrong direction—to turn from where you are and to return to the God who knows you, loves you, and has the power to set you free.
Father, as you have promised…use all that is intended for evil and bring forth good. If anything, use the horrific events of our day to awaken within us an awareness of the brevity of life. Turn our attention to things of eternal consequence. I pray we’d no longer expend our existence on what will waste away. Instead, let us use the short time we have here on this earth to invest in things which will last forever.
Photo Credit: Free photo: Wood Bench, Pond, Autumn, Fall – Free Image on Pixabay …
This Life & Beyond 
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