But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. Genesis 6:8  But.... This word pervades scripture.  Some terrible situation prevails, but...God does something else.  We must always seek the "but" that God wants for us.  So many people stop before the "but." They give up on faith.  They commit suicide, or they despair and live a life of  depression and sadness.  How do we initiate this "but?" By seeking the Lord and His goodness.  He is always wanting to give us a "but."  

Before every "but" is a stop, a period or a comma.  It's a pause before God makes a "but."  A period seems to be an end, but given to God can be the beginning of an entirely different thought.  A comma leaves us hanging, waiting for the "but."  Still God is working.  

Think of what was going on in Noah's life.  The world was being destroyed on the scale of the movie "2012," but because Noah believed, he found grace and became one of the greatest "buts" in history.  The thief on the cross was a "but."  Mary Magdalene and Peter were "buts." Most of the saints of scripture were "buts."   The Lord can make anyone a "but" if they just seek His face in their time of complaint.

Obedience and Life vs. Despair and Death

Obedience vs. despair.  Life vs. death.  This is ultimately the lesson of our lives.  When it's just too hard to go on, you must die to yourself and your own answers, your own paths, your own dreams and seek Him even in the darkness.  I think this is part of what fasting is all about.  You are setting aside a real felt desire to seek Him.  Every time you feel that desire, you must seek Him to overcome the temptation.

When does God bow down?

Psalm 86:1 states, "Bow down thine ear, O Lord, hear me: for I am poor and needy." The God of the universe is seen here bowing down. The infinite creator and Lord is seen humbling Himself to someone. But to whom does he bow down? The great and important? The beautiful and famous?The wealthy and educated? No, God bows down to no one except the poor and needy. Those that cry out to him. Those that humble themselves to Him. When a sinful and desperate person falls on his face before Him, the Lord of Hosts bows down to listen to his faintest whisper of longing.

The arrogant and proud and disbelieving are met with a King on a throne of judgment. This is the God that they fear. The contrite and poor in spirit only have the privilege of seeing God bow down to them in love, and forgiveness, and mercy.

One thing is needful: you must bow down to Him for Him to bow down to you.

God With Us

In the New Testament the first time we see the word "God" it is not in an ethereal spiritual atmosphere. The first time we're told of God, a woman is going through labor in a stable amidst cows and sheep and dung and smells. God is with us in the midst of our greatest pain, and when all around is darkness and inconvenience. Where many would want to keep the God of the universe out among the stars, He chooses to immerse Himself in the dirt and difficulty of the common world. God reveals Himself as Emmanuel; He reveals Himself as being with us. Even though God transcends all problems, He is intimately involved in every aspect of our lives no matter how distasteful.
Of all the people that God could have preserved from going through trials, why wouldn't he Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, the Holy Family? And of all the ways God could have come into the world, why would he come as the weakest of creatures, a human infant, completely vulnerable and without power? It is His desire to experience the fullness of our humanity, not our sin, but our suffering, our limitations, and our longing for the infinite. The immensity of God the Father is with us in Jesus Christ and His Holy Spirit. The question remains: Are you with Him?

Isaiah 12

"And in that day thou shalt say, O Lord, I will praise thee; though thou wast angry with me, thine anger is turned away, and thou comfortedst me." I have been going through a hard valley in the past several months, and my faith has been tested sorely. I have wondered why when one is trying to live their life for the Lord, the sins of others can completely undermine their walk so that they nearly despair of all joy. I have had to lay someone very precious at the feet of Jesus not knowing if they will ever return to me.

I believe that occassionally the Lord will ask a sacrifice from us. Oh, not a sacrifice for sin. That has already been done in Jesus on the cross. This is a sacrifice of our heart and our love laid down in willingness because we want the Lord "more than these." When he takes us through the valley of sacrifice, he knows there will be tears, and anger, and sadness, but he also knows that at the end of the valley, if we continue to walk, there is hope in joining him "in that day." He sees something in us unlike His holy being and it must go. Then he meets us on the road of our life where he holds out his hand into which he wants us to place that which is so precious to us. We shout "No, this is mine, you cannot have this!" And he just calmly, patiently waits while we cry and despair and thrash. And finally in a heap at his feet we give it up. And when we finally do, their is comfort far greater than the thing we cherished could ever give to us. That comfort is union with Jesus.

Look into his eyes and ask him what he wants in sacrifice. You will know.

Pesuppositions

Everyone has certain beginning points in their thinking. I begin with God. I presuppose God. Why? Because I want there to be a God. I want to believe in Him. I want to believe in Jesus and his resurrection. I like this religion. I don’t like other religions. They are cold and empty. My presupposition is that the religion I like is true. Others do not like Christianity because they do not want someone telling them what to do. They want to keep their sin. So their presupposition is that there is no God who has the right to tell them what to do or will judge them for their sin in the end. It is self evident to me that Christ is true. Nothing else makes any sense. The Bible says that people love their sin more than God, and so they will not believe in Him. This is the same thing that happens when a Christian sins. At that moment he loves his sin more than God. In my life, He had to get me to a point where I loved Him more than anything and anyone else. It is this very belief in Him that proves His existence to me, because “faith is the substance of things hoped for the evidence of things not seen.” I want to believe in God and therefore I do, but Jesus said that this is a valid reason to believe. “If you want to know the truth,” he said, “ you will know that the things I say are true. You must turn from your sin every day and face the unseen and follow the One who you want to exist. I begin my thinking with Jesus. I may study to understand better or to explain to others, but ultimately I choose Jesus because I want Him more than anything else. Then at some point the Holy Spirit comes in and witnesses his presence to me. I know He is there because I feel him there at the center of my being and know that if He was not there I would be hollow.
People do not come to a belief in Jesus from a neutral position. They have built up biases over a life time. That is why Jesus told Paul it was hard for him to kick against the picks. He had had his biases attacked by the death of Stephen and other martyrs and was finding it hard to ignore this new information. The Pharisees came to Jesus with presuppositions that when Messiah came he would support their position and power. Unfortunately Hassidic Jews today bear the same presupposition. But you can come to something with valid presuppositions. The Word of God is true. Jesus never lied. God is intimately involved in our lives. And God is good. But we must not presuppose that God’s idea of goodness is ours or that God should do this or that to be good. Everyone has certain beginning points in their thinking. You must make sure that your beginning points are God’s Of course, since God was before the beginning, his beginning points are sometimes quite mysterious.

And the Lord turned....Luke 22:61a

Jesus knows everything that we have done and everything that we are going to do. But when we do these things, he does not turn away from us, he turns toward us. Just as the father looked for the prodigal son, so does Jesus turn toward us in our time of sin. His desire is to restore as he restored Peter. Jesus is not a fair weather friend who deserts us, who abandons us to our fate. He calls to us as you would call to a lost child. He turns toward us with comfort and grace. His gaze is instructional not rejecting. He cannot be disappointed because he knows the end from the beginning.

When Jesus came to the world on Christmas, that was God turning toward us. When Jesus began his ministry that was God turning toward us. When Jesus died on the cross, the Father had to turn away from him, but in doing so He turned toward us in forgiveness. And when he rose again, God turned away from condemnation to the offer of eternal life for all who turn to him.

The Lord is turning toward you. Will you turn toward Him?