Once we know that the Bible is the living and active word of
God,[1]
and that it is the sword of the Spirit[2]
that the Holy Spirit speaks into our hearts to teach us the mind of Christ and
remind us of things we have already been taught,[3] we
receive the nudgings, and convictions, and Aha! Moments, as the gracious work
of God to relate to us as a Father to his beloved children.
This morning was one of those times when I was both
overtired and overanxious and found myself in the stupid and childish belief
that my Deeper could never be met by God’s Higher. I don’t know if God smiles
when he sees his beloved child believe such nonsense because he knows he is
about to bless me with a Higher I couldn’t have imagined (his word does talk
about him doing things like that), or whether he feels sad that I would doubt
him once again even though he has proven himself so many times. I dare not
impose my own human reactions onto the divine heart of my heavenly Father, but
I do wonder nonetheless.
The Deeper that consumed me this morning had to do with
fear. God was addressing a layer of fear deep within me that obviously required
his special care and attention. He had already reminded me that, “When I am afraid, I put my trust in you”,[4] so
I knew he wanted me to trust him while I was afraid, not after my fear-issues
were fixed.
However, because I share with my home church the things God
teaches me each day I was in a quandary. How much does a man share his personal
struggles before it becomes a burden to his family in Christ? There are times
when relationships are like a parent with a child where the parent knows that
the child would be traumatized by knowing the depths of worries, and concerns,
and fears, and doubts, that adults carry as they try to guide their little ones
safely through life.
And so, in the personal way that has been familiar for a
long time, I knew the Holy Spirit was reminding me of a key life-lesson he had
taught me a long time ago. A man named Asaph was going through a hard time because
he just couldn’t get over the way sinners seemed to prosper and God’s children
seemed to suffer. He was so upset by this that he came close to slipping away
from his faith in God. However, before he gave up completely he came to this
much-needed conclusion: “If I had said, ‘I
will speak thus,’ I would have betrayed the generation of your children”.[5]
What the Holy Spirit taught me years ago, and reminded me of
today, was that leaders must never speak such things as Asaph had been thinking
because it would be a betrayal of the children of God. If Asaph as some kind of
leader among God’s people began telling everyone that it was a waste of time to
believe in God, or to deny oneself the pleasures of sin, it would have put such
thoughts in the hearts and minds of others who may not have had the same
capacity to take all the struggles and troubles to God in prayer, and so they
would have swallowed the bait of his lying beliefs perhaps even to their
eternal harm.
So, instead, Asaph got alone with God in what he called “the
sanctuary” where everything became clear to him, and so he could later share
his testimony that he indeed was close to succumbing to the lies of his
discouraged mind, but he presented it all to God in the secret place of prayer
and came to the glorious experience he described like this:
“Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you.My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.”[6]
Now, this was all just the prelude to what God wanted to
speak the deepest into my soul (about my very tired fears). It just seemed like
he needed to remind me that part of what he was dealing with had to be kept just
between him and I, while the testimony of how he ministered to me in my fear
and despondency could be shared for the building up of others who might be
struggling with the same things.
Part of my reason for sharing this today is that I’m quite
sure there must be other people out there who are facing things that tear their
hearts out because they think they must choose between sharing nothing of their
struggles or sharing everything they are struggling with. I have been learning
something about how to share our worst and most painful thoughts in fellowship
with our heavenly Father, standing in Jesus Christ before the throne of grace,
telling him everything because we know we can’t hurt or demoralize him with any
of our inner burdens, and then share with our church families the testimonies
of both our struggles and God’s ministry to our souls. As we do this, we will
also see how God unites believers to share together in the part where we are
indeed to “bear one another’s burdens”,[7]
but without betraying our brothers and sisters with things we were supposed to
keep between ourselves and Father.
Because I am processing this as a man (sisters in Christ,
please feel free to share how God does this for you), I have a special interest
in encouraging men who are elders, pastors, husbands, and dads, to consider how
God invites us to come into the sanctuary of the throne of grace to pour out
all our needs before him in order to receive the mercy and grace we need for
whatever we are going through,[8] and
then share with others the testimony of how God made himself known to us
exactly (and more) as we needed through his word and his Spirit. We may wrestle
with God about how much to keep private between us and him, and how much to
share so people know us as men who have real feelings about life, I believe
that even this God will teach us if we stay with him until he makes it clear.
I encourage you to read and pray through Psalm 73 to see how
Asaph gave a testimony after the fact that showed people what God helped him
with, but without destroying their faith when he was at his lowest point. Here
is a link to that Psalm. Pray your way through it and see who God invites you
to share it with for the blessing of you both.
© 2017 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517,
Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8 ~ in2freedom@gmail.com
Unless otherwise noted,
Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English
Standard Version Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good
News Publishers.)
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