Grace For The Journey

Ever been there?  Maybe most of us fear hitting rock-bottom because we somehow became convinced it is the one place in the world where God does not exist.  Most everyone has a scenario where they don’t let their minds travel.  This scenario is the ugliest, scariest, and most intimidating place that your mind can conceive.  It is the thing you dread the most. Your rock-bottom is shaped differently than mine, and ours both hold a different aroma than the person you rode next to in morning traffic last week.  We are convinced that we can handle just about anything which might come our way in life … but not that.  That one thing, rock-bottom, we are convinced, would likely be the end of us if it ever came to pass.

I have a word of encouragement today that will help all of us when we have, or we feel like, we have hit rock-bottom.  The Bible says in Psalm 27:5, “For He will hide me in His shelter in the day of trouble; He will conceal me under the cover of His tent; He will lift me high upon a rock.”

For a Scriptural point of view, the bottom line about the rock-bottom is that God is the Rock you will find when you bottom out.  Fear breeds avoidance.  We do not wish to allow our minds to play out the worst case scenarios that distress our spirit.  We live on the unconfronted side of all the “What If’s?” that threaten us.

• What if I am not healed?  
• What if my marriage does not make it?  
• What if I never find a mate?  
• What if I lose my job?
• What if I never get out of debt?
• What if I miss my life-purpose?

All of us could add to this frightful list.  Chances are that you are like most of us and push out the thought as quickly as it enters into your mind.  We are quite good at that.  Yet, because we too often handle our greatest fears in this manner, they continue to haunt us from season to season and year to year.  We never really go there. I want us to go there today and see that we can find some real and lasting help.  What if our own personal nightmare scenario became our reality?

Our response to that unpleasant possibility is for us to acknowledge that our Father would be there when it occurred, and that all of who He is and what He has promised would still be true for us and still active on our behalf.

• We will still be the objects of His love.
• He will not leave us in the cold, isolating, and overwhelming uncertainty that we sense when the worst moment finds us.
• He will not be weakened at all, though we will acutely sense our own limitations in that hour.
• He will preserve the most important things and He would supply everything then which we currently lack now.

One of the reasons that those scenarios seem terrifying to us at times is because we aren’t equipped today for them.  We are not equipped with the truth and power needed to bring us through those difficult times.  What we need to remember is that God will have instant grace-resources for us to draw upon in the moments and hours of need, but likely, not before that moment actually arrives (2 Corinthians 12:9).  This is one reason people marvel at how we can press on through circumstances that would do them in if we were in our shoes.  When we go through “rock-bottom” experiences we need to remember that we have been supplied the necessary grace.

Our lives are prepared for and preserved in the occasion by God Himself.\

He knows and grants us what we need when life brings us to a crash landing.

The sum of the matter

Is that

The only thing that is promised

To us

On a permanent basis is

The unchanging presence, power, and provisions of God.

“Rock-bottom” experiences serve to reveal whether that promise from Him of His faithful presence, power, and provision . . .

Is enough for us.

Most of us want more than that, if we are being honest.  We really want God plus immunity from that one thing that strikes high anxiety in our hearts.

Because of what the Bible teaches about God we do not need to spend another day in dread.

Do not avoid the “What If?” that haunts you.

But, don’t stop there.

For the followers of Jesus Christ there

Is a “Well, Then…” to every “What If?”

That “Well, then…”

Is the assurance that God will absolutely see you through,

No matter what your what-if is.

He will see be there when it comes to pass.  He will be so close to you.  He’s not going anywhere without you.  As a matter of fact, you will experience a nearness to Him like you have never experienced before.  You will learn more about His faithfulness, His compassion, His love, His power, His wisdom, and His devotion to you.  You will also learn what it means to endure like Jesus did, to abide like Jesus did, to wait like Jesus did and then to pray in courage like Jesus did, “Nevertheless, not my will but Your will be done, Father.”  “Rock bottom” is where we are formed to be most like Jesus who suffered before He triumphed.

If we let God be our Rock when we hit “rock bottom,” this is what occurs when we go through “rock-bottom” experiences . . .

Temporary things fade off, and then everlasting elements come to stay.

 In the end, your rock-bottom experience will be permanently exchanged for a glorifying testimony of the Almighty grace, goodness, and greatness.

Your testimony will be . . .

God is there for me and God is able to see me through.

So, even during “rock-bottom” experiences, we press on in calm assurance that nothing in life can usher us out of the presence of the One who has pledged Himself to us forever.

This is God’s Word For Today … This Is Grace For The Journey

Rest and Rejoice in this eternal truth!

 Pastor Terry

Ephesians 4:7 – “But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it.”

Hebrews 4:16 – “Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.”