A man after God's own heart

After removing Saul, he made David their king. God testified concerning him: “I have found David son of Jesse, a man after my own heart; he will do everything I want him to do.” Acts 13:22

When God told Samuel to go to Bethlehem and anoint a new king, one of Jesse’s sons, his first thought when he saw Eliab, the first born, was that this must be the one (I Samuel 16: 6). Samuel was looking for a king as the people had, a king like all the other nations had, a king like Saul, tall and handsome.

God told Samuel not to look at the outward appearance because God does not look at these things, he looks at the heart. God was looking for a king who would have his heart and do the things God wanted him to do.

How true it is that man looks at the outward appearance. So often we look at men’s success or failings from the outside – we do not see what God sees – a man’s heart. Today when we hear of Christian leaders, who have fallen into moral or financial sin, it is shocking how quickly churches and individual Christians jump in to criticise and distance themselves from these people.

Whilst I understand that people may feel disappointed that those they admired or whose teaching or ministry has blessed them in the past have fallen, criticising and judging them is not the answer.  I wonder what the reaction of these people would have been to King David’s adultery with Bathsheba and his subsequent actions to have her husband Uriah the Hittite killed? There is much to criticise in David’s actions but as he himself said:

My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart you, God, will not despise. Psalm 51: 17.

David was truly sorry and repentant:

Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.

Psalm 51: 10 – 12

So often people look at the outward appearance – they do not know the heart of other people – only God knows that. It is not for us to criticise other people’s actions and whilst we also cannot condone sin, it is not our place to judge them – only God can do that.

We are all sinners saved by grace and unless we have walked the path that others have walked and faced the temptations they have faced, we are in no position to comment on their moral failure. So often the price they have paid for their sin is heavy, David lost his baby son. Many will have lost their marriage, family, home, ministry and income.

God and God alone knows their heart.  God not only restored David, he used his moral failure as a stepping stone to his plans and purposes to build an everlasting kingdom through David’s line. It was from this line that God’s Messiah, Jesus Christ was born.

We must pray for our fallen leaders and let God’s amazing grace ‘create in them a pure heart and restore to them their joy of their salvation’.

Moving past tragedy

I confess that today I am writing about something of which I have no personal experience. I am talking about personal tragedy by which I mean circumstances that are outside the experience of most people and which have such an impact on a person’s life that it changes them forever. Nevertheless, despite my lack of experience, there are some in the Bible and others who I know who have suffered and overcome this level of tragedy.

Most of us have had some very difficult circumstances such as the death of someone close to us, the loss of a job or an accident, all of which will have impacted our lives. However there seems to be a level of tragedy which can affect a life in such a way that they find it almost impossible to move on. Life stops and they get stuck at that moment and though everyday life continues, underlying it is a sorrow of the heart or even a bitterness of the spirit that seems impossible to shift.

However there is always God; the God who loves us and for whom nothing is impossible. Only he can heal the bitterly wounded and rescue those drowning in sorrow. We see it most obviously in Job, the man who had everything taken from him and who battled with God and his unhelpful friends but who never gave up. God then intervened and following Job’s incredible God encounter that literally shook him to the core, God restored and increased all that had been lost.

I know of a lady in South Africa who was married with two sons but the marriage was on the rocks. The husband persuaded a doctor friend to have his wife committed to a mental institution though there was nothing wrong with her. By the time she persuaded the doctors there that she was perfectly sane and was released, her husband had absconded from the country, taking their sons with her and clearing out all their money from the banks. She had nothing and even her own family were unhelpful. She has never seen her husband or sons again.

This level of tragedy could have caused her life and especially her relationship with God to come to a grinding halt. Instead, over time, she found forgiveness and healing and God has used her to talk to others in similar circumstances to help them through and out the other side of their tragedy to a place where their lives can begin to function again.

The key seems to be acknowledging all that has gone on and letting God touch every area. There may be areas that are so painful, so difficult that they have to be hidden away till God and time have done a measure of healing. Then they can be brought gently out for God’s divine touch. There may have been great injustice and only letting God help you find forgiveness will bring release and healing.

Why? will almost certainly be the word on your lips and in your heart and you may not ever have a satisfactory answer to this question. God however wants to take your hand and help you climb over the wall that Why? represents and help you trust him with that answer. He wants to help you move on. He wants to rebuild your life. He wants to give you hope.

I confess again this is an area of which I have no personal experience but I know and read about others who have overcome personal tragedy through the God whose love is limitless, who is bigger than anything we can think or imagine and who never leaves us – ever. He truly is the God of all hope.

God of all hope

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. Romans 15: 13

Hope is as essential to our lives as the air we breathe. Without hope, life begins to shut down and close in. For the Christian, hope is not an optimistic wish for future things but hope is a trust in the goodness of God; that despite the circumstances, God is good and will bring forth good things.  

Most Christians, I am sure, would agree with this but for some there can be areas of our life where hope has died and when that happens it is as if we close the door to any further hope in that area to save ourselves from future disappointment. There are many areas where this could happen but some examples are being single, childlessness, bereavement and grief, separation and divorce, church life and ministry, unemployment and failure. So often it feels like hope has been dashed and in order to function, we put our lost hope and disappointment into a room and close the door.

However God does not want us to have closed doors in our lives as they can lead to further difficulties and a bitterness of spirit. The only way to keep the door open on our deep hurts and disappointments is to establish in our own lives that God is good and has good things for his children. As Steve Backlund says, ‘hope expects and knows that things will ultimately work out in a good way.’

Whatever has happened is not because God is punishing us. God has not stopped loving us and God does not want to teach us a lesson in a negative sense. Some of these past hurts may have come about because we have made poor choices or even sinned. God wants to bring healing and hope again into these areas.

Today if fear is gripping your heart and you dare not trust God in an area where you have lost hope, start with this declaration and prayer:

God I trust you because you are a good God and want only good things for my life. I am so sorry if I have in any way caused these difficulties but I will not blame anyone for what has happened. I forgive any who have been instrumental in what has happened including myself. Today I choose to believe that you will bring good out of this. I open the door of my hurt to your healing love and restoration and I receive your hope. In Jesus Name Amen.

 

 

 

Restoring the years

Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit to sustain me. Psalm 51: 12

One of the most wonderful things about God is his restoration process. God does not just want to save us from our sins, foolishness and mistakes; he wants to restore us to ‘good as new’.  When David sinned in adultery with Bathsheba and murdered her husband Uriah he was overcome with his guilt and cried out to God in repentance and for restoration. God graciously answered his prayer. David married Bathsheba and their next child Solomon, despite not being the oldest son, became his heir and continued the Messianic family line.

If we think of a restoration project whether that is an old car or an old building, the object is to restore from a state of ruin or dilapidation into something that looks and to all intents and purposes is brand new. It is usually a wonder to behold.

God’s restoration is even more incredible. Reading the Old Testament prophets can leave you weighted down with a sense of God’s judgement and grief over Israel’s sin and stubborn refusal to repent and turn back to God. However at some point in the books of Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel judgment turns to restoration and again and again God promises wonderful things to his rebellious people. He shows them that though they will be going into exile for their rebellion, he also promises to bring them back to the land.

In our own lives God does not just want to save us and leave us there. He wants to restore us and restore ‘the years that the locust has eaten’ which is unfortunately a rather overworked Bible reference (Joel 2:25). The truth though is that there is no area of our lives that God does not want to restore and by that he means turn it to ‘good as new’. What is even more exciting is that he often uses those areas of greatest failure to become our greatest strengths in the future.

My own teenage years were fairly torrid and there was little to be proud of. God however has used those years of awful failure to give me such a heart to see teenagers now not wasting those years like I did. Instead I have been able to help them walk those tricky times holding onto God and laying a Godly foundation on which they can build their adult lives. I too want to encourage and help those who wasted their teenage years educationally to realise it is never too late with God. He will help us recover our lost education. I got my degree aged 47 so I am a walking testimony of that.

If there is an area of your life that you feel was lost, no matter the reason why, ask God now to restore it and return it to good-as-new. Trust him with the restoration process and thank him for the good things he has already done to restore your life to be more like Jesus.