Discerning the WHY & HOW
“Jesus said to them,
(Mark 2: 27-28 NASB)
“The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.
So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.”
There is a term within our mind, one that carries a negative connotation, one that immediately screams: “I can’t do this anymore.” STRESS can be terribly bad. Without a doubt, STRESS can make one’s health fail. When STRESSFUL situations come, we want to immediately turn 180 degrees and run the other way toward what seems to be less STRESSFULScircumstances.
- GOD KNEW HIS CREATION WOULD FEEL STRESS!
- GOD LOVES US!
- GOD GAVE US THE SABBATH REST!
The truth is that we read our Bible for understanding, and we are study God’s Word for more information. That’s right. Understanding & Information will be gained as we read. However, those who have their identity in Christ Jesus are to study His Word so that God can transform our lives!
Let us consider what “good” STRESS God produces & what it can accomplish.
- GOOD STRESS takes a grain of sand and with God’s help produces an expensive pearl.
- GOOD STRESS takes a person sensing the conviction of the Holy Spirit and leads the person to fall to his knees and seek Jesus.
- GOOD STRESS takes a rock and when placed under pressure reveals how God creates a beautiful diamond.
As a follower of Jesus Christ, we are to walk within our days, discerning the way God is at work changing us from this to that. It is a truth, everyone experiences STRESSFUL circumstances within their lives, but what we do ‘within the time’ when we feel STRESS makes all the difference. We can either seek the Sabbath rest God provides—OR—We can seek what man offers. God created His Sabbath rest:
- To remind us that we need time to be away,
- To give us time to pray,
- To provide us time to read our Bible,
- To give us time to listen to God speak,
- To ensure we have time to be at rest in our minds,
- To help us time to experience the peace only God Himself can provide.
“Jesus said to them,
(Mark 2: 27 NASB)
“The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.”
JESUS SAID!
Consider for a moment: There are 8 billion people in the world today, all living on the same-sized planet God created for the animals & for the first man and his helpmate. 8 billion all lived on the exact same-sized planet God created for just one man & one woman & the animals!
When we think about just how crowded our planet has become since the day God created Adam & Eve, how we are to exist within the same place, trying not to bump into one another as we go throughout our days, well, that alone is enough to cause us to feel some STRESS.
- Discerning the WHY behind the decisions we are to make is most important.
- Discerning the WHY creates the opportunity to know what is the ‘right’ decision in contrast to the ‘almost right’ decision.
- Discerning the HOW allows us to walk with Jesus under the direction of His Holy Spirit as we traverse toward our eternity with God.
Therefore, when we feel a huge dose of bad STRESS within our lives, let us recall God’s Truth & what ONLY HE can do within us, as HE transforms us.
S—We should SEEK GOD!
T—We should TRUST GOD!
R—We should REMEMBER HOW WE NEVER WALK ALONE!
E—We should EXALT GOD!
S—We should SEEK THE PRAYERS OF BROTHERS & SISTERS-IN-CHRIST!
S—We should STAND FIRMLY UPON GOD’S PROMISES!
That’s the TRUTH—the way we walk through the “GOOD STRESS”
DO NOT LEARN SCRIPTURE ONLY FOR UNDERSTANDING OR ONLY FOR INFORMATION BUT LET US STUDY GOD’S WORD FOR WHAT GOD PURPOSES TO DO WITHIN US, AS HE TRANSFORMS OUR LIVES!
If we seriously desire to understand the Sabbath rest Jesus wants us to claim, then we need to remember THE SON of MAN is LORD!
We are not.
Therefore, we are NOT to strive to ‘lord’ over our own lives, causing us to become STRESSED—you know, the bad kind of STRESS.
So, in closing, my dear best friend proclaimed how Christ followers are to be “Full of JOY” because of THE ONE WHO RESIDES WITHIN US.
Let us never forget what Father God bestowed on us, and as we face the bad STRESS found in this day, & let us fix our eyes where we need to keep them—on our eternity with God.
“See how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called children of God;
(1 John 3: 1-3 NASB)
and such we are.
For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him.
Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be.
We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is.
And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.”