My Hiding Place

“For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.”

(Col. 3:3)

One of my favorite songs is, “You Are My Hiding Place.”

You Are My Hiding Place

You Always Fill My Heart

With Songs of Deliverance

Whenever I’m Afraid

I Will Trust In You

What a hiding place! For Satan to get to one of the Lord’s children he must first get past God, then Christ. How ridiculous an assumption! Christ is hid in God and we are hid in Christ. If the devil wants to play the child’s game of Hide and Seek he will search for eternity and still come up frustrated and exhausted to find our secret and secure hiding place.

“...the shadow of his hand hath he hid me...in his quiver hath he hid me.”

(Isa. 49:2)

God's Guidance

Abraham had no other guide than God to direct his steps over the trackless desert to the place he knew not. The importance of God’s guidance in our lives cannot be over exaggerated. And I mean in every area. We do not know what lies around the next turn; He does, thus, the necessity of His leading.  

The scriptures abound in promises of God’s guidance in the lives of those surrendered to Him. “I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go: I will guide thee with mine eye”; “And the LORD shall guide thee continually”; “The meek will he guide in judgment: and the meek will he teach his way”; “He will be our guide [even] unto death.”

If you think for a minute you can run your own life, listen to Jeremiah, “O LORD, I know that the way of man [is] not in himself: [it is] not in man that walketh to direct his steps.” This is the reason we are to acknowledge Him in all our ways. For if He is not guide in all, then He will not guide at all.

Most informed Christians are aware in seeking God’s guidance that He generally uses means: enlightenment from the Bible, promptings of the Spirit, immediate circumstances, godly friends, etc. But sometimes it is forgotten He also uses a sanctified mind. Filling one’s brain with facts and information can be a determining factor which way He is leading. Common sense in weighing the pros and cons can go a long way in helping us.

After the angel delivered Peter from prison we are told, “when he had considered the thing,” he then set his steps for Mary’s house. How about some of us setting down and considering some things? We might just see our way through a confusing and difficult time.

Richard. D. Sandlin

Hopeless Hopers

“…all hope that we should be saved was then taken away.” The poet, Joaquin Miller, wrote these following lines in his poem that he simply called, Columbus: “What shall we do when hope is gone…Sail on! Sail on! Sail on! and on!” He got his inspiration for writing this from reading Columbus’ log from his first voyage across the uncharted Atlantic. In spite of storms, the threat of mutiny, hunger, darkness, and exhaustion, over and again, the captain recorded these words, “This day we sail on.”

Paul was one of those rare breeds who believe, no matter what, you keep on keeping on. He was like Abraham of old, who, “against hope, believed in hope.” He could go against all odds and encourage others to “…be of good cheer.” This was because of the fact that he belonged to God—lock, stock, and barrel. His telling testimony was, “For their stood by me this night…God, whose I am…”

"If Christ is our Hope, we need never lose hope."

(rds)

Psychological Jargon

For the past twenty-five years or so, the Church and other religious institutions has been turned into a world-like psychological clinic for the disturbed. We see this both in the preaching from its pulpits, and the counseling that comes from office calls to the church’s pseudo therapist. When will we learn Biblical principles outshine psychology as much as the sun does a lit match?

Martyn Lloyd-Jones comments, “Psychology, I believe, is one of the most subtle dangers in connection to our faith.” An area in which I find many Christians are taken up with is in the matter of self-image. The “doctors” tell us this is very important in facing life with its difficulties. But you need no PhD. to understand this. A simple saint with a sixth grade education, who loves God and lives in His Book, could grasp this truth.

Any Spirit-filled Believer, reading the story of the twelve spies in the Old Testament would be aware of this. The timid ten, in making their excuse for not wanting to face their giants said, “We were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight.” Their problem was that they saw themselves the way others did. No soul can be a giant-slayer in his or her life by accepting another’s evaluation of himself or herself.

Both Saul and Goliath said of David, “Thou art but a youth.” But the shepherd boy brought down his giant in spite of what others thought of him. He would not allow others to define him. David knew who he was and was content with what God had made him. He refused to pass himself off as another, hiding in their armour. Little David would have never said, “Why hast thou made me thus?” But he did say, “I am fearfully and wonderfully made.”

Daily Dependence

Few things in the Christian life that are once-for-all settled. Certainly our salvation tops the list in this brief category (Heb.10:10). But most things are on-going. For example, we are told God gives out His benefits on a daily basis. Israel found they were to be daily dependent during their forty year pilgrimage in the desert.

God has arranged things so that the Christian’s life is to be lived in perpetual day by day reliance upon His faithfulness. Thus He keeps our lives from becoming boring and matter-of-fact. For, says He, “Thou knowest not what a day may bring forth.”

It’s reassuring to know He’s planned ahead for each new day. And exciting to anticipate what new things He has in store for us on any given day. David knew his days were in Deity’s hands, and so he penned, “This is the day which the Lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.”

“When I am anxious it is because I am living in the future. When I am depressed it is because I am living in the past.”

(rds)

Stars, Salvation, and Victory

“…one star differeth from another…”

You’d be hard pressed to come up with a plan of salvation or a formula for victory in the scriptures. Why is this? Simply because, like the stars, no one of us is like the other. This is why it is so dangerous trying to emulate another’s spiritual experience, either in the former or latter case. We are to seek the Apostles teachings, not their experiences!

The Bible was written to meet the need of individuals, in the way each of us is going. We all travel different directions; therefore God meets us on the road we are traveling. Is it any wonder, for this reason, many believe the Bible contradicts itself? For example, to the self-righteous seeking salvation Jesus says, “Keep the commandments.” But to the convicted sinner Paul says simply, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.” In the first case, it was to produce conviction, but in the second, conviction had already set in.

So it is in trying to live the Victorious Christian Life. There are many Christians who are habitually reading about the experiences of others, trying to relive them in their own lives. We are not identical in our natural makeup; therefore God deals with us on an individual basis. Oswald Chambers mentions we should allow the Lord to be as original with us as he has been with the ones we seek to copy. Say and do as little David did, when he put on Saul’s giant armour, “I cannot go with these…And David put them off him.”

“Be yourself. Everyone else is taken.”

(Charles Schulz)

FRAGILE

“LORD, make me to know mine end, and the measure of my days, what it is; that I may know how frail I am.”

(Psa. 39:4)

It’s early morning and I just woke to face my fourth day of having the flu that has invaded our State. Believe me, it’s as bad as they say it is. I might add even worse for us Octogenarians. During this time alone with God I've thought of darling David’s words in the text quoted above. Maybe some of you need the following article as I do.  

The word “frail” is used only once in the Bible. David asked the Lord to make known to him his frailty; that is, how weak he actually was and how easily the earthen vessel could be broken. It’s interesting to note that in David’s autobiography (Psalms) he speaks so often of his sorrow, sickness, pain, and afflictions. I heard a preacher jestingly say once, “Be careful what you pray for; you just might get it!” It is evident from David’s life, God answered his prayer request.

It is important for all of us to have our frailties revealed to us, for we are so prone to think of ourselves as indomitable, thereby making ourselves independent entities. But once God brings a crack in the vessel, we are more apt to put our fragile lives in His hands for safe keeping.

Interestingly, earlier in his life, robust David killed lions, bears, and giants with his own hands; but later on, when the frailties of life set in, he needed others that God sent his way to help him in killing his giants. Our frailties not only make us realize our dependence upon God but also on one another. “No man liveth to himself.”

“If your life has been marked ‘Fragile,’ don’t worry, God will handle it with care.”

(rds)

Losing Your Edge

“Iron sharpeneth iron…so a man sharpeneth…his friend.”

(Prov. 27:17)

By friction is one iron instrument sharpened by another. And so it is with us, when we become dull and lose our intellectual and spiritual edge. God has ordained an instrument made of the same material to be used in taking off our rough, blunt edge, thereby making us sharp once again. The wise man tells us, “If the iron be blunt, and he do not whet the edge, then must he put to more strength.”

A recluse is invariably a one-sided person. This is one reason, no doubt, we’re told, “It is not good for man to be alone.” We need to learn to mingle with those with diverse opinions and viewpoints: people who’ll make us think, that keep us from being intellectual and spiritual sloths. Brisk, lively, spirited conversations can not only be enlightening but even enjoyable.

There is great gain to be acquired from conversations with those possessing superior knowledge, mainly the increase of wisdom. Need I point out Timothy and Paul as an example? Challenging conversations are advantageous to all parties involved. Anytime we’re provoked to independent thinking, it will always be to our profit. A stagnant mind produces the same as stagnant waters.

That great intellect, C.S. Lewis, would meet with friends in a local pub for informal discussions. Not all held the same views, hence it could become quite spirited but all remained friends. They called their group, “The Inklings.” This continued for some twenty years. Such dialogue can be very profitable. J.R.R. Tolkien was one of the members of this group; he was instrumental in Lewis’s conversion.

Those who “pick up their marbles and go home” in disagreeing debates, have lost their marbles.

(rds)

Daniel's Belief in God

“But there is a God in heaven...”

(Dan. 2:28)

Daniel was taken captive by Nebuchadnezzar at the age of around twenty years old most Bible teachers believe. He was one of a small band of Jewish captives carried off from his native homeland Jerusalem to distant pagan Babylon. He lived through the seventy-year Babylonian captivity. He was both a godly and handsome young man. He was a political prophet; “God rules in the affairs of men,” said he.

There is much debate among the apostates as to the authenticity of his writings, as well as the existence of such a person as himself. But Jesus vouchsafed both. That is the only authority I need, though there are many other proofs.

In spite of his lot in life, whatever that might entail, his testimony from youth to old age was, “There is a God in heaven.” Taken from home never to return again, made a slave, lied about, and put into a lion's den, he never questioned his God’s dealings with him. He was resolute. Daniel’s faith was not passive. He not only believed God COULD; he believed God WOULD. He carried this unwavering faith from youth down to his hoary hairs of old age. He was preeminently a man of prayer!

O, that our Lord might grant us the godly character of this“greatly beloved,” man of God, a man with a spiritual backbone. As the old-timer said, “The lions didn’t eat Daniel because there was too much gristle in his backbone.”

“But the people that do know their God shall be strong, and do exploits.”

(Dan. 11:32)