Why Not Rejoice?

Design_PNG

Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude you, and revile you, and spurn your name as evil, on account of the Son of Man. Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven…

But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High; for He is kind to the ungrateful and the evil. Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.

(Luke 6:22-23, 35-36 ESV)

I was in the midst of my morning time with the Lord, ( He has been working on me fiercely these past many years) as I began crying out to Him this morning I started my prayer in remembrance of His sovereignty. I started out acknowledging that I knew that nothing happened unless it first passed through His hands and was purposely permitted by Him. I also had to acknowledge to Him that knowing these solid foundational Scriptural truths did not make the reality of these experiences any easier… and He quietly and softly reminded me that they didn’t have to… that wasn’t the point of knowing them.

Pain is pain.

Hurt is hurt.

Truth doesn’t make it go away. Quoting Scripture back to myself doesn’t make it go away. Knowing God is sovereign over it all doesn’t make it easier to bare… but that’s the problem. Who decided that it was supposed to? Who told me that lie and when did I accept it as truth? The purpose of this lie was to cause me to doubt the love that my Creator God said He had for me.

There is only one who works to cause doubt, which leads to disobedience, which leads to deception, which leads to death… and that is the enemy of old. The one who first caused Eve to doubt, disobey, deceive, and die. I will not be his victim. I will learn from the examples that the Lord has given me in His Word. I will choose to learn from Eve’s mistake instead of following in her footsteps.

I am currently reading The Calvary Road by Roy Hession. In this book I underlined these two quotes:

  1. If someone hurts and slights us, we immediately have the choice of accepting the slight as a means of grace to humble us lower or we can resist it and stiffen our necks again with all the disturbance of spirit that is bound to bring. All the way through the day our brokenness will be tested, and it is no use pretending we are broken before God if we are not broken in our attitude to those around us. God nearly always tests us through other people. There are no second causes for the Christian. God’s will is made known in His providence, and His providences are so often others with their many demands on us.
  2. So the real test along the Highway will be- are our cups running over? Have we the peace of God in our hearts? Have we love and concern for others? These things are the barometer of the Highway. If they are disturbed, then sin has crept in somewhere- self-pity, self-seeking, self-indulgence in thought or deed, sensitiveness, touchiness, self-defense, self-consciousness, shyness, reserve, worry, fear, and so on.

Who was I to think that I deserved better treatment from the world than the Son of the Living God? I belong to the One that the world hates. I belong to the One that makes others uncomfortable. I belong to the Truth teller and frankly many simply have a hard time with truth. They prefer to live comfortably in their own well-developed lie.

The past many years the Lord has been removing scales from my eyes and fairy tales from my heart. He has been teaching me to love Him and trust Him in depths that few will follow Him into. I will continue to walk deeper still. As deeply plunged beneath the blood of His Son as His hands would bid me go… I will go. I will let Him rip out every ounce of pride and selfish desires that He will that I might walk in a manner that is worthy of service to Him.

Whatever wounds I might receive cannot compare with the ones that He bore for me. I am tired of walking around this mountain of doubt and I am ready to jump off the cliff of abandoned trust. I understand that I will bounce off trees and rocks and probably fall into a few ravines that I have to crawl up out of as I make this leap, but if it brings death in me and exalts my Christ, then let it be.  I want to grow to a place in my walk with Him that allows no thing or no one to disturb the peace of God in my heart, for He is my peace.

So when hurt comes, when pain comes, why not rejoice?

Why not rejoice…

Yes, Lord I will indeed learn to rejoice.