Day 7: Check God’s Faithfulness: Missing details

Bible Reading: Lamentations 3:1-26

Have you ever been in one of those situations where it was hard to backtrack? Maybe you got in a ‘You said that-No I didn’t say that-Yes you said that’ kind of tussle with a friend. Then your friend remembers that the conversation in reference was over a chat and decides to scroll it out. Now you’re getting a bit nervous. Maybe I should have said, I really think that I said that. 

The chat can’t lie.

‘Can you see!’ Your friend shouts as she points out where you actually said it. Yes, you said it after all. 

‘This?? Ermm… Is this my WhatsApp number?’

What about conversations do you forget most easily?

We all have the tendency to miss out or take for granted some details of every conversation and then remember other details as though that’s all there is to the story. 

The reality is that that in itself can misrepresent the conversations.

Have you misrepresented the conversations of life by omitting the details of God’s faithfulness? 

I think that’s what was happening with the Prophet Jeremiah in our reading today. And if we’ll be honest, it happens to us too. There are all those moments when things get so quick in our face, the pace gets so intense, the pressures to deal with are all over us, and then if we’re not careful, we start to take some of the most precious things in our life for granted.

But as we round off on our Surge Check today, let’s not forget to keep a check for the faithfulness of God:

This is A Story Of God’s Grace, Not of The Devil’s Evil
Where do you interpret this from- a story of the extent of evil the devil has worked or a story of the extent that God’s grace has worked? I honestly think Christians give the devil way too much credit and recognition.

It’s easy to go by the apparent and think of all the evil in the world and the evil that we have experienced. It’s easy to describe this year in the narrative of a pandemic and of the lockdowns and difficulties we faced. It’s easy to think about the one friend that betrayed you, so much more than the hundred that didn’t. It’s the human tendency.   

I pray that we will be reminded today that our lives look more like the grace of God than the evil of the devil. You might have a broken bone, but think of the number of bones that aren’t broken, and of the incredible grace that is keeping you walking even with a broken bone.

The truth, friends, is that we live in a broken world. There is pain and suffering and injustice. We live surrounded by the fruit of humanity’s sin. But that’s one part of the story. We live in a broken world, but if there’s anything that has given us life and hope, it’s not the leniency in destruction of the broken evil world, it’s the intervening grace of our God.

I still believe that it is the grace of God that takes what the enemy means for evil and turns it for our good.

The tendency is to think more about the taste of the food than the plate that holds it all together. When last did you deeply think about the constantness and graciousness of God to you? When last did you look beyond to truly see?  

When last were you overwhelmingly grateful in deep recognition of God’s faithful grace. 

I’ll tell you what: a deep recognition of the God’s faithfulness to you is not just a propelling to gratitude, it is also your deepest secret to be hopeful in this broken world. 

They are new every morning;
Great is Your faithfulness.
“The Lord is my portion,” says my soul,
“Therefore I hope in Him!”
Lamentations 3:23-24 NKJV

May today birth in you a deep reflection of God’s faithfulness that births gratitude and renews hope!

 

Something To Do
Can you soul-searchingly identify a few things that you had previously taken lightly or for granted that you really owe to the faithfulness of God? Would you take time today to repeatedly give God credit for these.

I’d also love to know in the comments section one or two things that you so often take for granted that you owe to the faithfulness of God.

For me, I think it might be some of the incredible people I get to do life with (including my world’s best wife) and the privilege of God’s constant strength in all the in between. 

 

Tolulope Moody