Scripture:

Isaiah 26:3-4

"3 You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you.4 Trust in the LORD forever, for the LORD GOD is an everlasting rock."

Where Do You Find Your Peace?

Isaiah teaches us something so important about something that most of us need in our lives: "PEACE."    I confess that I have not always been good at looking for it in the right place.  Sometimes we look to people for our peace, other times it is in the security of our job, our bank, and still other times it is our surroundings, the time we are in.  But Isaiah says: "You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you."  

Peace that He Brings

It is perfect

Perfect Peace: In the original Hebrew, the phrase for "perfect peace" is literally shalom shalom,

peace peace. This repetition is meant to emphasize completeness, soundness, and a deep, unbroken state of mind that isn't dependent on your current circumstances

My Peace is in HIM

A Steadfast Mind: The peace is conditional on the mind being "stayed" on God. This means keeping your thoughts fixed, settled, and focused on Him rather than on worldly anxieties or problems

Trust and Refuge: The foundation for this peace—an ongoing, eternal trust in the Lord, who is the "everlasting rock", the solid ground we can depend on and put our trust in.

Our God-Shot today is that our peace is found in Him.  If you and I want peace, we can find it in Him.   Fixing our thoughts on Him, His way, His leading, He will lead me into places of rest.  As I put my trust in Him, I will find the stability for my life in Him.   

Lord, keep our minds stayed on you and our trust in you.  Don't allow the things of this world to distract us, keep our focus on you, and our paths straight, set on your ways, in Jesus' name, Amen! 

Scripture:

Psalm 59:16

But I will sing of your strength,
    in the morning I will sing of your love;
for you are my fortress,
    my refuge in times of trouble.

What do you do in times of trouble?

David, during this time, is being pursued by Saul; literally, Saul had soldiers watching David's house, waiting to kill him. In fact, in the morning, come to run him through with swords in his bed, but his wife (Saul's daughter) had warned him and snuck him through the window and he escaped.   

David in the day of his trouble, he decides to declare praise, to worship the Lord, through the blur of terrible days, through relentless attacks from those to whom he did no wrong, he declares praise. 

"BUT" is the biggest word in the Bible,

• My world was falling apart, "But! then..."  I remembered, my God is my REFUGE!  

This caused praise to fill my heart!  

• My life was in a shaky place, "But! then.." I remembered the God I serve is a FORTRESS.

This caused praise to fill my heart!  

So today, what has your attention, is it the blur of your troubles, or is it the Lord of your Refuge and Strength?

Our God-Shot today is that we can choose how we respond and what we see in the day of our trouble.   For David, it produced praise; he had seen the Lord who delivered him from the hand of giants, who was now delivering him from the hand of Saul, he was already anointed King, but would not step into it for 17 years. His world was anything but something people would expect praise from, but David saw the bigness of God, the greatness of God, and this allowed him to look beyond his trouble to see the Lord, and that produced praise.

So, how about you... Maybe you need your But then... moment this morning to remember that God is BIG, He is merciful, He is great, and He is mightier than the things you are facing.

Father, I praise you for you are our strength in difficult days, we may have days that we go through the valley, but then... You show up and lift us up, walk us through, you are always going to be greater than the sum of our circumstances, so this morning we like David lift up a shout of praise, declaring the greatness of your love, our voices will shout your praise, in Jesus' name, Amen!

Scripture:

Micah 5:4

He will stand and shepherd his flock
    in the strength of the Lord,
    in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God.
And they will live securely, for then his greatness
    will reach to the ends of the earth.

In Him

Often when our world turns upside down, we look for a place of rest, places where we can refresh, things that can decompress us when life gets tough.   The only trouble with this is that we don't often look for the right things, or in the right places.   For instance, Paul tells the church in Ephesus this: "Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit". (Ephesians 5:18.)   Why is the contrast important?   Because the effects of wine are temporary, and they never deal with or solve the real issue, the need to be filled, the need to be strengthened, the need for peace, but the Holy Spirit does all this and more.  

Today in our portion, Micah points us to the truth that God has everything we need: our strength, the peace we are looking for, the security we need, His able; He is great; He is mighty.

So today's God-Shot is to rely on Him, to be refreshed in and by Him today.   If you are weak, He has the strength you need; He is the mighty God, if you are suffering, He is the comforter; if you are at un-rest, He is the prince of peace, if you need direction, He is the counselor.

Lord, like David we again today acknowledge that you have "everything" we need.   We look to you today for all of it, our strength, our peace, our wisdom, our understanding, we put our trust in you, our value, we praise you, in Jesus' name, Amen!

Scripture:

Isaiah 9:2

The people walking in darkness
    have seen a great light;
on those living in the land of deep darkness
    a light has dawned.

REDEEMED

If you are like me and you know what it is like to walk in darkness, lost and without help. For me it was one bad decision after another; it was brokenness and drugs and addiction. I was lost, without hope, walking in pure darkness.    It was the entry point of Jesus into my life that changed everything; it was His great light that dispelled the darkness.   So when I read this, my heart is full of praise and worship, knowing what He saved me from and that He was the only one who could.  

If you have someone who is still lost, broken, living without hope, then this is a promise to cling to: Jesus has the power to dispel the darkness in their lives and REDEEM them from the day of their destruction.   That is the HOPE I cling to as I have known the power of Christs work in my own life.

Today's God-Shot is:  Don't lose hope for those whom you love and who are lost; His great light still shines in the darkness; His power to redeem the lost has not diminished or lost its power.  There is hope for the lost, those living in darkness.

Father, I pray that even today you would dispel the darkness in the lives of my family and friends who still need to come to the saving knowledge of your son Jesus Christ, who are living in darkness; shine your marvellous light into their lives, dispel its power, break the chains of addiction and rebellion, move heaven and earth for your Glory, in Jesus' name, Amen!

Scripture:

Job 23:8-10

8 “Look, I go forward, but He is not there,
And backward, but I cannot perceive Him;
9 When He works on the left hand, I cannot behold Him;
When He turns to the right hand, I cannot see Him.
10 But He knows the way that I take;
When He has tested me, I shall come forth as gold.

Better

Today, Job reminds us of some really solid truths we should take to heart.  The first being that although we don't see God or perceive Him, He is still at work.  Job in the midst of all that he was going through, pauses here in Job 23 to remind us that just because you're in a difficult time, in a rough patch, this does not mean that God is not with you in it, at work.   That brings us to something else Job teaches us today here in vv. 10. Job reminds us that what God is doing in our lives will make us better; he uses a metaphor: "I shall come forth as gold."   Well, gold does not come in the state you receive it; it is refined, the impurities are heated out of it, it is refined in the fire, in a process that leaves it purified.    This reminds you and me that what God is doing in your life is for your good, that in the end you will be better than you were before you began, He is always "REFINING" us, to make us better, to give us life, and it is ABUNDANT!

Today's God-Shot:  The PRESENCE of TROUBLE is NOT the ABSENCE of GOD.   Although we might not be able to see God through the smoke in our lives, although things seem difficult now, we will be better on the other side, today if you are in the "REFINING" process, TRUST Him, He is at work in the situation He did not cause to make you better, to refine you, to make you shine.

Lord, I pray we would always trust the process, trust you, that you are working on our behalf, that even when we can't see you through the smoke, the flames of our situation, you are there, working to refine us, make us better, we praise you, we thank you that you have not left us, and are working for us, in Jesus' name, Amen!