The Seed Blog: Son...Ripened Fruit

I know there are a number of people in dire need of this Message today—I personally am one of them. I want to share with you all what God has shared with me. Some will hear these things and think, “Man, you guys must be depressed!” My answer to that is extreme pain and difficulties come to even the most engaged and joyful people. And the burden they bring has nothing to do with depression, but with the passion felt and the helplessness often experienced. So, either your time just hasn’t come yet [hold on tight because it is a guarantee that life will happen], or maybe you’ve allowed yourself to live a bit too carefree because this world has burdened and broken Christ’s heart (the toughest and most joyful of all), and He has called us to share in and carry that weight with Him. When you get to a place in your life for various potential reasons—where you sincerely feel you just have nothing left in you and you don’t have the will to try anymore (relationships, sickness, conflict, sins, ministry, job, family, uncontrollable events that hit like a hammer and often stay); where you feel very alone, as if no one knows quite how badly you are suffering inside (no one sees, appreciates, seemingly cares what’s happening in your life); where you feel you have lost the reason, lost the motivation to keep going anymore; where you question where God is in this moment and you can’t seem to even sense His presence or comfort, and you even wonder if you are in His will anymore; where you’ve done all you can, faithfully and nothing is working out right, nothing is getting better—when we get to this point in our minds and souls, we need consolation and hope desperately. But if that’s all we get (consolation and hope), we have been done an injustice. At this point in our fight we don’t just need comfort, we need courage, perseverance, and a reason to continue the battle or we will quit. We will surrender in the company of empathetic and well-meaning consolers and Satan will win. As we abandon our faith and sacrifice for Our Jesus.

What do you do when you don’t even want to do anymore? How do you find the “encouragement” to press on? First, you realize that you are in great company. You are not the only one who has reached this point, even though Satan will make you feel this way. The majority of the most faithful and obedient servants of God in Scriptures have made it to this point in their journeys: 1 Samuel 1:7-8, 10; 1 Kings 19:4-5; Job 7:3-4, 15-16. And what about David, Naomi, Joseph? The disciples? The list goes on endlessly. What about Jesus, the Messiah? A Man of sorrow, deep grief, filled with burdens (Isaiah 53), weighted down, almost to despair: Matthew 26:37-38. Next, get a firm grasp on the reality and importance of just where you are in these moments—it is possibly one of your most important times with God, possibly your key to mental, emotional and spiritual healing that you would have found and experienced in no other way. How is suffering the key to healing? Because it is in these times when you have no other motivation or hope in your life, that you will decide concretely, wholeheartedly to follow Jesus Christ because he has become your only hope: John 6:68-69. You draw closer to Him for no other reason in your life than because He is worthy because you love Him and because He has become your greatest hope. He becomes the One you cling to with all your might, as we were meant to do all along but were too self-sufficient: Psalms 71:14. It is here that you will learn to trust in faith like never before, that He really is in control. He can make a way out of chaos and mess if you just keep walking, sometimes letting that be all you can do; that others have tremendous value even when they are broken, hurtful, or rejecting as you learn to keep loving selflessly, without reward; that life does not have to be lived in constant comfort, provision or happiness in the moment to be rewarding and full—but often just the opposite. Real living, real purpose, real love is almost always grown, lived out and experienced in some of the toughest, heaviest times of life. It’s these moments that shape, build, and grow who we are and what we hold dear in life, what we cling to, that shape our true joy in living. Through purpose and sacrifice for those things, we learn that victory may not always be in changed circumstances, in physical blessing, or even in removal of pain, but in how deeply you learn to trust, cling to, and honor God; in how deeply you draw nearer to Him in the midst; in how you recognize what is truly important in the life you have been given: Philippians 4:11-13. It’s only in the difficult struggles and costly moments that we truly commit to what we believe in and care about with faith that can only be proven and strengthened in resolve. Don’t waste these opportunities in despair, but embrace them with one goal when you have nothing else left to cling to. Listen to Paul’s motivation when awaiting death in his last imprisonment at Rome: 2 Timothy 2:7-11. Paul says when all is lost, when you have no reason or hope left on which to cling, remember Jesus, the reason you fight, and endure all things for the sake of His children around you. This shows whether you truly love Him more than your life—when His people are more important than your discomfort.
It is difficult to even know where to begin when you are empty and emotionally broken. So, where do you even start? How do you find your way out of Satan’s attacks? 1) Remove any option of quitting. Decide that you will show Jesus Christ, your Savior who died for your soul, that you are in this for Him to any end, until He alone tells you to step away—doing it all for His sake alone, even if nothing changes. Decide to show Him with your life what you’ve claimed with your lips: Galatians 2:20; 2 Corinthians 5:14-15; John 4:34. Your calling is to live the life He has planned for you right now, not the life you decided you should live or have. When pleasing Him is the only motivation you have left, you are living your faith to the fullest, and you have no idea where you will be in a month, a year—no idea what God may be planning to do if you stay. 2) Guard your mind from bitterness and resentment, concerning how you ended up in this trial. Don’t dwell on one more negative thing about your circumstances, what has been done to you, what you’ve lost, or what you can’t accomplish. Focus on truly loving, serving, and praying for those who may even be part of your pain; understanding that your life in Christ is rooted in loving even the broken and undeserving, and that your calling in Him is bigger than your pride or discomfort. Focus on the fact that if God is with you (He is), He will do amazing things you can’t imagine, or He has planned for His glory in your perseverance. Your triumph is not in winning the battle but in your faith-filled obedience in the trial: Daniel 3:17-18. 3) Remove all the distractions that are keeping you from hearing and leaning on Him more deeply. Remove negative talk and gossip. Remove everything keeping you from being with Him now. Understand that prayer and truth are the privilege and power that will carry you through. Prayer and truth keep your perspective in trials; keep your love for others tour focus on His purposes. Prayer and truth keep you clinging to all that matters—Him. Prayer and truth give you hope, worth, and perseverance in His work. Prayer and truth release Him to do amazing things you can’t imagine. Jesus went away into desolate places alone to pray often (when tired, weary, anxious, in need of power and wisdom). If He needed prayer to get through His trials, how much more do we need it? Satan will attempt to steal these things away most of all. 4) Stand ready to give all, lose all. Release your needs, release your identity, release your security, release your desire for acceptance from anyone—give it all to Him alone. Care only about what He thinks of you, care only if you are pleasing Him, obeying Him. Release yourself to His Sovereignty and purpose first. If you can’t do this in troubled times, you never truly surrendered anything in life to Him before. Decide that you are not the most important thing in this situation and refuse to defend your rights; refuse to do only what makes your life better. Let your hope and self-worth rest on these thoughts: I have my God, His love, His salvation, His future. I have one sole purpose—bigger than anything else in life—to follow His desire and see the worth of those around me. Therefore, my course, my focus is unchanged no matter where it leads. Understand that adversity and trials are literally God’s path to often strengthen us beyond our own ability. We are ripened by the Son, in our trials to become so much more than we think possible, do so much more than we would attempt. Muscles only grow with resistance. Soldiers become elite through testing and real experience (battle-hardened soldiers know how to win): James 1:2-4. Don’t waste your chance to grow into the warrior God is Calling because you want to shrink back into your comfort: Hebrews 10:35-38. Maybe one of the biggest reasons for your trials is to learn this one thing. God only works through broken and humble people: Matthew 5:3. [poor]. It means, those who realize they are not the power or the answer or the righteousness. Those that realize they make mistakes are sinful so they will not condemn others. Those that will not rely on what they are capable of doing. Those who are ready to be filled and led by something new and different because they know they can’t do it alone. That is being spiritually poor. Most of us here today are not truly broken and humble enough to let Him flow. And it often takes trials which bring us to the end of ourselves to empty us enough to be filled with something much better. What does it take for Satan and this world to make you quit, to make us miss what God was willing to do through you? Because our lives were too precious to be poured out? Listen to Jesus’ Own Words regarding our perseverance in Him: Luke 14:29, 33; Luke 9:62. Don’t let Satan win. Don’t give in to adversity that crushes, but hold to your purpose. Let these Verses be our security and inspiration: Acts 20:24; Acts 21:13; 2 Corinthians 4:7-9, 17-18.
Never give in to surrender; never stop walking at any cost. Make your single goal when you can’t focus on anything else in your distress be to hold onto Him, follow Him, until you are incredibly victorious or you have honored Him in your sacrifice to the end. Either way, you win. Let your joy in life be that He is working through you. Understand that real life and love are grown in the sacrifice of the battle, not in the rest and ease of life: 1 Corinthians 13:7-8, 13.