Proverbs 3:5, “Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.”

It’s difficult to have trust these days. We don’t know who or where to turn to for accurate information. We seemingly can’t trust anyone – not the media, not an elected official, and now we can’t even trust a lot of preachers either.

What we can absolutely trust is the Word of God. Or rather, we should know we can trust the Word of God. But, like most things stemming from being fallible human beings, the influences of the world and people can muddy the waters of that trust in the Word of God.

Let’s stop for a moment and have a reality check – life is hard. There is a long line of trials waiting their turn in our lives. We can see some of them coming from a distance, and sometimes they sneak from around the corner, but they still come and keep coming. Even if we see them from the distant horizon, it doesn’t make them any easier when they arrive.

I’ll admit that most of the trials I had or am currently having are self-inflicted. I reckon yours are as well. Whether these trials were born a moment ago or from actions or decisions dated years back, when that train comes a’ rolling in, I know immediately it was from my own poor decisions or mistakes. But yes, there are events outside of our control coming from the world and others that cause us trials. Either way, we don’t look forward to them.

Now, when we are knocked down in a trial of some sort, it is easy to fall prey to the tunnel vision that comes with that moment. Our focus is solely on the problem, and like blinders on a horse, we can only see what is in front of us. It is like the saying “not seeing the forest from the trees” because we only see that which is causing us angst and nothing else.

When we turn our attention only to the trial in front of us, our mind’s aperture narrows, leaving everything other than the problem blurred out. This is what happens with our trust in God and in His Word. When we focus in on our present trial, our trust in God gets fuzzy. We need to ask ourselves why.

What I mean, in a different way, is when we have issues with our trust in what the Word of God gives us regarding the surety of God, we need to question our trust level with Him. Why? Because God does not change (Isaiah 40:8; Malachi 3:6; Hebrews 13:8, etc.). We, on the other hand, in our fallen state, do.

When times are good and the faucet of blessings is pouring out, we have great trust in the Lord. Why wouldn’t we, right? Things are great! Yet once that smooth road starts getting bumpy, we begin to falter in our trust. When the blessings stop flowing and only drips or stops, this is when our ‘great’ trust starts forming question marks in and around our minds. We start asking why, not in an attitude of seeking comfort or guidance, but we ask why in a pitiful and condescending attitude toward God.

An unexpected medical diagnosis. Losing a job. A spouse walks out on the family, or a loved one dies too soon. Unexpected and bad things happen. This is life. This is what happens in a fallen world. When things like these occur, we can quickly imitate the unsaved by blaming God instead of having the trust in God that He deserves from us, regardless of the situation. This, in turn, leads us to turn to man and the world for answers and comfort.

When things do go awry, what we need to do and what we commonly do as Christians can turn into a contradiction. We know we need to turn to our faith and prayer to seek God first, and yet, we turn to ourselves or others for answers or comfort, leaving the things of God as a last resort. We are quick to turn to an internet search engine to seek answers man has provided, not God’s Word for wisdom, hope, or comfort.

The question to ask ourselves is, why do we do this? When things are not going so well, why do we turn to the things of man instead of the things of God? Why do we move our trust indicator from God to the world? More than this, why do we turn our trust in Him and question (or ignore) the guidance or direction that God shows us in the moments of trials and tribulations through His Word?

I see it as a matter of holding on to our foundational faith and trust in God and His Word. The key here is to “hold on.”

For those who have played sports or were in the military, you know there is a lot of training involved in these types of activities. Training is what honed and reinforced the basic skills needed, so foundational actions became second nature. Through training and building on the basics, one can face and adapt to challenges because of that foundation beneath them.

The same is true with our faith. To face and come through trials with full trust in God from beginning to end, we need to practice the foundations of trust in God so that when a trial plows into us, we know how to react. It is quite simple to begin this foundational training – just pick up your Bible and begin to read.

Once we begin to learn and practice the foundations of our faith to trust God, we can start to superimpose God’s Word in our lives so we can see God in action, whether in retrospect or in our current moments. Being able to superimpose God’s Word in our experiences creates anchors in our lives for us to reference back to for helping us in current and future trials.

Anchors, for me, are pivotal experiences in my life that are, without a doubt, from God operating through the Holy Spirit or another person or other means. These are very clear and lucid moments that when I recall them, and superimpose God’s Word on them, I am re-grounded in the promises and truths of God. This helps me remember that God is in control, not anyone else, including me, but God and God only.

Again, this happens only when I can superimpose the Word of God on those events. If I am not familiar with the attributes or the ways of God as spelled out in His Word, how can I testify with surety that God was involved or not? I could guess, but that would not be a truthful biblically based assessment.

What I am saying is one cannot superimpose the Word of God in and on their lives without being familiar with the Word of God to be able to recognize that He is involved. If you are not familiar with the Bible, how can you know with certainty what is and is not from God in your lives?

Don’t get me wrong; one doesn’t have to be a Bible scholar to imprint the Word of God on their lives – not at all. The great thing is that as we develop and mature as students of our faith, as we study and become more familiar with the Word of God, we will be able to look back in our personal histories and todays and see the truths of God operating in our lives.

This will give us more confidence in His Word, and with more confidence will come more trust in Him for our now and futures, whether in times of trials or blessings.

God Bless!

Johnflysaught@gmail.com

 

 

 

The forty days between the time God our Heavenly Father raised His Only Begotten Son Jesus from the dead and the moment He called Jesus to depart the earth by ascending up to heaven were an amazing forty days. John 20:1-17 tells much of the story.

That short period of time begins when Mary Magdalene, at sunrise, was the first person to go to the tomb and find it empty. Upon approach, she noticed the stone enclosing the tomb where Jesus had been laid had been rolled away.

Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb and saw two angels in white sitting where Jesus’ body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot. They asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?”

“They have taken my Lord away,” she said, “and I don’t know where they have put Him.”

One of the angels informed her and the other Mary who also had arrived at the tomb that Jesus had risen from the dead.

Imagine the shock but also the thrill Mary must have felt upon hearing such news about Jesus rising from the dead. Her precious Lord and Savior, whom she loved so dearly.

Mary’s heart must have been bursting with hope and excitement, and her mind certainly must have been racing as she thought to tell the other followers of Jesus all about the things she had just seen and heard.

On her way back to the others, she ran into a man on the trail whom she at first mistook for the gardener. He asked her, “Woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?” Thinking He was the gardener, she said “Sir, if you have carried Him away, tell me where you have put Him, and I will get Him.” Then the man spoke her name.

“Mary,” he said, in what to her would have been a very familiar voice.

When she realized it was Jesus, we can only imagine what went through her heart and her mind and her soul.

Mary’s entire being must have leapt with truly unimaginable joy. She turned toward Him and cried out in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” which means teacher.

Jesus said to Mary, “Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father.”

“Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.'”

Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news; “I have seen the Lord!” And she told them about the things He had said to her (John 20).

Up to this time, none of the disciples or other followers of Jesus fully understood what it meant that in three days, Jesus would rise from the dead. The news of Jesus’ rising must at first have sounded too good to be true, mixed with excitement and hope and anticipation of seeing Him again.

The disciples and the women followers of Jesus were all gathered in a large room behind locked doors. The doors were locked due to the concern about what the Sanhedrin-led Jews who crucified Jesus might do to them. It was in this locked room where the risen Jesus first appeared to them all together. Only Thomas was missing.

Because the doors were locked, and yet there in their midst appeared Jesus, they at first thought he must have been a ghost and were frightened. Although Jesus, before the crucifixion, as written in Luke 9:22, had said to them, “The Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised on the third day,” the disciples still were finding it hard to believe what was actually happening in that locked room.

He showed them the nail marks on His hands and feet and the spear mark on His side, and had them touch Him to show them that it was He and that He still had flesh and bones and was not a spirit or a ghost. When He saw that they were still in doubt and acting terrified, He said this: “Have you any food here?” So, they gave Him a piece of broiled fish and some honeycomb. And He took and ate it in their presence.

Then, the disciples realized that it really was Jesus, and they were overjoyed.

I am thinking that overjoyed is an understatement.

It is the best description we have, perhaps, but think about the actual reality of what was happening there in that place.

In all fairness to the disciples, no one had ever seen anything like this. Though they had walked with Him and seen Him do many miracles along the way, His appearing to them, after witnessing what had been done to Him at Calvary, was miraculous and supernatural on a level that, for lack of a better term, blew their minds.

The followers of Jesus thought that they had lost Him after witnessing the brutality and seeming finality of the crucifixion. When they, the disciples and all of the women followers of Jesus, came to grips with the reality that He had indeed risen just as He told them He would do, they really began to understand who He was and who He still is, on a whole other level. They really began to fully comprehend what Jesus meant when He had said, “I and my Father are One” (John 10:30).

Then Jesus said to them, “This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets, and the Psalms.”

Then Jesus opened their minds so they could understand the scriptures. He told them this is what is written: “The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached in His name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with the power from on high” (Luke 44:44-49).

They realized that Jesus was not just the Son of Man and the Son of God but that Jesus was God, the second part of the Holy Trinity. All creation was spoken into existence through Him who appeared risen from the dead and standing in their very midst.

Jesus appeared to them again one week later when Thomas had returned. The story of Thomas is a familiar one. Jesus dispelled the doubts of Thomas by having Thomas touch the wounds, and Thomas fell on his knees and proclaimed, “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28).

Jesus again appeared a third time to some of His disciples at the Sea of Tiberias, where Simon Peter, Thomas, Nathanael, and the sons of Zebedee (James and John) had been fishing during the night but had caught nothing. Early in the morning, Jesus stood on the shore and told them to cast their net on the right side of the boat (John 21:6).

The net filled to the brim with 153 fish. Then John said to Peter, “It is the Lord.” Jesus had some bread and a fire with burning coals and fish cooking on it there on the shore. He called to them, “Come and have breakfast” (John 21:7-12).

After breakfast was when Jesus asked Peter three times, “Do you love me? Then feed my sheep” (John 21:1-17).

On day forty after the Resurrection, when He had led His disciples out to the vicinity of Bethany, He lifted up His hands and blessed them. While He was blessing them, He left them and was taken up into Heaven. Then, they worshiped Him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy. And they stayed continually at the temple praising God (Luke 24:50-53).

The last paragraph in the gospel book of John says that Jesus did many other things as well. “If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written” (John21:25).

In summing up this article called “Between the Resurrection and the Ascension,” I cannot help but wonder if meeting the Lord Jesus and seeing Him face to face for the first time will fill our hearts with a similar kind of joy and amazement and wonder as Mary Magdalene felt when she met Jesus on the trail right after He had risen. I anticipate that it will be the most wonderful thing that has ever happened to each of us who is blessed with the gift of Eternal Salvation.

Whoever may read this, I pray that you will be part of God’s Forever Family. If you have not given your life to the one who gave you your life, today would be a perfect day to do that. Romans 10:9-10 is a beautiful way to begin.

“If you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart man believes unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made to salvation.”

Jesus, I stand in complete awe of you…

Your friend, Rick Segoine