I remember hearing a story about a man, a professor at a very renowned school, something like DTS. He was very well respected by his students and fellow staff members. One of the students got up the courage to approach him on his way home one day and posed the question, "Professor, what do you do during the dry times?". The man's reply was pretty astounding...he said, "why son, I don't have dry times..." Now I can't say with any real certainty whether this is true or not, maybe he has a bad memory, or perhaps his dry times are so inexplicably horrible that he has suppressed them in his mind. However, honestly I'd like to believe that he was telling the truth. The more that I read about joy, grace, and the true nature of our relationship to Christ I am inclined to think that we are all promised the prospect of never having dry times in our relationship with the Lord. I'm not entirely certain that this is true, but it's something to think on. If this man was telling the truth then the only way that he could have possibly gotten to that point in his life is by not making excuses.
We make excuses for the hardening of our hearts by calling them dry times. By saying, "The Lord is leading me into a drought right now...He must want to teach me something." Now, we do learn things from the dry times no doubt, but I think that we miss one of the biggest lessons that God wants to teach us every time. It's to quit making excuses. Some of you may say, "Well God is soverign and He is always leading us." YES! You are right! God is always leading but we are not always following. We lose our way, and when we lose our way, one baby step at a time usually, we end up wandering in the desert.
I want to make myself abundantly clear on this one point, there is a major difference between dry times and hard times. But almost always it's hard times, whether big or small, befall us just before the dry times hit. I believe that it's because we let the hard times do exactly what they have come to do, to rob us of our joy. Our joy of life, in Christ. David says this many times, "The Joy of the lord is my Strength!!" Nehemiah 8:10 "Do not grieve, for the Joy of the Lord is your strength." If we really believe what the Bible says is truth then how incredibly essential is it for us to find out what this means! If the joy of the Lord is supposed to be our strength then what does that look like???
As we get older, and as I touched on before, we get more and more cynical. Life is not about joy it's about getting by. Doing the best with what we've been given, and if we are really honest most of us have been dealt pretty crappy hands. Joy is compartmentalized into a rare experience. As we shuffle through the photo album of memories that is our life joy only seems to flash on the page once in a short while. Like a cameo appearance of an over glorified hollywood star in some British B-movie comedy. John Eldridge describes it as meeting a stranger on an airplane. You hit it off, exchange some witty dialogue, have a few drinks and then part ways. You think back on the trip and think, "well that was nice" and then go on living your life. So are we really living life as the joy of the Lord as our strength? I don't think that most of us are. I don't know how to get to that point, or even where to start, but I plan on finding out. I hope that those of you reading this will find it a worthwhile mission of your own. Thank you again for reading and God Bless!
2 comments:
"The joy of the Lord is my strength." Wow, bro you've no idea what an encouragement your last blog has been for me. Since Angie's death this verse has been playing over and over and over in my mind. I've been struggling back and forth wrestling with the concept of joy and wondering why I don't always have it. Ange had it that's for sure. Every time I think of her I think of her smile, laugh and this verse. I agree with you 100% that God is not the one with the problem, He never changes. He is always faithful, He is always there. I make excuses and rely on fleeting emotions and am constantly forgetting that happiness is not the same thing as joy. I will go through hard times and I won't always be happy but I know I can have joy and peace when things get tough. My commitment to Christ is more than an emotional response it is a daily choice, a lifelong determination to pick up my cross and follow Him. Thanks for your honesty and insight my brothah from anothah mothah. I'm praying for ya.
Jason G.
Joy, like love, is a choice that inspires a feeling. The cool thing about these two concepts is that they are virtues not feelings.
I think many in our society get that messed up. I like to think of these two virtues as gifts that you can give and gifts that you can receive.
Just an opinion, but I know that thinking this way has helped me.
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