Words Of Encouragement For Your Day (Wednesday 10/19/2011)

It’s Not An Option!

Colossians 1:10-12 Amplified Bible (AMP)

¹⁰That you may walk (live and conduct yourselves) in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to Him and desiring to please Him in all things, bearing fruit in every good work and steadily growing and increasing in and by the knowledge of God [with fuller, deeper, and clearer insight, acquaintance, and recognition].  [We pray] that you may be invigorated and strengthened with all power according to the might of His glory, [to exercise] every kind of endurance and patience (perseverance and forbearance) with joy, Giving thanks to the Father, Who has qualified and made us fit to share the portion which is the inheritance of the saints (God's holy people) in the Light.

Lamentations 3:21-23 Amplified Bible (AMP)

²¹But this I recall and therefore have I hope and expectation: ²²It is because of the Lord's mercy and loving-kindness that we are not consumed, because His [tender] compassions fail not.²³They are new every morning; great and abundant is Your stability and faithfulness.
   

Have you ever had a day, a week, a month, or  a year, that you thought to yourself, “if one more thing happens I am just going to lose it and go postal, or snap on someone?”  Or in those moments you felt like just throwing in the towel, because you were thinking, “Jesus has left the building.”  Like many of you I have been in a season like that.  I can honestly say through all the praying, counseling, interceding, and pressing I have done with and for others, it appeared my prayers were going unanswered and frustration and struggle had set in.  I was thinking “My God what in the world is going on up in here?”  I began to check my life, I began to ask myself and God “did I do something wrong, what is it, Lord?”  It appeared that everything I was involved in outside of helping others was a struggle, a battle, warfare, and even that was beginning to be crazy as well.  But my husband the motivator that He is said “no matter what Lisa, failure is not an option.”  I wish I could honestly say in those moments when he said that something clicked in me and everything was all better and perspective rained down from heaven, but it didn’t instead I wanted to scream, I think I even thought about pinching him.

            This morning as I was lying in bed praying before the sun came up, feeling frustrated because although I had been praying, faithful and steadfast, NOTHING and I do mean Nothing had changed.  In those silent moments I heard my husband’s voice, failure is not an option.  But this time when I heard it I understood, it was not just what my husband meant, but it was, God failing or even remotely looking like a failure was not an option.  Many times we look at things not happening and or doors closing as God failing us, or even when God allows us to be caught in something, or He allows circumstances where we are forced to change a mode of operation or thinking, we think God has failed us or we have failed.  We think that things not turning out the way we need them to or want them to is us being let down, or us being unsuccessful, but what if the letdown, the lack of God moving, the door closing is actual our success, or our set up for a comeback in a way better than we could have imagined?  It is when the pressure is on and the walls are closing in and the enemy appears to have the upper hand that is when we that is it not our lack of faith or doing something wrong, it is because of our faith and because of our willingness to persevere that we are in the position we are in.  This is not the time to give up, because truly failure is not an option.  God is not a God that fails at anything, nor is He a God that fails us; it may not be in our timing or in our way BUT He always succeeds and He always gets the victory.

            Today no matter what it is looks like or feels like, understand that our praise is in the press, or testimony is in the test, that our joy is a result of the journey and that our outcome is in the overcoming!  Do not make it an option to lie down and die, spiritually, mentally, emotionally or physically.  Don’t surrender your peace, joy, love or your happiness, fight to stay in the race.  If you have run out of strength remember God has all the strength, mercy, grace and favor that you need to make it to the place that you have persevered, overcome and obtained your victory. A place He has again proved Himself as Lord, King, Ruler, Supplier, Victor and Subduer.  Don’t quit, Don’t stop, your faithfulness is not going unnoticed just because He isn’t responding as we need or want Him to in the moments we think we need or want Him to. God is always on time and Always doing more than we can think or ask of Him.  Hang in there with Him, press, praise, and persevere with Him, as He has done so many times with us!