God's Awesome Grace

THE DAILY WORD
By Jim Seekamp

Monday January 7, 2008

I've heard people give all kinds of reasons why they thought that God was "no longer working through them", or that God had them "on the shelf until they learned something". That kind of thinking is entirely unscriptural. It is often when we seem to be blowing it the worst that God's greatest works are brought forth in our lives!

Paul was a great example of this:

Acts 21:4 (NIV)
Finding the disciples there, we stayed with them seven days. THROUGH THE SPIRIT they urged Paul not to go on to Jerusalem.

Acts 21:10,11 (NIV)
10. After we had been there a number of days, a prophet named Agabus came down from Judea. 11. Coming over to us, he took Paul's belt, tied his own hands and feet with it and said, "The Holy Spirit says, `In this way the Jews of Jerusalem will bind the owner of this belt and will hand him over to the Gentiles.'"

These are just two of the many times that the Holy Spirit warned Paul not to go to Jerusalem. But it was Paul's wish to go there, so he went, and as a result he spent the rest of his life a prisoner. But despite Paul's blatant disobedience, God continued to work through him, and even used him to write half the New Testament!!

Paul wrote about his own imperfection in a way we can all relate to:

Romans 7:15 (NIV)
I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.

I've seen people that were involved with a ministry that they were clearly not called to, and yet God was blessing them in the areas where they were standing on His Word, because God requires Himself to do so!!

I even heard one minister tell how he spent over 10 years in the pastoral ministry before he finally got the revelation from the Holy Spirit that God had never called him to pastor in the first place!! God used him greatly over those years he pastored, but his new ministry went into a totally new high gear once he started walking in it!! And yet God's grace was upon him, blessing him all those years he pastored.

None of us has the slightest idea how great God's grace is upon us, His children. He loves us so immensely that He will just LOOK for ways to bless us!! Even if we totally ignore His leadings, if we are putting His Word to work in any area of our lives, He is REQUIRED BY HIS OWN WORD to bless us in that area of our lives anyway!!!

PRAYER
Thank You Father for Your Word that tells me the spiritual truths that will bless my life as well as the lives of others. Help me to stay strongly motivated to renew my mind. Help me understand Your Word as I study and learn Your ways.
In Jesus' Name, Amen

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