Bad Days at the Office

Words from the Lord today.  Lots of them.  Words from the Lord earlier in the week, too.  Pretty deeply hurt about an enormously significant negative career development this past week, but “The LORD is my strength and my shield; My heart trusts in Him, and I am helped; Therefore my heart exults, And with my song I shall thank Him.”  [Psalm 28:7]

Some day I will need to add more commentary to all of these Scriptures that the Lord has put before me the last three days to explain their significance to me in this situation.  For now, it is enough to say that I will humble myself under God’s mighty hand.  In His time He will lift me up.

I have resolved the question about whether or not to speak up.  I will not:

But HE WHO BOASTS IS TO BOAST IN THE LORD.  For it is not he who commends himself that is approved, but he whom the Lord commends.  [2 Cor 10:17-18]

Paul’s resume was pretty impressive, but he didn’t brag about it.  After all, he perceived that everything he had done was pretty inconsequential compared to the things that are really important:

But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ.  More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.  [Phil 3:7-11]

So blessed to be a free man in God’s Spirit.  No man has any claim on me, and that makes the air taste fresh and clean:

Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.  [2 Cor 3:17]

The Bible says elsewhere to be on guard against all forms of greed.  Really, what the Lord has done here for me is a gift and I need to receive it as such.  In my lack of faith I worry about what will become of my career after 45 which appears to be going nowhere and how I will put my kids through college and take care of my wife some day in retirement.  But the Lord knows what I need.  And He knows that what I need most is Him!

Make sure that your character is free from the love of money, being content with what you have; for He Himself has said, “I WILL NEVER DESERT YOU, NOR WILL I EVER FORSAKE YOU,”  [Heb 13:5]

In 5^th grade Sunday School this morning we looked at 1 Samuel 26 where David had the opportunity to kill Saul but refused to because he wanted to leave the matter in God’s hands to deal with Saul.  I found this timely also, only because it is critical for me to remember that the Lord will be my defender.  I don’t need to defend myself.  This is not said to minimize the situation.  Saul was chasing David all over the wilderness trying to kill him.  The prudent thing for David to do was to kill Saul when he had the chance, but his faith in God’s ultimate justice was greater than his fear.  God was looking out for David.  David knew that and it was enough.

Ten days out from running.  Thank the Lord.  He is very tender with me.