The seed of faith, the fruit of praise!
Illus. from the book Guide posts, “ His mysterious ways: miracles of healing”
What I remember most about the summer of 1934, when dad got his tonsils out, that’s how hot it was. The middle of July in Blackwood, Virginia, and we hadn’t seen a drop of rain or felt a cool breeze for days.
The ground was parched, the flowers drooping. Normally, I could at least cool down with a ice cold drink. The iceman hadn’t been around for weeks, and the last block of ice in our icebox have long since melted.
My dad was recovering from his operation in the downstairs bedroom when mom rushed out to the kitchen telephone. She called The doctors office. He’s hemorrhaging badly, she said, urgency was in her voice. What can we do?
Then I heard her repeat the doctors instructions. Ice, make a compress of ice and pack it around his throat. But there was no ice to be found for miles around.
We lived 10 miles from town. Dad couldn’t be moved and mom didn’t dare leave him. She tried wrapping dad‘s neck with cloths drenched in Coldwater, but it was of no use.
His throat kept swelling and he was still bleeding. Tears feeling her eyes, mom said brokenly, “Lord, you take over. I’m lost and don’t know what to do.” I was worried so I wailed a prayer of my own, “I said God please help my daddy, please God.”
Mom took me in her arms just as the wind begin to blow, the sky grew dark as dusk, then simply opened up. The overwhelming hammering noise on the roof was quite deafening. My mother then kissed me on the forehead.
She grabbed a pail and ran outside. Soon she was back, and in 15 minutes my father’s bleeding had been stopped by the large balls of ice she collected, which had miraculously fallen from the Heaven scent hailstorm.
So lift your hands and praise the Lord, for He is good, and His mercy endures forever! (Psalm 106:1)
Nothing is impossible when you stop trying to figure things out on your own and put your world, and your future in the hands of God!
Hebrews 13:15
15. Therefore by Him let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name.
Sacrifice infers, doing something even when you don’t feel like doing something. TBS here, it is the fruit of giving thanks from our lips!
What is fruit?
noun
1. 1. ?the sweet and fleshy product of a tree or other plant that contains seed and can be eaten as food.
Our Faith is the seed, our praise in our time of need, is the fruit produced from the seed of our faith! Both together moves God to supply the harvest of the miracles we desire!
TBS that God inhabits our praise and worship! Simply put, God loves and enjoys the fruit, our faith, praise and thanksgiving Produces!
Illus. by Kyle Rye
SIT DOWN AND ENJOY LIFE
There was a rich industrialist who was disturbed to find a fisherman sitting lazily behind his boat.
"Why aren't you out there fishing?" he asked
"Because I've caught enough fish for today," said the fisherman.
"Why don't you catch more fish than you need?" the rich man asked.
"What would I do with them?" said the fisherman.
"You could earn more money," came the impatient reply, "and buy a better boat so you could go deeper and catch more fish. You could then purchase nylon nets, catch even more fish, and make more money. Soon you'd have a fleet of boats and be rich like me."
The fisherman asked, "Then what would I do?"
"You could sit down and enjoy life," said the industrialist.
"What do you think I'm doing now?" the fisherman replied.
God didn’t make life complicated. But the fall of man and sin with the accusers relentless help, has made life seem complicated and at times overwhelming!
Psalms 55:22,23 MSG
Pile your troubles on God’s shoulders—
he’ll carry your load, he’ll help you out.
He’ll never let good people
topple into ruin.
But you, God, will throw the others
into a muddy bog,
Cut the lifespan of assassins
and traitors in half.
And I trust in you.
God says, cast your troubles on me and I’ll take of your troubles, and the ones who cause you trouble as well!
Psalms 91:9-11 NKJ
9. Because you have made the Lord, who is my refuge,
Even the Most High, your dwelling place,
10. No evil shall befall you,
Nor shall any plague come near your dwelling;
11. For He shall give His angels charge over you, To keep you in all your ways.
Even though the word says angels, which indicates God is capable of delegating as many angels as needed to take care of and to watch over you, still some folks find trusting God difficult, because of the fear of the unknown!
TBS the Love Of God casteth out all fear!
God knows the unforeseeable of the unknown, God knows what’s around the corner, He knows what’s up around the bend. God knows and that’s all we need to know and that’s where the hard part of, “that’s enough” comes in!
The simplicity of resting in the fact that God knows! Because we always feel like we need to know more!
TBS. He will open doors that no man can shut and close doors that no man can open.
We say we believe and are good with God being in charge of our destiny, but sometimes its kind of hard to not want to help God be the doorman and open all the doors, when we think with have the answer or solutions figured out before God does!
When were good with the solution that we come up with, we end up being a settler. And anyone willing to be a settler, will never see the best and abundant life God wants for us!
In essence, we’re good with settling for the mediocrity of human nature, and by doing so completely miss the extravagance God is willing and capable of delivering!
Illus. by Ryan Johnson?
MISSING THE CIRCUS
A little boy who lived far out in the country in the late 1800s had reached the age of twelve and had never in all his life seen a circus. You can imagine his excitement, when one day a poster went up at school announcing that on the next Saturday a traveling circus was coming to the nearby town.
He ran home with the glad news and the question, "Daddy, can I go?"
Although the family was poor, the father sensed how important this was to the lad. "If you do your Saturday chores ahead of time," he said, "I’ll see to it that you have the money to go."’
Come Saturday morning, the chores were done and the little boy stood by the breakfast table, dressed in his Sunday best. His father reached down into the pocket of his overalls and pulled out a dollar bill-the most money the little boy had possessed at one time in all his life. The father cautioned him to be careful and then sent him on his way to town.
The boy was so excited, his feet hardly seemed to touch the ground all the way. As he neared the outskirts of the village, he noticed people lining the streets, and he worked his way through the crowd until he could see what was happening. Lo and behold, it was the approaching spectacle of a circus parade!
The parade was the grandest thing this lad had ever seen. Caged animals snarled as they passed, bands beat their rhythms and sounded shining horns, midgets performed acrobatics while flags and ribbons swirled overhead.
Finally, after everything had passed where he was standing, the traditional circus clown, with floppy shoes, baggy pants, and a brightly painted face, brought up the rear.
As the clown passed by, the little boy reached into his pocket and took out that precious dollar bill. Thinking he had seen all there was to see, he handed the money to the clown, turned around and went home without ever have even seen the show.
When trusting God with all the details and having the faith to wait for the end results, it doesn’t take very long to realize there is nothing mediocre about God’s methods or abilities for producing results!
Ezekiel 37:1-10 MSG
1-2 God grabbed me. God’s Spirit took me up and set me down in the middle of an open plain strewn with bones. He led me around and among them—a lot of bones! There were bones all over the plain—dry bones, bleached by the sun.
3 He said to me, “Son of man, can these bones live?”
I said, “Master God, only you know that.”
4 He said to me, “Prophesy over these bones: ‘Dry bones, listen to the Message of God!’”
5-6 God, the Master, told the dry bones, “Watch this: I’m bringing the breath of life to you and you’ll come to life. I’ll attach sinews to you, put meat on your bones, cover you with skin, and breathe life into you. You’ll come alive and you’ll realize that I am God!”
7-8 I prophesied just as I’d been commanded. As I prophesied, there was a sound and, oh, rustling! The bones moved and came together, bone to bone. I kept watching. Sinews formed, then muscles on the bones, then skin stretched over them. But they had no breath in them.
9 He said to me, “Prophesy to the breath. Prophesy, son of man. Tell the breath, ‘God, the Master, says, Come from the four winds. Come, breath. Breathe on these slain bodies. Breathe life!’”
10 So I prophesied, just as he commanded me. The breath entered them and they came alive! They stood up on their feet, a huge army.
What kind of need do you have this morning? Do you need God to deliver a death to life, ARMY OF AN ANSWER? He can, He’s willing and He’s able!
If you are willing to believe, God is willing to deliver death defying results in your life, against every need you come across, every time you believe!
Nothings hard for God, Nothing! Results are easy for God!
We’re not responsible for results, and the moment we stop production on the “act of producing the results,” the results will become easier and more better than we could ever expect!
Wether it’s bringing to life an army from dry bones, or making ice fall from the sky on a hot summer day, nothing is impossible from the seed of faith and the fruit of praise in the God of all possibilities!
Amen?
