Hello All...read this devo by John Piper today and really enjoyed
it...thought you might too! I love the imagery in the verses he
provides..."And I will be to her a wall of fire all around, declares
the Lord, and I will be the glory in her midst." He doesn't say he
might be...he says "I WILL BE"....enjoy
WHAT TO DO IF YOU WAKE UP FEELING FRAGILE
There are mornings when I wake up feeling fragile. Vulnerable. It's
often vague. No single threat. No one weakness. Just an amorphous
sense that something is going to go wrong and I will be responsible.
It's usually after a lot of criticism. Lots of expectations that have
deadlines and that seem too big and too many.
As I look back over about 50 years of such periodic mornings, I am
amazed how the Lord Jesus has preserved my life. And my ministry. The
temptation to run away from the stress has never won out — not yet
anyway. This is amazing. I worship him for it.
How has he done this? By desperate prayer and particular promises. I
agree with Spurgeon: I love the "I wills" and the "I shalls" of God.
Instead of letting me sink into a paralysis of fear, or run to a
mirage of greener grass, he has awakened a cry for help and then
answered with a concrete promise.
Here's an example. This is recent. I woke up feeling emotionally
fragile. Weak. Vulnerable. I prayed: "Lord help me. I'm not even sure
how to pray."
An hour later I was reading in Zechariah, seeking the help I had cried
out for. It came. The prophet heard great news from an angel about
Jerusalem:
Jerusalem shall be inhabited as villages without walls, because of the
multitude of people and livestock in it. And I will be to her a wall
of fire all around, declares the Lord, and I will be the glory in her
midst. (Zechariah 2:4–5)
There will be such prosperity and growth for the people of God that
Jerusalem will not be able to be walled in any more. "The multitude of
people and livestock" will be so many that Jerusalem will be like many
villages spreading out across the land without walls.
But walls are necessary! They are the security against lawless hordes
and enemy armies. Villages are fragile, weak, vulnerable. Prosperity
is nice, but what about protection?
To which God says in Zechariah 2:5, "I will be to her a wall of fire
all around, declares the Lord." Yes. That's it. That is the promise.
The "I will" of God. That is what I need. And if it is true for the
vulnerable villages of Jerusalem, it is true for me a child of God.
God will be a "wall of fire all around me." Yes. He will. He has been.
And he will be.
And it gets better. Inside that fiery wall of protection he says, "And
I will be the glory in her midst." God is never content to give us the
protection of his fire; he will give us pleasure of his presence.
This was sweet to me. This carried me for days. I took this with me to
the pulpit. I took it with me to family gatherings. I took it to staff
meetings. I took it to phone calls and emails.
This has been my deliverance every time since I was first marking my
King James Bible at age 15. God has rescued me with cries for help and
concrete promises. This time he said: "I will be to her a wall of fire
all around, and I will be the glory in her midst."
Cry out to Him. Then ransack the Bible for His appointed promise. We
are fragile but HE is not.
Zechariah 2:4-5
God Bless
Jon Abercrombie
http://holybloggers.blogspot.com
