Trusting God

The Forever Things

Jesus Is Lord, Sanctification

“The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever,” Isaiah 40:8

Several months ago, while washing dishes, I noticed a small hairline crack in the granite countertop behind my kitchen faucet. It alarmed me. Having been built in 2019, my house is still new in my mind. As the months passed, the crack spread and deepened. Recently, my husband and I purchased a granite repair kit and worked together to fill and paint over the very noticeable crack.

As we worked, I kept thinking about the fact that nothing remains the same. Obviously, I know this. But my mind was pondering about so many things. My car, which was also purchased in 2019, is having issues. The exterior of our house needs scrubbing. The once beautiful lawn has been invaded with stickers. The trampoline is rusting. My 37-year-old hair is changing and sprouting tiny greys. My lower back feels like it’s 60. Slight wrinkles are developing near my eyes. We build things with our own hands, and our work will inevitably face wilt or decay. Our minds absorb, learn, and then flesh out what we’ve learned, then our work is forgotten.

You get the point because you have your own list culminating in your mind.

My list is soft, normal, and definitely first-world problems. I have no room for complaints, yet I complain.

Things in this life fade. We wither away with age.

It’s actually pretty depressing to think about. I can see where a perspective of hopelessness could overtake one’s mind.

But, as Christ followers, a hopeless perspective shouldn’t be our permanent residence.

Because we know that our hope is not bound in the work of our hands, the longevity of our homes and vehicles, or our own young and healthy bodies.

Life would be hopeless if those are the things we are placing our hope in. Because they will never last nor will they satisfy us for long.

Nothing in this world lasts forever.

The only reasonable response would be for us to hope in something not bound to this world.

The only thing not bound to this world is THE Creator of this world. Our holy and good God.

In Isaiah chapter 40, God is comforting His people that have been in exile. Part of God’s perfect comforting is His declarative promise that only He can be utterly and completely trusted. Because He is the only true and trusted One, His words are infallible and remain forever as infallible and cannot decay or be void of truth.

“The grass withers, the flower fades when the breath of the LORD blows on it; surely the people are grass. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever,” (Isaiah 40:7-8 ESV).

I want the forever things.

I want my hope to remain on the only thing that will stand forever…The Word of our God.

Isaiah 55:10-11 says,

“For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.”

Our purposes go unaccomplished often and are filled with emptiness that evoke hopelessness apart from God. As Believers our hope should be intertwined in the character and promises of God, not that of our own human motives and accomplishments. It should thrill us to serve a God Who is unchanged by His changing world corrupted by the sin of man.

I do not like change. I enjoy and thrive in order, schedules, and well-made and kept plans. This dislike of change has become a big area of sanctification for me over the last decade. What a gift this specific area of sanctification has been in growing me closer to my Holy and good God. He has brought to the center of my heart and my perspective His sovereignty and His perfect reign as my life has experienced seasons of intense changes.

He has made it a solid truth in my soul and spirit that I cannot look to anything in this world to place my faith or hope in or seek comfort from as I attempt to avoid or surrender to the many changes of life.

There have been seasons that many things in this world have given me false securities of hope and comfort. Like the list above—Having a beautiful home, a reliable vehicle, a well-paying job, a healthy body, a mind that thinks and creates, hands that accomplish work, pretty things, a husband, wonderful children, church, ministry, goals, past accomplishments and the pursuit of future ones. None of these things are inherently wrong. But they all have one thing in common… They will not last forever.

Decay, wilt, deterioration, inevitable change, age, and death will happen. All things in this world will succumb to an unavoidable end. They will not last forever, ever.

I want the forever things.

If the Word of God is the forever thing, then everything in His Word should be worth our attention and seeking. We should feed on His Word like it were food, because it is. Jesus says this in His human hunger as He was being tempted by the devil in the wilderness forty days and forty nights.

“Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God,” (Matthew 4:4 ESV).

The forever things are found in God’s Word.

The forever things are bound up in seeking God. We cannot truly seek the One True God without seeking Him first and foremost in His Holy Word.

The forever things are bound up in knowing God. We cannot truly know the God of the Bible without knowing His beautiful, all-powerful, life-giving, Holy Word.

The forever things are bound up in loving God. We know from His Word that we only love because He first loved us (1 John 4:19). We know as Believer’s, His ardent love for us is a gift rooted in His wonderful mercy that will always be undeserved on our part.

The forever things are bound up in trusting God. When God has drawn us to faith and repentance, we are made justified before Him through the ordained, perfect work of His Son, Jesus, at the Cross of Calvary. We are made alive and a new creation in Christ Jesus! (Ephesians 2:1-10). How could we not find Him trustworthy in all matters of our life? We should trust unwaveringly, but we don’t. But we get to spend our earthly lives practicing our trust through continually seeking and knowing more of who God is through His Word. We get to study how much He loves us. Because He is faithful, He will grow our trust in Him.

The forever things are what our holy and good God says are essential and imperative for His children: picking up our cross, and following Him (Matthew 16:24-28), keeping His commandments (John 14:15-17), abiding in Him (John 15:4-5), loving one another as He has loved us (John 15:12-13), bearing fruit that abides (John 15:16), loving our enemies and praying for those who persecute us (Matthew 5:44), going and making disciples of all nations (Matthew 28:19), being holy for He is holy (1 Peter 1:13-16), rejoicing always, praying without ceasing, giving thanks in all circumstances (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18).

This list is inexhaustive, but it’s a good start for us to submerge our thoughts and affections for the forever things.

I pray you have an urgency rooted in God’s grace to be a continual student of His scriptures. I pray you love the wisdom that consumes His Word. I pray you love His commands and boundaries laid out for His children. I pray you humbly recognize His sovereignty on display from eternity past, present, and eternity future. I pray you are stirred to submit under His wonderful and perfect authority in all things, knowing that He is the only One that is immutable and all-sufficient.

The grass withers, as we all will do in this life. The flower fades, as do all things in this life.

I pray you joyfully seek the forever things… the life-giving, sustaining, unfading, imperishable, permanent, immutable, all-sufficient, infallible, inherent Word of God.  

“All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work,” (2 Timothy 3:16-17 ESV),  

I Trust my God, I Trust my God, I Trust my God

Ardently His,
Jess

Our Sovereign Lord

Sanctification, Trusting God

“For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.” Colossians 1:16-17 ESV

When I consider my life, I see an abundance of blessings that I don’t deserve even a little bit. I see the mercies of my great God. Yet, still, I contemplate discontentment. I entertain the lie that I deserve more. More of what I ask myself. More excitement in daily life? More time? More space? More accolades for meaningless accomplishments? Just more.

I don’t like it in the headspace of longing for “the more” of life. These notions plagued me recently on a beautiful sunshine day as I played outside with my young daughter. We made our way to our backyard trampoline and looked up at the beautiful blue skies. Above us was an enormous pine tree. As we sat taking in the beauty of the nature designed by our most creative God, I started studying the pinecones and pine needles on the tree overhead. I witnessed several pine needles fall from the tree at different times. My spirit became overwhelmed with the thought that my God ordered those needles to fall from the pines.

My heart and soul were filled with questions to my glorious God. “How many pine needles did you order to this tree?” “How many needles have you told to fall today?” “How many needles are left on this tree?”

Pine needles on a tree stirred my wandering heart to meditate on the sovereignty of my boundless God who authorizes every molecule, dust particle, and pine needle to move.

And if my God Who created the blazing sun, the shining night moon, the stunning stars, sets boundaries for every wave, limits the heights of mountains, numbers the clouds, commands the lightening strikes, and so much more…If He is ceaselessly in tune with His creation so much so that He ordered these pine needles to fall… Then in His sovereignty, He has undeniably ordered my steps to this place in my personal walk with Him.

My God is an intimate, loving, merciful, gracious, personal, trustworthy, and sovereign God.

Over the last decade plus, the Holy Spirit has led me to an endless study on the sovereignty of our magnificent God. I notice when I’m attracted to the world around me and my heart is being seduced by “the more’s” of life, I’m not ruminating in His sovereign ways. My mind and heart are distracted with the clutters of life and I’m neglecting the truth of Who my God is and who I am in Him.

I know I reference this a lot—but what a present reproof is to the believer. It’s a present I want to open daily for the rest of my life. It’s a gift that is so rich and good and aligns our hearts back to truth repeatedly. Praise the Lord for His loving reprimands.

I love John Piper’s definition of Sovereignty and Providence, “God’s sovereignty is His right and power to do all that He decides to do. God’s providence is His wise and purposeful sovereignty.”

So, in God’s sovereignty he has every right and all the power to do as He wills. But, because of the character of God, His providence is displayed through His wise and purposeful sovereignty.

There are so many examples of God’s sovereignty being recognized from saints of the past in scripture, but one that has recently stuck out to me is David’s recognition of God’s sovereignty when King Saul literally spent years chasing him across Isreal with the intentions to murder him out of jealousy.

David had the opportunity more than once to put Saul to death and end the cat and mouse game they had been playing for far too long. When David and his men were sitting in the innermost parts of a cave, and Saul entered the cave to relieve himself, David could have killed Saul right there. Against the words of his men, David, trusting God, chose to only cut a piece of Saul’s robe off rather than assassinate him as most would say he deserved. David says in 1 Samuel 24:6, “The LORD forbid that I should do this thing to my lord, the LORD’s anointed, to put out my hand against him, seeing he is the LORD’s anointed.”

It is evident that David trusts God’s sovereign rule over how long Saul would remain king, God’s current chosen and anointed one. David knows God’s timing is perfect, and he is not called to attempt to intervene with what God has already sovereignly ordained.

This is so encouraging to me. I can’t imagine all that David went through in the years of constant fleeing from Saul’s sword. Can you imagine relentlessly looking over your shoulders? Can you imagine the mental torment trying to figure out who you can trust when the king of the land is set on ending your life? We know from the beautiful Psalms that David wrote during this time that he indeed warred with discontentment and was ailed with many questions to God’s sovereign plan. But, when it came down to David’s heart showing through circumstances, it is evident that the Lord was at work in Him and He was sealed by God’s sovereign protection…and David recognized it.

I want to recognize God’s sovereignty in my life, too. I want God’s sovereignty to be on my mind as soon as I awake in the morning. I want it to be one of the last things I ponder when I close my eyes at night. I want God’s sovereignty to pervade every perspective and decision in my life. I want my life to reflect a heart stance that trusts my God’s sovereign reign over everything.

I want this. However, I must confess, I fail miserably at abiding in Who God is and submitting to His sovereign authority in my life.

But, as I watched the pine needles float seemingly aimlessly through the air to the ground, I was consumed with the notion and truth that they weren’t merely floating aimlessly. Each pine needle was at my sovereign God’s rule. They wouldn’t have loosened from their original place on the tree if God didn’t order them to. If these insignificant pine needles are on my God’s radar and under His authority, then why do I doubt He sees me, His child, and is permanently lovingly governing my life in a way that brings Him the most glory and the best to me? Why is it so easy to doubt and feed unbelief in God’s sovereignty?

Paul writes powerful words influenced by the Holy Spirit that magnifies God’s supremacy over all creation. “For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent” (Colossians 1:16-18 ESV).

When we seek God for Who He is and not merely what we want Him to do in our lives, we will discover deep intimacy with our great God. In this intimacy we won’t be able to deny His sovereignty. We will see His sovereign rule stretching from His gift of eternal salvation for His children that He determined before the foundation of the world, to the pine needle falling to the ground. All of it is by Him, through Him, and for Him.

This intimacy we discover will no doubt deepen our trust in our wonderful Lord. Though, on this side of glory, we will never understand so many mysteries of God, our lives, or the wonders of heaven, but we can rest in knowing He is sovereign in the mysteries. He is sovereign in our heartaches, tears, and griefs. He knows what ails us. He knows the griefs that may silently consume us at times. He knows each tear that has left our eyes. In fact, He has them numbered. David writes in Psalm 56:8, “You have kept count of my tossings; put my tears in your bottle. Are they not in your book?” Oh, what sweet intimacy the Lord offers His children as He displays His ardent love for us.

Though the depths of God’s perfect design will never be comprehended to its full capacity in the here and now, we also know from scripture that God is sovereign even over sin. This does not purport that God causes or condones sin. But He is sovereign over it as He’s not surprised by our many sins. He even uses our sin for our good and His glory. Paul writes in Romans 8:28, “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” What a gracious and grand Heavenly Father we have that He uses even the darkest, most secret parts of our heart and actions and uses it for His divine glory.

The Psalmist writes of our God’s divine sovereignty in Psalm 135, “For I know that the LORD is great, and that our LORD is above all gods. Whatever the LORD pleases, he does, in heaven and on earth, in the seas and all deeps. He it is who makes the clouds rise at the end of the earth, who makes lightnings for the rain and brings forth the wind from his storehouses” (Psalm 135:5-7 ESV).

If you find yourself in wanderings of the heart and being tantalized by the fading sparkle of the world as you question God’s plans for your current lot in life, I want to encourage you to immerse yourself in the truth of God’s sovereignty. Soak in His scriptures and ask Him to reveal His sovereignty in every Bible reading and in every area of your life. As believers, our fleeting lives are not about us, but all about our glorious God who set His affections on us though we reek of total depravity. His affections for us burned with absolute commitment to His glory as He planned for us to remain with Him for eternity by sending His Son Jesus to live sinlessly, undergo crucifixion, and bear the holy wrath of God to atone for the sins of the saints. Our God is good. Our God is merciful to those He chooses to show mercy. Our God is just to those He doesn’t show mercy to. Our God is sovereign over all, and all is unto His glory.

I Trust my God, I Trust my God, I Trust my God

Ardently His,

Jess Dennis