Patient Prayer

Wednesday, October 11, 2023

The Lord is my light and my salvation—so why should I be afraid?  The Lord is my fortress, protecting me from danger, so why should I tremble?

 …Teach me how to live, O Lord.  Lead me along the right path, for my enemies are waiting for me.  Do not let me fall into their hands.  For they accuse me of things I’ve never done; with every breath they threaten me with violence.  Yet I am confident I will see the Lord’s goodness while I am here in the land of the living.  Wait patiently for the Lord.  Be brave and courageous.  Yes, wait patiently for the Lord.  Psalm 27:1, 11-14

Did you ever do that thing as a kid (or – gulp – as an adult)?  The pastor preached on being patient in prayer, waiting on God’s answer…and your prayer was more like, God, show me a sign and I’ll believe…I mean, right NOW, God!

The author of this Psalm was undoubtedly King David.  It is a prayer laid at God’s feet to do-with as God will.  He asked for God to teach him how to live in the crisis of a lifetime.  He was completely innocent in his thoughts and actions for which powerful people had targeted him.  He tried to live a clean, useful, and Godly life, but he’d been unjustly accused.  In this pickle David lifted his life towards the God who had always rescued and blessed him, and said:  Lord, I need an answer, and I’ll wait…no matter how long it takes.  This is patient prayer!

There are those times when we shoot a prayer heavenward in a crisis.  Before the days of cell phones I was on a dark road one night, and the muffler fell off my old car.  It was still attached, but dragging, and I couldn’t untangle it from the mess of bolts and hangers.  It would have been dawn before I could walk to the house.  Driving the car meant sparks flying from the muffler dragging against the road.  Visions of explosions danced in my brain.  My arms ached from trying to either rig the muffler back in place, or yank it off the car.  Nothing I did worked! My only hope was one of those “arrow prayers” and God’s immediate answer.  I prayed, Lord, help me here, I’m out of options and strength.  I pushed once more, and was totally-shocked that the muffler went back in place – and stayed there! 

Once, on another dark road.  It was raining, the tire was flat, and I didn’t have a clue how to get the wheel off.  (The hubcaps on my new car had a key, secreted away so well by the manufacturer it required a search warrant to find).  I stood there in the rain, dead cell phone in hand, staring at my useless new car in the mud.  I was stuck…again!  (Thanks to a State Trooper who “just happened to be there” I made it home…again!)

It's so hard to wait, to be patient when it seems your world is crumbling.  Mufflers and flat tires are minor crises.  What about marriages that fall apart, or loved ones who are on death’s doorstep?  What about a catastrophe that is going to wipe-out your life savings and put you in bankruptcy, and add you to the homeless statistics?  How can you wait silently and patiently when those kinds of elephants walk in your room?  The key for those, and any other crisis, is patience.  And that does not mean just taking deep breaths, or reading another self-help book, or frantically-searching Google for a government program.  It’s much simpler, and more commonly ignored, but light-years better than that.  The answer is staying close enough to God to hear Him whisper:  Hey, bud…be brave and courageous; I’ve got this one too!

For You Today 

You were created with enough faith for whatever God knew you were going to face in this life.  Stay close to the Author and Source of that Faith, and you’ll learn to be patient until He brings that which you never imagined or asked-for to knock-down the wall, or open the door!  Wait patiently, quietly…for His whisper.

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!

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There are about 2,600 devotional posts and 400 sermons in the Rocky Road library.

Title Image courtesy of Pixabay.com Images without citation are in public domain or cited via weblinks.  

Unless noted, Scripture quoted from NLT^©   

Bitter Water

Thursday, September 21, 2023

Then Moses led the people of Israel away from the Red Sea, and they moved out into the desert of Shur.  They traveled in this desert for three days without finding any water.  When they came to the oasis of Marah, the water was too bitter to drink.  So they called the place Marah (which means “bitter”).  Then the people complained and turned against Moses.  “What are we going to drink?” they demanded.  So Moses cried out to the Lord for help, and the Lord showed him a piece of wood.  Moses threw it into the water, and this made the water good to drink.  It was there at Marah that the Lord set before them the following decree as a standard to test their faithfulness to him.  He said, “If you will listen carefully to the voice of the Lord your God and do what is right in his sight, obeying his commands and keeping all his decrees, then I will not make you suffer any of the diseases I sent on the Egyptians; for I am the Lord who heals you.”   Exodus 15:22-26

The children of Israel had water issues.  When they were running away from Egypt, they were stuck with too much water, the Red Sea, preventing them from getting to the Promised Land.  The Egyptian storm troopers were hot on their heels, and God parted the waters so they could walk through dust, instead of swimming (and mostly drowning).  Three days later they had the opposite issue – no water.  They complained and Moses led them to Marah…where the water was unhealthy, bitter.  God fixed that by purifying the water.  Further on in the journey they were dry once again, and God brought forth water from a rock. 

I had my own issues with a water valve this week.  The plumber came right away and did another miracle, fixed it, and charged me less than the cost of a Buick!

Normally I write in the early morning hours.  Yesterday was an exception.  I started the day by getting my dog settled with his business, and carrying him to that spot he occupies right next to my desk.  I began to write when dawn was just breaking.  Elizabeth opened the study door and the pitiful sight of my bride in pain was worse than Israel’s drought on the run.  We immediately got in the car and went to the Emergency Room.  Around three o’clock we found out she had pancreatitis, along with a secondary infection.  An hour later she was admitted and settled into a room.  It is now 8:22pm, I’ve just had supper; it’s been a day!

So what does all that have to do with Marah’s bitter water?  Well, I’m glad you asked.  Today’s events were much like Israel’s Marah experience.  When they were back in Egypt as slaves, they could at least count on having water to drink from the beautiful river Nile.  Out in the desert life became uncertain, uncontrollable.  Today reminded me of that…my sweet bride, usually smiley and always on the lookout for our family…now helplessly rubbing her side, and not wanting to do anything but be left alone.  And Russell, helpless, unable to do anything like Superman, leaping tall buildings, stopping speeding bullets; I had no way to take away her hurt.  All I could do was just sit by the bitter water of pain.  I’m not sure how many people prayed for us today; I do know my phone looked like an exhausted little puppy when the battery died.  Tons of people responded to our Facebook post, and the word spread.  When I left Elizabeth’s room at 6:30 this evening she was smiling, and looking forward to coming home tomorrow.  The doc had said, “we’ll see,” but I know that look in the woman’s eye.

So…time to wrap it up and get some sleep.  My day was planned to write.  Pain had other ideas…and like too much water at the Red Sea, too little water in the desert, and bitter water at Marah, I got frazzled and saw my weakness.  But God had the answer…even before I asked.

For You Today 

Whatever you’ve got going on today, remember where the well is located.

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!

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There are about 2,600 devotional posts and 400 sermons in the Rocky Road library. 

Title Image(s) courtesy of Pixabay.com

Images without citation are in public domain.  Unless noted, Scripture quoted from NLT^©   

Below the Surface

 

 

Tuesday, July 19, 2022

Help me understand the meaning of your commandments, and I will meditate on your wonderful deeds.  I weep with sorrow; encourage me by your word.  Keep me from lying to myself; give me the privilege of knowing your instructions.  I have chosen to be faithful; I have determined to live by your regulations.  I cling to your laws.  Lord, don’t let me be put to shame!  I will pursue your commands, for you expand my understanding.  Psalm 119:27-32[1]

If you notice the words and phrases in red, the Psalmist asked for understanding of what God’s ways and character mean when put into daily living.  He asked for encouragement (strength) to live that way.  He asked for knowing, a clear understanding of his own character (not lying to himself), all an indication of the tendency to stray from God’s way.  He wanted to change; he wanted to be pleasing in God’s sight, and he expressed faith that God …would expand my understanding. 

How about a little expansion for today?  How about going deeper than the surface “milk” of God’s word, clear-down to the “meat”?  For instance, read this verse from Paul’s letter to the Corinthian believers:

The temptations in your life are no different from what others experience. And God is faithful. He will not allow the temptation to be more than you can stand. When you are tempted, he will show you a way out so that you can endure. 1 Corinthians 10:13

In a “surface” read many people assume what you often hear as bedrock Gospel; The Lord won’t put any more on ya’ than ya’ can stand.  But if you dug deeper you’d have to admit God does just that sometimes (even often).  Just ask Job.  In the oldest of the Biblical writings, the story of Job proclaims him a good man.

There once was a man named Job who lived in the land of Uz. He was blameless—a man of complete integrity. He feared God and stayed away from evil.  Job 1:1

Read a little farther and you discover Job, a man loved by God, got clobbered with more bad stuff than most of us would face in 3 lifetimes.  But at the end, Job found mercy and grace.  And in the long-run, in God’s timing, things turned-out far-better for Job than the earthly wealth and success he’d managed to accumulate.

The prophet Isaiah wrote that God said:

“My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts,” says the Lord.  “And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine.  For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts.”  Isaiah 55:8-9

God’s wisdom, strength, and gifts all match his mercy and grace, and it is all available to us, if we will trust like Job, not popular theology that denies God’s Word.

For You Today

If you can pray with the Psalmist for underestanding, strength, clarity, and discipline to live God’s way, you’ve taken a first step in a lifetime of heading in the right direction, pleasing God in every way.[2]

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!

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There are about 2,000 devotional posts on Rocky Road Devotions. 

To dig deeper into today’s topic or Scripture text:  Tough Trust  and Faith Leap

[1] Images:  Russell Brownworth (own work)  Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©  

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[1] Emphasis (mine) added

[2] See Romans 12:1-2

Hard Times

 

Wednesday, March 30, 2022

One day the widow of a member of the group of prophets came to Elisha and cried out, “My husband who served you is dead, and you know how he feared the Lord.  But now a creditor has come, threatening to take my two sons as slaves.”  “What can I do to help you?” Elisha asked.  “Tell me, what do you have in the house?”  “Nothing at all, except a flask of olive oil,” she replied.   And Elisha said, “Borrow as many empty jars as you can from your friends and neighbors.  Then go into your house with your sons and shut the door behind you.  Pour olive oil from your flask into the jars, setting each one aside when it is filled.”  So she did as she was told.  Her sons kept bringing jars to her, and she filled one after another.  Soon every container was full to the brim!  “Bring me another jar,” she said to one of her sons.  “There aren’t any more!” he told her.  And then the olive oil stopped flowing.  When she told the man of God what had happened, he said to her, “Now sell the olive oil and pay your debts, and you and your sons can live on what is left over.”  2 Kings 4:1-7

Many people I’ve known have lived through some tough times.  The widow who came to Elisha was down to family facing indentured slavery because they couldn’t pay their debts.  There were no reserves, bank accounts, or 401K from which to draw.  She went to Elisha and told her tale of woe.  And, it’s Elisha’s question that has always intrigued me:  …what do you have in the house?  The woman’s answer was one of those “duh” moments…no food, just a little cooking oil.  Had I been Elisha I’d have been stumped.  A small flask of cooking oil won’t pay off debts that calls for debtor’s prison.  But Elisha wasn’t stumped.  He told the woman to start pouring-out that oil.  And it didn’t stop until they had no more room to store any more.  Every debt was paid…and some oil left over to boot.

Isn’t it curious how some miracles are connected with what is already available to us? 

     ·       The woman had only a little oil left.  Elisha’s mentor, Elijah, had also met a poor       woman[1] who was down to her last meal.  Same result – God’s multiplication of the flour barrel’s contents. 

     ·       Jesus fed 5,000 men and their families from a basket with just a small boy’s lunchbox.[2] 

     ·       Ten lepers came to Jesus with less than nothing, so they simply brought themselves.  Jesus took the diseased skin they possessed and turned them into new people.[3] 

     ·       When the wedding at Cana had run out of wine, Jesus took the water they did have and the joy of the day was not only complete, it was the best ever.[4]

Sometimes, when we shake our heads in amazement over the miracles, we are forgetting the fact that the God who created everything is still there, still the same, and still knows how to provide for every need we face.

For You Today

If you’re facing some hard times, remember that you have something God will use to turn your world right-side-up!  Every person in scripture who had a miracle change their lives just needed to listen and act on what God was saying.  Remember, Jesus took the pain of scourging that took him to the brink of death, mocking that was undeserved and crushing, a cross, and a borrowed grave…not the kind of inventory anyone would like to count on for retirement…and he turned that less-than-nothing of resources into the salvation of souls for anyone who would trust in Him.  If your hard times have never included trusting Jesus…that’s the first miracle your life needs.

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!  

[1] Title image: Pixabay.com   Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©   

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[1] 1 Kings 17:8-24

[2] Matthew 14:13-18

[3] Luke 17:11-17

[4] John 2:1-11

Between the Rock and Hard Place

 

Thursday, March 3, 2022

So the slave drivers and foremen went out and told the people: “This is what Pharaoh says:  I will not provide any more straw for you.   Go and get it yourselves.  Find it wherever you can.  But you must produce just as many bricks as before!”  So the people scattered throughout the land of Egypt in search of stubble to use as straw.  Meanwhile, the Egyptian slave drivers continued to push hard.  “Meet your daily quota of bricks, just as you did when we provided you with straw!” they demanded.  Then they whipped the Israelite foremen they had put in charge of the work crews.  “Why haven’t you met your quotas either yesterday or today?” they demanded.  So the Israelite foremen went to Pharaoh and pleaded with him.  “Please don’t treat your servants like this,” they begged.  “We are given no straw, but the slave drivers still demand, ‘Make bricks!’  We are being beaten, but it isn’t our fault!  Your own people are to blame!”  But Pharaoh shouted, “You’re just lazy!  Lazy!  That’s why you’re saying, ‘Let us go and offer sacrifices to the Lord.’  Now get back to work!  No straw will be given to you, but you must still produce the full quota of bricks.”  The Israelite foremen could see that they were in serious trouble when they were told, “You must not reduce the number of bricks you make each day.”  As they left Pharaoh’s court, they confronted Moses and Aaron, who were waiting outside for them.  The foremen said to them, “May the Lord judge and punish you for making us stink before Pharaoh and his officials.  You have put a sword into their hands, an excuse to kill us!”  Then Moses went back to the Lord and protested, “Why have you brought all this trouble on your own people, Lord?  Why did you send me?  Ever since I came to Pharaoh as your spokesman, he has been even more brutal to your people.  And you have done nothing to rescue them!”  Exodus 5:10-23

Four hundred years in captivity was a hard place.  The descendants of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph were conscripts of Pharaoh’s dynasty.  They were forced to work endlessly just to stay alive, and had nothing.  Then things really got hard.

Bondage is brutal – and that is certainly an understatement.  Not just Israel, but humanity has been under something of bondage to COVID-19 and its cousins the past two years.  Even if you have been blessed enough to have escaped having the virus, you know someone, perhaps many, who have had to tough it out like making bricks without straw.

You’ve also seen what happens when the rock of struggle meets the hard place of frustration…someone must take the blame.  Pharaoh, like any pandemic virus, was an iron-fisted, hard-hearted tyrant.  He threatened, bullied, and killed.  His soldiers spread the virus of hate and oppression.  The people, frustrated, having no place to turn for relief, blamed Moses for stirring up Pharaoh’s anger.  Moses went right to prayer….and blamed God!

Just a few plagues later, the slaves were seeing Egypt in the rearview mirror.  Forty years later Moses saw the Promised Land from the mountaintop.  But none of the original group, including Moses, ever set foot on the other side of Jordan. 

The conclusion is rather rock-like:  Blaming someone else for your problems will get you somewhere, and it’s often a harder place than the rock you were facing.

For You Today

When the temptation comes for you to blame someone, some pandemic, some circumstances, or God, for whatever trouble presents, let your prayer of surrender to God’s will and care turn blame into blessing.  

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!  

[1] Title image:  Pixabay.com  Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©    

Overwhelmed

 

Wednesday, July 14, 2021

I cry out to the Lord; I plead for the Lord’s mercy.  I pour out my complaints before him and tell him all my troubles.  When I am overwhelmed, you alone know the way I should turn.  Wherever I go, my enemies have set traps for me.  I look for someone to come and help me, but no one gives me a passing thought!  No one will help me; no one cares a bit what happens to me.  Then I pray to you, O Lord.  I say, “You are my place of refuge.  You are all I really want in life.  Psalm 142:1-5

In preparing for celebrating the Lord’s Supper with a group of other preachers I realized I was a bit consumed by commitments.  My schedule looks like a crazed chicken with print cartridges for feet had been turned loose to run all over my calendar!  Here I was, contemplating what it would take to be a non-anxious presence as the celebrant, realizing (in that honest look-in-the-mirror moment), that I was probably the most-anxious guy who would sit at that table.   

It’s a common state of affairs these days; there’s just not enough time for everything you planned, much less what everybody else in your world wants.  As the Psalmist, it’s no trouble at all to make the leap from well, I’m a little busier than I’d like to be…all the way to stop this crazy merry-go-round, I need to get off before I explode!

The key word in that compound thought is OVERWHELMED! 

If you can honestly say you’ve never felt overwhelmed, you’re either quite disconnected from everyone and everything, and might consider checking with a psychotherapist for some new meds…or you’re not really being honest.  Anxiety, fear, concern, frazzled…there are so many ways to describe that sense in the pit of your stomach that alerts you to the fact that you can’t possibly complete all that life has dumped on your plate!

Then I read today’s Psalm again.  A Psalm generally appears 3 times each week in the Lectionary Readings, and I’m certain the Lord (knowing how dense I can be) ordained it that way.  Sometimes it takes much rain to soak a dry mind!  It finally sunk-in; the Psalmist knew how to sing woe, despair, and agony on me as well as anyone; in short – he is me!

And look what I discovered – the Psalmist opens up that part of my innermost being and lays it out for the sun to get at it – to chase the darkness and fear, to cull the briars from where I’m walking barefoot.  He opens the prayer book of my heart and the notes resonate deep-within how God, as my refuge from all the tormenting angst of the day’s demands, is all my heart really wanted anyway. 

And there is a reason for that.  Created in the image of God, even a sin-stained life can recognize the light that still lingers there, waiting to be set on the hills of our heart and soul.  It illuminates all the goodness of the hand of God from which we’ve sprung.  And it draws us to Him.  And that is enough to turn the anxiety of all the shortcomings I feel into nothing but gratitude for God’s grace.  If there is any place in this universe where Russell doesn’t come up short, it’s when he is bathed in the forgiveness of God’s loving embrace.

That’s a different kind of being overwhelmed; beloved, I’ll take that over what the world wants to give me…any day!

For You Today

If you’re feeling a bit overwhelmed by the workload, crises, world news, or what to do about your child’s failing grades in school….or maybe just the whole lot of what you’ve been dealing-with…take an extra moment with Psalm 142 today.  Nothing that’s been chasing you will stand a chance at robbing the peace you’ll find there.

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!   

[1] Title and Other Images:  Pixabay.com  Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©    

The Crowd Around Me

 

Tuesday, July 13, 2021

Hear my cry, for I am very low.  Rescue me from my persecutors, for they are too strong for me.  Bring me out of prison so I can thank you.  The godly will crowd around me, for you are good to me.”  Psalm 142:6-7

This, according to the marginal notes in the text, is David’s reflection of what he felt while hiding in a cave to escape a relentless pursuit by King Saul.  David was very low in spirit, surrounded by those under orders to kill him…a whole army of professional killers.  They were too strong a force for anyone to withstand.  David felt as if he were the death-row inmate, and the last appeal had been denied.

And so the prayer lifted for release from the prison is our prayer when we are also “low”, depressed, defeated, diseased, disenfranchised, duped, and dying in spirit.  We pray for the safety net to lift us out of the pit.  The Psalmist (King David) expresses for us the greatest truth about what God intended for the church – to be the safety net of His goodness. 

The crowd of the godly to which David points is God’s family, godly compassionate souls who are ready to stand together.  This is more than an army; this is the two or three of which Jesus spoke; when they gather around, they are a crowd no earthly force can defeat.

To be sure, the church is made up of people who have been lifted out of their own prison of sin.  That certainly makes them imperfect, and we can be a messy bunch, sometimes making incredibly unwise, or unhealthy decisions.  But, there is one truth that cannot be denied – when God placed you in the church, He meant it for good, and what God means for good will turn out for good.

At times I have seen (in myself and others) the doubt of believing the circumstances we face being anything close to God-ordained.  We imagine tough times are always Satan’s work.  We feel like David in the cave, perhaps.  But God, in His infinite wisdom, is always working things together for good for those who are His.[1]  Sometimes the dilemma in which you are bogged down is engineered in Heaven.  And it is not God “testing” you to find out if you’ll stand.  Rather, the tests of God go beyond that; He already knows how much you can stand; you’re being tested so YOU will know you CAN stand, if you’ll stand in His strength alone.

For You Today

So, what’s on your plate?  Got troubles by the truckload?  Got a decision to make that you’re hesitating to pull the trigger for fear of what others might think or say?  Got a relationship that’s a little rocky?  Job in jeopardy?  Kids getting into stuff?  Doctor still hasn’t called about that test?

The church is more than that place of obligation on Sunday, or the ritual chest, or a porch to discuss the ball game; it’s God’s safety net for you, that crowd around you and me. 

And you’re part of it that someone else needs. 

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!   

[1] Title and Other Images:  Pixabay.com  Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©    

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[1] See Romans 8:28