Keepers Weepers, Losers Finders!

Matthew 10:39

He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it.

Finders Keepers, Losers Weepers!

A real Christian is an odd number anyway. He feels supreme love for One whom he has never seen, talks familiarly every day to Someone he cannot see, expects to go to heaven on the virtue of Another, empties himself in order to be full, admits he is wrong so he can be declared right, goes down in order to get up, is strongest when he is weakest, richest when he is poorest, and happiest when he feels worst. He dies so he can live, forsakes in order to have, gives away so he can keep, sees the invisible, hears the inaudible, and knows that which passeth knowledge.

Real life is found only by giving up one’s life to Jesus. The person who refuses to relinquish this right to the Lord Jesus misses out on the life God intended for him. He fails to experience the fulfillment of completing his mission on earth, whereas the person who gives the Lord the right to order his life experiences real life. He experiences that deep sense of fulfillment, satisfaction, and pleasure with his life—even in the face of difficulties and hardships. In addition, he is given that special quality of life called eternal life.

There is power in Relinquishment, but the process isn’t much fun.

Relinquishment: the process of releasing, yielding, resigning, surrendering, abandoning, waiving, or giving up something completely.

This power of relinquishment took Isaac up the slopes of Mt. Moriah and left him tied to an altar like a lamb led to the slaughter.

God’s request that he sacrifice Isaac was totally out of character with the God Abraham had known in the past.

All Abraham could do was to relinquish his son and trust God.

Can you imagine the load Abraham carried up that mountain?

In order for Abraham to be the man God would build a people up on, he had to relinquish to God that which meant to most to him.

The Lord doesn’t want the first place in my life, he wants all of my life.

Moses tried to do things the “Egyptian Way” the bible says Moses “looked this way and that way” before he murdered the Egyptian. What he failed to do was look up!

He wanted to know if men were looking and evidently he wasn’t concerned by the fact that God was watching.

Once he stepped out of the will of God, he could not keep one Egyptian buried in the sand.

When he stepped back into the will of God, he was able to bury the entire army of Pharaoh in the bed of the red sea.

But the process in between was the process of losing one’s life.

He was pulled away from Pharaoh’s throne, and brought to the desert to do the very thing he had been taught to hate.

It was the “desert of relinquishment” that Moses learned many of the things he needed to lead Israel through the Sinai.

Moses did not start by parting the Red Sea.

God ask Moses what is in your hand?

That rod, a shepherd’s staff, a mere stick, became a miracle when Moses turned it loose at God’s command.

When did it cease to become a miracle?

When Moses picked it back up.

Moses had left his scepter in Egypt, and now his staff was a symbol of his authority over those bleating sheep.

God said “give me your authority” turn it loose if you want to be what I want you to be.

The first have to be last, if you want to lead you have to serve, full you have to be emptied.

This is the law of the Kingdom is much different than the laws of this world.

Sin began because the devil said “I will”.

Redemption was birthed because Jesus said, “not my will, but yours be done”.

Moses was scrambling for excuses to avoid God’s call when the Lord told him “put your hand in your bosom…now pull it out.

He was shocked to see that his hand was covered with leprosy!

Put it back in now and when he pulled it out it was cleansed.

God was teaching Moses two lessons.

First, any person who cannot control his flesh, cannot cast out devil.

Second, God cannot do anything through anyone who wants control.

God intended to embarrass the devil and humble Pharaoh, but first He had to work on Moses.

You will never be a success for the Kingdom until you see yourself as a threat to the enemy.

When we relinquish are lives into his hand, “the rod in your hand”, the ordinary tool that God put in your life, “it will be transformed into the “rod of God”.

No more was it called Moses’ rod, but from then on it became the rod of God.

God looks for ordinary people who will relinquished their life to him so he can give us the abundant life, life everlasting.

The lad gave up his lunch, but when it was given to Jesus it fed 5000.

 

Perplexities Are Prayer Answers

Much that perplexes us in our Christian experience is but the “answer” to our prayers.

We pray for patience and God sends tribulation, for tribulation worketh patience. (Romans 5:3)

We pray for submission, and God sends suffering, for we learn obedience by suffering. (Hebrews 5:8)

We pray for unselfishness, and God gives us opportunities to sacrifice ourselves by thinking on the things of others. (Phil. 2:4)

We pray for victory, and the things of the world sweep down upon us in a storm of temptation, for “this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.” (1 John 5:4)

We pray for strength and humility, and some messenger of Satan torments us ’til we lie in the dust, crying to God for its removal. (2 Cor. 12:7-11)

We pray for union with Christ, and God severs natural ties, and lets our best friends misunderstand us and seem indifferent to us. (Matthew 10:34-39; John 15:18-20)

We pray for love, and God sends peculiar suffering, and puts us with apparently unlovely people. He lets them say things which rasp the nerves and lacerate the heart, for “love suffereth long.”