Word of Encouragement (11/16/2020)

I’m so glad you decided to click on the email and read “Today’s Word of Encouragement.” I talked about the importance of humility yesterday and how it entails living in humble reliance on God. One way of showing our reliance on God is to begin our day with a time of communion with God, thereby reminding ourselves of God’s glory and His glorious grace toward us, His will for our lives, and His pledge to protect, provide for, and pilot our lives. These are wonderful truths to be reminded of, aren’t they? For we are easily distracted and lured away by the temptations and promises of the world. Each morning, our mind and heart and will need to be realigned to the True North. Your decision to read the Bible and pray (and read this email) shows your awareness of your need to rely on the Lord.

It is a great blessing that we have someone to rely on, especially when that Someone is the almighty and merciful God! Then, why is it so hard for us to take advantage of that every morning and throughout the day? Probably it is because we don’t really believe that we need God that much for our day to day living. Many of us have become competent in what we do in life and in our careers. There are challenges, of course, but nothing we cannot handle, we think. So, we go on living and doing what we do, seeking God’s help only when we are desperate. So, we drift away from God little by little and some of us know it deep inside. We know this is not good but we don’t know how to snap out of it. Often, we helplessly wait for God to sound an alarm by causing a disaster to happen in our life.

I’d like to tell you that there is another, better way. It is to kickstart your daily, morning devotion—to read the Bible, even a short portion, and to pray, even for a short time. The reason we don’t feel the need to rely on God is because we are pretty satisfied with the way our lives are going—maybe not happy but satisfied enough not to go to God because there are no big, urgent problems. We have lost the vision of the new life and the lofty calling to which God has called us and sacrificed His beloved Son for. Even when we get a glimpse of it on Sunday, it fades away because we do not nurture it throughout the week through our personal, family devotions, and our fellowship with our fellow saints in God’s Word and prayer. And this becomes a vicious cycle: the less we expose ourselves to God and His Word, the less we see what God has called us to and for; the less we see it, the less we feel the need to depend on the Lord to live it out. And soon, we wonder whether God loves us and we are even saved!

I hope you don’t find this email to be depressing or discouraging. One of our hymns says, “Praise the grace whose threats alarmed thee, / Roused thee from thy fatal ease....” It is an act of God’s grace to awaken us from our spiritual stupor and complacency. But of course, when we respond in faith and repentance, we can “Praise the grace whose promise warmed thee, / Praise the grace that whispered peace.” May you experience the rich and abundant grace of God as you heed His warning and His call. Have a blessed day!    

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