Ekklesia of Crane Web Log

Submitted by Beth.

This morning Craig spoke of God adding weight to us in 2007, and I began to think of all that entails. 

In the natural, we think of our weight, mope over our added weight, rejoice over our reduced weight, and concentrate on how we can adjust everything to change our weight.  We can apply so much of what is in the natural to the spiritual – “first in the natural, then in the spiritual”.  Here is what God put on my heart to consider this morning:

What you eat is what you are.  In the natural we know that if we eat fatty foods, we will gain fat, not muscle.  So our choice is to eat healthy and be healthy, or eat what we crave naturally and suffer the consequences.  In the spiritual, we have the same choice.  We can choose to dine on God’s Word (written or spoken) and gain spiritual muscle or to gorge ourselves on worldly pleasures and gain spiritual fat. 

Work out to build to change your fat to muscle.  In the natural, experts tell us that to improve your quality of life, exercise combined with diet is the fastest and best choice.  Exercising takes you from a place of lethargy to a level of higher energy.  Exercising also restructures your physique – toning you and building muscle.   In the spiritual, we learn that only ingesting God’s Word is not enough – just hearing can make us spiritually fat.  We need to exercise the Word – put it into action.  Then, we can gain spiritual muscle – toning us and building spiritual muscle – giving us a higher level of energy to do God’s work here on earth.

Fat versus Muscle.  The Webster’s definition of fat is “having too much adipose (fatty) tissue” – not what we desire in the natural.  The Webster’s definition of muscle is “to strengthen or toughen” and “a tissue composed of cells or fibers, the contraction of which produces movement in the body” – both of which we esteem in the natural.  How we should desire to have spiritual muscle – to have movement in the Body of Christ – to strengthen and toughen our most holy faith.  WOW!  Remember – muscle weighs more than fat!

Looking forward to putting on some spiritual weight (muscle) in 2007!

Many are the afflictions of the righteous.

Darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people.

We are troubled on every side, we are perplexed, we are persecuted, we are cast down.

How are they increased who trouble me,Many are they who rise up against me,Many are they who say of my soul “There is no help for him in God.”

With men it is impossible.

Feeling a little discouraged yet? Depressed? Well, you should be because those words leave the listener or reader without hope or remedy. I am sure you probably recognize that those “statements” are actually Scriptures. I purposely left out the second-half of the verse that begins with one small and yet very significant word: “BUT”

Let’s look at those verses again in their entirety (bold italics mine):

Many are the afflictions of the righteous but the Lord delivers him out of them all. (Psalm 34:19)

For behold, the darkness shall cover the earth,and gross darkness the people:but the Lord shall arise upon you and His glory shall be seen upon you. (Isaish 60:2)

We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; perplexed but not in despair;Persecuted but not forsaken; cast down but not destroyed. (2 Cor. 4:8,9)

How are they increased that trouble me, many are they that rise up against me, Many are they that say of my soul “There is no help for him in God” but You oh Lord, are a shield for me; my glory and the lifter of my head. (Psalm3:2,3)

With men it is impossible but not with God:For with God all things are possible. (Mark 10:27)

Hallelujah! What a difference! What faith, hope and joy come when we get the whole picture! Yes, the circumstance or situation may be factual, it may be actually happening, we may be seeing it with our eyes, or hearing it with our ears, or feeling it in our bodies BUT be sure you bring into account the God-factor – what God has said about the situation!!!

Too many times we, as Christians, let a conversation drop without making sure that God has the last word regarding the situation. Before you hang up that phone, or walk away from that conversation, or maybe send that letter make sure you have interjected and boldly declared and proclaimed what God, the Alpha and Omega; the Author and the Finisher; the Beginning and the End has said regarding the present circumstance! Don’t leave the hopelessness and heaviness hanging in the air. At times you may have to be the bearer of bad news, or may be on the receiving end of hearing a bad report but don’t ever let the communication end there.

The other day a dear friend called me with serious developments in an ongoing situation that were weakening her spirit and eroding her faith. If our conversation had ended right there we both would have hung up feeling defeated and despondent. But as we turned our communication to what God has said; as we reminded ourselves of what we believe; as we ended the conversation with prayer it made all the difference in the world to her countenance and the strength of her spirit. We both hung up edified and encouraged!

Even in the bleakest and grimmest of circumstances if you can only eke out and proclaim just this one pervading and dominating truth – but with God all things are possible – you will leave faith hanging in the atmosphere, something for both the listeners on the earth as well as in the heavens to reckon with!