Our God is a deliverer. Throughout the history of the planet He has come on the scene to rescue those who trust in Him. His greatest act of deliverance happened about two thousand years ago in a little place called Israel. He Himself took on flesh and walked the earth, preaching a message of repentance and forgiveness, salvation and healing. And as many as received Him and believed in His name, to them He gave the right to become the children of God (see John 1:12).<\/p>\n
There is nothing quite like knowing that you are not only forgiven and made brand new by the Creator of the universe, but also that He\u00a0 has pledged never to leave or forsake you and\u00a0to be with you always, even until the end of the age (see Hebrews 13:5 and Matthew 28:20).<\/p>\n
How the God of all things can care about small, insignificant humans is beyond the comprehension of many of us. But He does. David declared in Psalm 18:35, \u201cYou have also given me the shield of Your salvation, and Your right hand upholds me; and Your gentleness makes me great<\/em>.\u201d I imagine David was in awe of God\u2019s amazing intervention on his behalf and that of his nation; but this verse reveals something even more amazing about God. When David praised God for His gentleness, he was extolling the fact that the Creator Himself, the Mighty One of the Universe, in humility, meekness, and an act of condescension, made him—insignificant David—great.<\/p>\n God\u00a0rescues us. He delivers our lives from destruction. He saves our souls and welcomes us into His family. He is with us at all times and will continue to be right there until the end of our lives or the end of the age—whichever comes first! And to top it off, He gently humbles Himself to grant us greatness in our little time span.<\/p>\n But there are hindrances and obstacles to a well-lived life. And those hindrances don\u2019t have all that much to do with whether or not\u00a0your dreams were\u00a0fulfilled the way you had hoped\u2014no; such disappointments have less\u00a0impact upon\u00a0the quality of your life than you would imagine.<\/p>\n The hindrances and obstacles that must be conquered in the well-lived life have everything to do with the mind and attitude, beliefs and reactions, flexibility and resolve. Upon what do you meditate? What is your prevailing attitude toward work, responsibility, or others? What is your belief system\u2014beyond your faith in Christ? Do you believe easily that He will cause all things to work together for your good, or do you think bitterly, probably not\u2014nothing works out as I want<\/i>? How do you react to stress? Do you seek Him and trust, or do you fly off the handle in fear, panic, or rage? Can you deal gracefully with changes in plans, whether short-term or long, or do you stew over the unfairness of it all? When options present themselves that violate your convictions, do you follow your conscience or do you fudge, just this once\u2014it won\u2019t hurt anything<\/i>?<\/p>\n These are the things that determine whether\u00a0your life\u00a0is well-lived. Dreams fulfilled, desires met\u2014those are icing on the cake.<\/p>\n This weekend, I urge you to spend some time with your Deliverer, Rescuer, Redeemer, Forgiver, Healer, and Savior. Pour out your heart to Him and allow Him to touch any encumbrance in your life that, if left untouched, would hinder you\u00a0from having a life well-lived. Let Him do what He loves to do: to bring light to entanglements, to deliver you from hindrances, and to remove every obstacle that would disqualify you from having\u00a0that life well-lived.\u00a0Don\u2019t put it off; He who saved you is delighted to bring you to full maturity. Remember, it is His gentleness, meekness, and humility directed toward and in you that will make your life, when all is said and done, not only well-lived, but great.<\/p>\n And, on that Day when you see Him face to face, may He look you in the eyes and say, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”<\/p>\n Happy weekend, happy life, happy eternity!<\/p>\n Dorothy<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Our God is a deliverer. Throughout the history of the planet He has come on the scene to rescue those who trust in Him. His greatest act of deliverance happened about two thousand years ago in a little place called Israel. He Himself took on flesh and walked the earth, preaching a message of repentance […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1292","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-july2013","category-weekend"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1292","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1292"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1292\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1758,"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1292\/revisions\/1758"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1292"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1292"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1292"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}