HCC Monthly Harvest Seed
Psalm 27:14 - Wait on the Lord; Be of good courage, And He shall strengthen your heart;
Wait, I say, on the Lord!
(AMP) - Wait for and confidently expect the Lord; Be strong and let your heart take courage; Yes, wait for and confidently expect the Lord.
None of us like to wait. We are an impatient society.
We have been conditioned to want things now.
Our life will be marked by significant seasons of waiting.
We need to walk in wisdom in the wait. While we wait.
The waiting process will either become one of the most impactful times in our life or it will be one of the most frustrating times in our lives. – It can be both but it doesn’t have to be frustrating.
The first piece of Wisdom in the wait is to realize that you are waiting on the Lord.
The Psalmist says that we are to wait on the Lord. We are to wait expectantly on the Lord.
This is so important that it cannot be over emphasized.
We are not waiting on people.
We are not waiting on situations to change.
We are not waiting on the conditions to be just right.
We are waiting on the Lord.
Notice that it doesn’t say that we are waiting on God. We are waiting on the Lord.
Our Master.
We are not in control He is. We are not in charge – He is.
This changes everything about the wait.
The wait becomes less about us and what we want and how we think things should go and ALL about His way and His will, His purpose and His timing.
Wisdom gives us a much better perspective.
People are unreliable. Situations without God depend on luck.
God is completely reliable, He is good, faithful and wonderful.
When you wait on God there is an entirely different confidence about the outcome.
(AMP) - Wait for and confidently expect the Lord
When you wait on people and situations you have no idea what to expect but when we wait on the Lord, we can have confident expectation.
Wait, I say, on the Lord!
This is such good wisdom that he says it twice.
The Repetition of "wait for the Lord":
The repetition underscores the importance of this concept. It acknowledges that waiting can be difficult, but it's a necessary part of trusting God.
It takes courage to wait on the Lord.
Psalm 27:14 - Wait on the Lord; Be of good courage, And He shall strengthen your heart;
Wait, I say, on the Lord!
Be of good courage… The Amplified says let your heart take courage.
Courage is a choice.
Too many people wait in fearful expectation. It takes courage to expect the good in the wait.
That is what is meant by - good courage.
This isn’t a false bravado it is a choice to bravely and confidently wait on the Lord.
Courage is choosing faith over unbelief and doubt It is choosing peace over fear.
Nothing drains your strength like fear and unbelief.
Waiting means that we have positioned our self in a posture of rest.
Isaiah 40:30-31 - Even the youths shall faint and be weary, And the young men shall utterly fall, 31 But those who wait (Trust, place their Hope) on the Lord Shall renew their strength; They shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.
Waiting is a time where God is strengthening us and helping to renew us.
Needing renewed strength is not a sign of failure or weakness it is evidence that you have been running, soaring and working.
Get off your own back.
Isaiah prophesied some truth that even the young people get faint and weary. All of us get tired. The more miles that life puts on us the truer that statement is.
Waiting on God allows us to trust Him to put our Hope in Him all from a position of stopping and rest. – You cannot gain strength when you are expending strength and striving.
Courage says I trust God enough to stop while He gives me the energy to fly again.
Waiting helps us to regain and renew our strength. To build up steam.
It helps us to refresh.
The wait renews us and strengthens us.
If you go into the next season of your life without strength you will not have what you need to prosper in that season.
New seasons require renewed strength. Why? Because new seasons are new – not easy. They are exciting but require not only ability but energy. We not only need the will for a new season but the ability for the new season.
God desires us to soar. Realize that there is wisdom in the wait.
Many people never step into God’s next thing because they never stopped long enough to wait on Him while they were being renewed.
God loves you and me. He will never put us into new highs if we are not going to soar there but drop like a rock.
Remember before Elijah was sent into his next season; God fed him and allowed him to rest before he ran for days.
The waiting is not just a place of resting it is a place of renewal and re-freshing.
Waiting is where we grow in wisdom.
Psalm 25:5 - Lead me in Your truth and teach me, For You are the God of my salvation;
On You I wait all the day.
Where there is a great deal of motion there is also commotion. There is confusion.
It is in the waiting that we allow God to lead us into the truth.
John 16:13 - However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come.
We need God to teach us His truth and we need the Holy Spirit to guide us into truth.
The Pause helps us to survey the landscape in order to get a fuller picture of what is happening.
To learn and to listen. You can learn a lot in a moment.
Many times, we get into trouble because we don’t wait to get the leading, guiding direction of the Holy Spirit.
Isaiah 30:21 (NLT) - Your own ears will hear him. Right behind you a voice will say,
“This is the way you should go,” whether to the right or to the left.
God promises to lead us and guide us. To go before us and to speak to us.
Waiting means that we are teachable. That we are willing to learn His will, purpose and ways.
While you can learn a great deal in a moment you can learn a great deal more over time.
Real learning takes time. If we learn during our season of waiting it makes our season of doing so much easier and more productive.
Moses, Joseph, David, Daniel, Paul all had extended seasons of learning and unlearning.
There was wisdom in the wait. They were learning what they needed for their next season in the wait. Now they were not only knowledgeable but skilled and experienced.
Never underestimate the experience that you are gaining in the wait. This is called seasoned. But you are only seasoned in the season of the wait.
This is where you grow. Joseph went into his season a boy but came out a man. So did David. WE do a lot of growing – up in the wait. – this is called maturity.
View waiting as an opportunity for spiritual growth and deepening your reliance on God.
Waiting may not always be easy but it is always beneficial.
Seasons are wonderful the productive ones and the waiting ones.
Speaking of seasons. May the Lord bless you and your family this Christmas Season. May you regain the awe of knowing Jesus as a little Child.
May you have a very Merry Christmas and may the coming year be filled with His glory and blessing.
Pastor Marvin & Dawn
Image by Daniel Nebreda from Pixabay
HCC Monthly Harvest Seed
Galatians 6:2 (Amp) - Carry one another’s burdens and in this way you will fulfill the requirements of the law of Christ [that is, the law of Christian love].
A while back we were doing a study in our monthly men’s meeting, Man Up. We were talking about the characteristics of a Godly man. One of those characteristics was strength.
Most of the truly men of God, most of the truly Godly women of God are people of strength.
These are people of Godly, emotional, Spiritual and physical strength.
These people lend their strength to others when they are weak and going through difficult times.
Sometimes it is for a short period of time and there are times it is for an extended period of times.
When we are talking about strength, we are not speaking to the physical strength of being a specimen of muscles and fitness. We are talking about something much deeper. We are not talking about physical meatheads that can lift hundreds of pounds.
We are talking about all of us as believers who are strong in the Lord and in the Power of His might. Each of us - spiritual powerhouses who are normal people who know that they serve a mighty God.
All of us deal with things. Heavy things that we just don’t have the strength for at times.
Galatians tells us to bear one another’s burdens.
One version says to carry on another’s burdens. Another version says to share one another’s burdens.
Actually, we are commanded to carry one another’s burdens.
Now don’t miss what this verse is saying. It says to carry ONE ANOTHER’S burdens. This means that we help each other out. It is not a one-sided thing. It is reminding us that we help each other.
Some days I am strong and other days you are strong. Whatever day we are having if you have a burden I will help you.
All of us have needed help carrying our load in life at one point or another. The fact is that we all get tired, weary, discouraged and there are things that we just cannot deal with on our own.
Burdens by their very definition are heavy. They are weighty matters that we need help with and we can no longer do it on our own.
The truth is that even things that are not terribly heavy if they are carried over a long period of time become a burden.
Sometimes burden carrying is physical help, like caring for an aging parent.
I think of my wife and a lady in our church, Mona. Both of them recently helped care for their aging parents. They could no longer care for themselves, and they lent them their strength, love, honor and time until they walked into glory.
Just helping someone move is literally carrying a burden. A couch, a washer and a dryer are not a one-person job.
Some things are not only heavy but they are awkward. Even if something is light, if it is awkward, it is hard to handle alone.
Life brings many awkward situations, and it is good to not be alone in them.
My family has nicknamed me the “king of the awkward situation and the awkward conversation”. It is a gift that God has given me. While I can often do them alone, the weight of the situation is lifted when there is someone else to help.
My son, when he was moving, needed help with a king-size mattress that he had. Now I was a mover before I went into ministry. I love the challenges and the physicality of it all. This mattress was not only heavy it was awkward. We had three stories of steps to bring it down. Most mattresses can easily be moved with two people. This one required four. Life is like that sometimes.
~ I love the phrase that – Many hands make light work.
When we are tired and carrying a lot, we need others to help us carry the load. They need us to help them carry their load.
Part of being strong is recognizing when you need help and recognizing when others need help.
Matthew 11:28-30 (NIV) - “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
Life is rough when you are tired, and things are heavy.
Jesus is gentle and humble with us.
We have to go to Him when we realize that we are overwhelmed, tired and carrying to much.
We get to yoke up with Jesus. This means that we stop carrying things on our own. That we include Him in the process. That we realize He won’t weigh us down.
That we can exchange our weakness for His strength. Spiritually, emotionally and physically.
One of the ways that Jesus does that is by providing other people to help.
When we carry someone’s burden we become God’s strength with skin on it.
I love that Jesus invites us to learn from Him.
He is gentle, kind, it is ok to not do everything on your own, you can’t, you are not supposed to and you don’t have too.
When people carry my burdens, when I carry someone else’s burdens, when I cast my cares on the Lord because He cares for me, it becomes some of the greatest learning opportunities in life.
We learn more about Jesus, we learn more about ourselves and we learn about others, and we certainly grow spiritually and emotionally.
Even the strongest of people face battles in life.
The book of Deuteronomy talks about how one will put a thousand to flight and two ten thousand.
You would think that if one can defeat one thousand then two would defeat two thousand.
Strong people can do a great deal by themselves.
Here is a spiritual truth the more strong people that you put together you have MULTIPLIED, EXPONENTIOAL EFFECTIVENESS.
This is true of prayer; this is true in spiritual and physical battles.
In every battle we need people who have our back, to give us comradery and to boost morale. People who help us to see what we are missing and to help us up when we fall.
Ecclesiastes 4:12 (NLT) - A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer. Three are even better, for a triple-braided cord is not easily broken.
The truth is that there are times that we run out of our own strength. We come to the limits of what we can do on our own and we need the strength of others.
Someone needs to hear this – there is no such thing as a self-made man.
All of us need someone to walk with us, to just keep us company.
We all need those who can offer us wisdom and at times just listen and not speak.
There are times when we or others are emotionally drained and spiritually dry and we need encouragement. Someone to lift us up with words and prayer and to help us shoulder the load.
We have all known people like Job’s friends. These people started out good. When Job lost everything and he was scraping the boils on his body to feel better they just sat quietly with him.
Job’s wife was hurting so bad that she told Job to curse God and die.
Many criticize her, but she was in anguish. He couldn’t help her, and she didn’t have the strength to help him.
After a while these friends who were there for Job started adding to his burden. We call these types of religious people. Job’s comforters.
May we never become like that. Their limit of understanding lasted about a week.
Sometimes carrying the burdens of others means that we are committed to going the distance with them. There are some things that we may think but we never get to say because it only adds to the heaviness.
All of us look up to the strong people of the world. God commands us to – Be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. Do you see yourself as a strong person? In Christ we are. We can be. We get to be. That will make us a blessing to others and to one another.
Be strong for someone today. Allow someone to be strong for you. Remember – You are dearly Loved. – Pastor Marvin & Dawn
Image by Anemone123 from Pixabay