By: Robert D Rogers
Have there been times in your life when you asked yourself the above question? How in the world did I get where I am? I never intended to be in this place. I never dreamed I would feel like this or find myself where I am. Yet how much more difficult it might be when the Lord Himself asks us that question! Indeed this is exactly the question a mighty man of God was confronted with by the Lord.
This beloved man of God was one of God's mighty warriors who had won great victories and seen the miraculous power of God flow in his ministry. Yet he was now in a place of fear, worry, and discouragement. How strange it is to see men and women of God who have walked with such power and authority succumb to the smallest of problems. We have watched them conquer great problems with a sure and confident faith. We have marveled at their courage and boldness. We have admired their ability to stand against the greatest of obstacles and never flinch. We were sure they would never be discouraged or disheartened.
What perhaps we did not know or recognize is that the power to overcome and win was not in the man or in the woman but lay in their abiding in the true source of strength. The Lord God Himself. Truly there are times when the greatest men and women of God forget this truth and imagine the strength is in them and their giftedness. It is when this happens that failure; defeat and discouragement are not far behind. Do you find yourself weary in the battle? Discouraged by the problems? Overwhelmed by everything? Dear one, it is because we have forgotten the source of our strength and peace. Indeed it was never you nor I that won these battles nor scaled these heights but rather the mighty hand of God that rested upon us and gave us all that we needed. And how did we gain this unlimited strength? Was it not because we knew we were no match for the task we had been given and in knowing we cried out to the Lord for His strength and power. Did we not implore Him to grant us His loving strength for we knew we would be overwhelmed, defeated, and perhaps destroyed without His divine help!
Two times the Lord asks His weary servant Elijah, "What are you doing here?" and two times Elijah gives the wrong answer:
1 Kings 19:9,13
9 And he came thither unto a cave, and lodged there; and, behold, the word of the Lord came to him, and he said unto him, What doest thou here, Elijah?
13 And, behold, there came a voice unto him, and said, What doest thou here, Elijah?
Perhaps after a successful Christian life you now find yourself in a cave of coldness, discouragement, and perhaps even bewilderment as Elijah did. Each time that the Lord asked Elijah why he was in this cave of coldness, Elijah answered the Lord by telling Him about all of his problems and difficulties. So entrenched was Elijah on focusing on his problems that the Lord was unable to get him to understand why He had led him to this cave. How blind we often are to the wise ways of our great King. Indeed He tells us in His word, "My ways are not your ways, for as high as the heavens are above the earth so are my ways above your ways and my thoughts above your thoughts."
The Lord brought Elijah to this cave of isolation to teach him the true source of his strength. To remind him of how the Lord works through His servants and to send him back to his tasks with a renewed knowledge of the continual fountainhead of joy and power to do the work of the Lord.
Dear one, I have found that one of the greatest problems among the servants of the Lord is that we are too busy to find the time to be with the Lord in a way that we can hear His "still small voice." Do we not busy ourselves with ministry and good deeds? Do we not rush from this problem to that problem? Yet most of the problems exist because we have not spent the necessary quiet time with the Lord. He has all the answers to those things that are overwhelming us but like Elijah we cannot get quiet enough to hear His voice. Is He not now calling you to "be still and know that I am God!" Is He not calling you back to the sweet place of confident prayer and waiting upon Him?
Ps 46:10
10 Be still, and know that I am God:
KJV
The word "know" in the above verse means to literally see the Lord. In other words the only way we can truly know the Lord in His sovereignty, authority, power, wisdom, and love is to be "still." To be quiet before Him, to wait, to be at peace and rest in His loving strength. I cannot tell you of how many of the Lord's ministers that I have counseled who were at the very end of their strength, frustrated, tired, weary, and falling into discouragement. Each time I have reminded them of the Lord's call to cease their business and come away and be "still" before the Lord. Does not His word say:
Isa 40:31-41:1
31 But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.
41:1 Keep silence before me, O islands; and let the people renew their strength:
KJV
This Hebrew word "wait" means to tarry until two cords are joined together. In other words the Lord is saying the reason I am calling you aside to me is so that I can join with you in your work and be your strength. He is further saying there is a part of me you will never see, a part of my strength and love that can only be seen in quiet, restful, peaceful waiting upon me. Are you too busy? Well then, you will never know the strength you are longing for. You have been deceived by the urgency. You have been tricked and are now on a treadmill that will only lead to burn out and weariness.
Elijah never learned the lesson he needed the first time the Lord led him to the cave of isolation. So the Lord gave him the answers he needed to go on with his ministry and solve his immediate problems. Is that not what we find ourselves doing? We perhaps are forced in some way to wait upon the Lord just long enough to find some answers and then we rush off with our new found strength only to weary once again and find ourselves in the place of discouragement and eventual defeat. How much better to learn to wait on the Lord simply because we love His presence more than we love anything else. We refuse to ruled by the urgent but have determined that we must live only by the necessary and the necessary is "to be still and know that He is God."
Does He not then promise our life will be like the Eagle who has only to spread His wings and be carried along by the jet stream of His peace and glory? The Eagle can maintain his great height above all the storms that rage below because He has found the source of his strength is to rest on the current of the wind that the Lord Himself has provided.
Go ahead and rush off to your meetings and schedules, your ideas and your plans to the urgent and the draining of your strength. But as for me, I believe I will choose the good part that Mary chose and "sit at His feet." Having waited upon Him first and foremost, I will enter my day soaring on the jet current of His divine power and at the end of the day I will have accomplished all that He required of me this day. How about you? What will you chose?
Imagine... a body of Christian believers all speaking, declaring, and proclaiming God's strategic word for this moment in history. Will you join us in this strategic moment of history so that the Church may fulfill its end-time destiny?
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