1 Samuel 7:12 - Samuel took a single rock and set it upright between Mizpah and Shen. He named it "Ebenezer" (Rock of Help), saying, "This marks the place where God helped us." God answered Samuel. I Samuel 4:10 says that the Philistines had just thrashed Israel so mercilessly that the Israelites ran for their lives, leaving 30,000 soldiers dead. I can't wrap my mind around that big of a problem. I'm lost in my own little world of problems. I'll remember this week for a long time. Stuck but not forgotten by God. God is changing the way I relate that is committed to my own well-being at others cost and that's not right. Changing my motives to want to live holy. There are absolutes in the midst of my storm. Unshakeable Truths. Unrelenting Truths. What anchors you in the midst of your storm? I don't know a lot but this I know...God has met me this weekend in the midst of my loss and emptiness. I don't know how He makes shifts in our souls but it happened somehow. He lifted my head up. Psalm 3:3. I've been so frustrated this week with my responses to a difficult situation. There's a quote in 66 LL: "Your frustration with everything, including yourself, makes it possible to turn in deeper dependence to Me. Your haunting sense of futility shuts you up to a kind of endurance that can be sustained only with hope in My Son's return." So, I raise my Ebenezer, marking a good place, for I so need His Help.
1 Samuel 7:8 "Pray with all your might! And don't let up! Pray to God, our God, that he'll save us."
ReplyDeleteHosanna, God save us, we cry this day. We know what kings do, as Samuel warned. We don't need a king but Jesus reigning in our hearts. Lord, save us. Hosanna in the highest. Blessed Palm Sunday to each of you.
I've been kind of stuck in the futility of evaluating my sin over the years. Wishing I had more to show for life. To show Whom? For Whom do you carry the stone---do you know that apocryphal story that Elisabeth Elliot tells where Jesus asks the disciples to carry a stone all day and Peter picks a pebble and Jesus turns it into bread at lunchtime. So then Peter shoulders a boulder for the rest of the afternoon. At the end of the day, Jesus says, "throw it in the river," Peter. Peter balks but Jesus says---"for Whom did you carry the stone?" I've been kind of stuck this week in a funk. And yesterday, God so showed up to speak to me through a six-year-old and a blogger named Donna. So, I raise my Ebenezer. For Whom do we carry the stone?
ReplyDeleteI have been thinking of an answerto your question. "What anchors you in the midst of your storm?
ReplyDeleteFor me it is knowing that no matter what I am going through, no matter how my heart is breaking, someone, somewhere is praying for me. That is my rock, because sometimes when things have gotten so bad I couldn't see a light at the end of the tunnel, when I could not even form words or coherent thought to pray for myself, prayers were being offered up on my behalf. Be assured that you are being lifted up in prayer right now and rest in the knowledge you are loved.
Right now I cannot recall the name of the hymn I sang in church growing up but I recall a phrase, "Now I raise my Ebenezer.." Honestly, as a youth all I could remember when singing that hymn was Ebenezer? Scrooge?? Yes, I know the Bible teaching was available but somehow it just skipped past me.
ReplyDeleteEbeneezer (God, My Rock of Help). I have been raising my Ebeneezer all my life. I know who I am and it is only by God's Grace, Mercy and power that I have received the rich blessings in my life as I "Raised my Ebenezer" and continue to do so.
I can say though devasted in January, today almost to April God has taught me and is continuing to teach me more about the Holiness He desires to see in my life. Such a loving God has even provided a few really big major miracles for me in this process. I still am in the stormy season of this health issue but I can see real progress. God is and has been so Gracious to me I want to love Him more.
Bev, one thing that continues to amaze me is the unique ways God chooses to bless me that I would never think of. The Creativity of our Holy Father God is a huge blessing.
Bev, I'm believing this blessing on you as you have "Raised your Ebenezer."
God who?
ReplyDeleteGive us a king!
No one cared about God's desires during this time. All they cared about was their own desires.
Humbling myself this day to forget my desires during this day and to focus on what God's desires are.
How many times do we pray asking for things when we should pray to God asking what we can do for Him today.
Lord, don't make it my agenda...it is yours. Even though I get so caught up in living a blessed life without suffering, look inside me and cure my self-centeredness and my thoughts of entitlement. Lord, continue working Your holiness in me. I want to live peaceably with the Chest of God resting safely here in my heart. You are my heart's desire, God. Thy will be done. In Jesus Name. Amen.