30 Days of Praise - Day 19

I can't believe it's been 19 days straight that I've been doing this blogging. It's been an eventful 19 days. I am grateful (and praiseful), though, that God put the desire in my heart to pursue Him in this before the events got challenging. It made a big difference when I was struggling through the past weekend because I was already focused where I needed to be.

I think back to just a week ago tonight sitting in a hospital room with my husband being told about a lot of concerns with little definitive information. I felt torn and divided having to leave my kids at home so I could tend to my husband, then when the flu started the next day having to leave my husband alone in the hospital so I could tend to my daughter. It tears at your heart to be in a position like that.

There is something to be said to have an assurance of something bigger than yourself that you can hold to. I feel sorry for people who think faith is a crutch. Well, I feel sorry for them because what they believe that means. The Lord is my crutch at times, because I lean on Him in my weakness, but it doesn't make me weaker, it makes me stronger. I have a friend who has a quote on her MySpace that says something to the effect of "the greatest mistake of mankind is believing there is anything greater than life itself." I think what she means is life is supposed to be some great adventure, and I don't disagree with that, but I think the mistake is believing this is the best that there is.

This world is the broken down version of what God intended for us. Sin destroyed the "great life" God had planned for us all, and in the process the clear view of God and His love for us was severely obscured. As time goes on I think the world obscures Him more and more, and the truth of the matter is that as in many nations of the world, eventually the whole concept of believing in Him will become a crime. I believe I will see the day in my lifetime that religious freedom in America no longer exists.

But I praise God that they can not regulate my faith, nor destroy my testimony. And I pray, like Daniel in the Bible, I will be a believer who stands firm and faces any conflict against my faith with confidence in the One I serve.

It's very interesting to me that so many of these people who "enjoy this life" and deny God are the same people who live their lives medicating themselves with alcohol, drugs and/or illicit sex. Or perhaps it's not even things that innocuous, maybe their pain killer is work, achievement, worldly succes. They numb themselves to the pains of this world and call it a party or a success, when eventually the party catches up with them, and their "crutches" crumble or the success fades and they have nothing but "stuff."

I don't judge these people, I feel sorry for them, and I know, there but for the grace of God go I. But I am thankful and filled with praise for the God who rescued me from that life. I remember days when I myself called the Bible "a book of stories to be interpreted." I praise God for opening my eyes to truth and giving me the foundation I can build my life on. Because this life isn't the "greatest thing there is," it is but a dress rehearsal for the eternal, and I look forward to the days when all I'll do is praise, for God alone is sure.

(Jesus said)"Whoever comes to Me, and hears My sayings and does them, I will show you whom he is like: he is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently against that house, and could not shake it, for it was founded on the rock. But he who heard and did nothing is like a man who built a house on the earth without a foundation, against which the stream beat vehemently; and immediately it fell. And the ruin of that house was great.” Luke 6:47-49