2002-11-01
Good Morning Dear Ones,
People who have read my writing know that these messages aren’t about Lynn Johnson; they are about God. However, I would like to share a part of my faith walk that points out how our awesome God can work in a person’s life to help when one who has been saved is pummeled by Satan with doubts. When I came to faith in Christ, I quickly got off on the wrong foot. To begin, I didn’t really understand what it meant to be saved, because my faith was so very young and ill-defined at the time. I was being swept away into wrong doctrine by a wave of attention and affirmation to which my sorry life had rendered me vulnerable. There’s nothing wrong with attention and affirmation when it comes for the right reasons, ones without an ulterior motive attached to them. The latter kind come from God’s influence on people’s lives and not from human agendas. That was a very important lesson I had to learn. Satan would like to muddy up the real source, so the vulnerable person can’t tell the difference. It’s one of his ways of sending a fiery arrow to the mind of a believer with the potential of producing lots of fruits of the Spirit, of the kind described in GA 5 :22-23. “But the Spirit produces love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, humility, and self-control. There is law against such things as these.”
After twelve years of having my ego massaged and not really better understanding what a great gift of grace my salvation was, I had gradually become aware that something was terribly wrong. When I put questions designed to uncover the reason for the internal unrest I was feeling to those in authority in the church I was attending, the answer I received was, “Your time to understand will come.” I knew immediately that God was not in charge with these people. I had to deal with my doubts head-on by humbling myself before the One and Only True Authority, on my knees and asking for His guidance. 1 PET 5: 6-7, “Humble yourselves, then, under God’s mighty hand, so that He will lift you up in His own good time. Leave all your worries with Him, because He cares for you.” PS 32: 8, [God speaking] “I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way thou salt go: I will guide thee with Mine eye.” There was an additional doubt that was gnawing away at my spirit, one with which only the Lord could help me. I had been raised to know God’s words in EX 19: 5-6 and IS 49: 6, which read respectively, “Now, if you will obey Me and keep My covenant, you will be My own people. The whole earth is Mine, but you will be My chosen people, a people dedicated to Me alone, and you will serve Me as priests…I have a greater task for you, My servant. Not only will you restore to greatness the people of Israel who have survived, but I will also make you a light to the nations-so that all the world may be saved.” My doubts had raised the question, where do I fit into this personally?
Prayer and study of His word were what I needed. In all the time I had spent learning wrong doctrine, not realizing that FAITH + NOTHING = SALVATION, I had not really spent much time reading directly from the Scriptures, especially the NT. I knew something about the OT, but wasn’t even familiar enough with that to have been greatly impacted by it. Oh yes, I could say all the prayers I had grown up with in both English and Hebrew, but I didn’t really understand them the way God is allowing me to do today. Even today, I realize that I will need to spend the rest of my life praying and studying His word daily, because in comparison to Him what I know can get lost in the head of a pin. It was God Who gave me the boldness to study His word and eventually leave the denomination I was in. And it was God Who led me to 1 PET 5: 9-11, “Be firm in your faith and resist him [Satan], because you know that your fellow believers in the all the world are going through the same kind of sufferings. But after you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, Who calls you to share His eternal glory in union with Christ, will Himself perfect you and give you firmness, strength, and a sure foundation. To Him be the power forever!” Does God hear and answer our prayers? You bet, He does! Being firm in one’s faith and having it rest on a sure foundation [or should I say a Sure Foundation] is the ticket to thwarting Satan’s fiery arrow of doubt headed for our minds. God stops it with His mighty hand mid flight! PS 116:1, “I love the Lord, because He hears our prayers and answers them,” David reminds us. Dear Ones, God has given us the power to resist the devil on the grounds of the cross.
JN 1: 1-4 is the Firm Foundation upon which we can stand. “Before the world was created, the Word already existed; He was with God, and He was the same as God. From the very beginning the Word was with God. Through Him God made all things; not one thing all creation was made without Him. The Word was the source of life, and the life brought light to mankind.” The Word gave His physical life on the cross for us, so that we would have the chance by repenting and coming to real faith in Him, we are saved. As if that wasn’t enough, God gave us the same power used to raise the Word from death to life to us to combat Satan. Even more, He gave us the gift of the Holy Spirit to help us have the discernment we need to understand His teachings and establish lives of holiness. We do not have to wallow in doubt when we take part in this life that Christ has modeled for us. Hallelujah!
PRAYER: O Lord, the term “Sure Foundation” with capital letters can only refer to Your Son. The same can be said for “Word.” You have given us a beautiful mental picture in EPH 2: 20-22 of the kind of lives we need to effectively push back Satan’s attempts to make us doubt You and our own faith in You. “You, too, are built upon a foundation laid by the apostles and prophets, the Cornerstone being Christ Jesus Himself. He is the One Who holds the whole building together and makes it grow into a sacred temple dedicated to the Lord. In union with Him you too are being built together with all the others into a place where God lives through His Spirit.” When we put this together with PS 48: 9, our picture is fleshed out in a meaningful way when faced with doubts. “Our God, here in Your temple we think about Your love.” In the course of teaching a lesson on AC 2: 42-47, our pastor recently stated, “The church is about relationships, not a building or edifice.” Our relationship with You, Dearest Abba, if healthy, gives You the opportunity to teach us we do not have to doubt our faith in You. We need to study, pray, and listen for Your direction when faced with this onslaught from Satan. Once that is done, we need to obey Your command to take action at the time and in the way You guide us to take it. Above, I asked the question about where I personally fit into what we learn from EX 19: 5-6 and IS 49: 6. You answered that question by giving me these messages to write for others, messages with the purpose of letting them see You at work in all our lives and that convey why You deserve our praise, love, and thanks. You are eager to answer the questions each of us ask, not just mine. We acknowledge the great sacrifice of Your Son and the gift of the Holy Spirit with our humble confession of sin and offering at Your altar of our adoration, worship, loyalty, diligence, glory, honor, trust, obedience, thanks, and utmost praise. In Christ’s name, amen.
There is still more the Lord wants me to say about the issue of doubts and the power God has given to resist them. These will be the subjects of tomorrow’s message. Once again, what I have been given to convey this morning has the stamp of God’s love for us all over it. Through PS 32; 8, God has said, “I will make you wise and show you where to go. I will guide you and watch over you.” Is it any wonder that I’m led to call the Scriptures “God’s Love Letter To us?” Those are the words of a God Who adores His children and cares for them. I must conclude with PS 40: 16, “Let all those who seek You rejoice and be glad in You: Let such as love Your salvation say continually, ‘The Lord be magnified!’” That is the love relationship God wants us to have with Him. Peter and I send you our love too.
Grace Be With You Always,
Lynn Johnson