Issue 016
Do you ever feel like giving up? For some reason your confidence
levels are low and you lack motivation. The drive or spark has gone
and you feel that you are going through the motions. You used to
want to achieve all; now you want to hang it all. Plans you had are
becoming less likely to succeed and time is running out. Although you
work you don’t seem to enjoy it and you feel like you are swimming
in treacle.
In the middle of this type of crisis whether it’s midlife, early life or just
Life, there can emerge a further set of feelings:feelings of failure
towards God and feelings that somehow you have let Him down. Either
by accident, default or sometimes even deliberate behaviour, you feel
that you and God are a long way off walking in agreement -more like
negotiating at a distance. Whatever you had, you seem to have lost it.
When this happens it is likely that you will underperform and may
even begin to resent your job and your life.
There is, however, an experience to which many will testify in such
circumstances. It seems that God doesn’t abide by the rules ‘three
strikes and you’re out’, or verbal and written warnings, then disciplinary
hearing prior to dismissal.. If you listen carefully there is something
altogether different in his approach. It’s a quiet, almost inaudible,
voice. A re-assurance – a whisper of love and hope. Elijah on the
point of despair heared it after the noise of earthquake and the wind.
Peter saw it in a look after he had denied his Lord three times. David
wrote about it when he talked about walking through the valley of the
shadow of death. Mary saw it at her home in Bethany. Mary
Magdalene heard it as she wept.
Paul tells us that for good and upright people maybe you would give
your all, but God shows his love in that while we were still sinners
Christ died for us.. While Peter was denying, Judas was betraying,
Pilot was lying, his friends were running, the Romans were whipping
and the Jews were plotting, Jesus was loving. It was always thus, it is
now, and it always will be. I dont know why – it’s just the way he
works. It’s just the way he is. It has stopped millions giving up and it
will stop you.
Psalm 23
1 The LORD is my shepherd, I lack nothing.
2 He makes me lie down in green pastures,
he leads me beside quiet waters,
3 he refreshes my soul.
He guides me along the right paths
for his name’s sake.
4 Even though I walk
through the darkest valley,
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
they comfort me.
5 You prepare a table before me
in the presence of my enemies.
You anoint my head with oil;
my cup overflows.
6 Surely your goodness and love will follow me
all the days of my life,
and I will dwell in the house of the LORD
forever.
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Work well
Geoff Shattock
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