Avoiding Burn Out
Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savor, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men. Matthew 5:13 (KJV)
Imagine with me going out to the highway where the road crews have just salted the roads to make them safer for driving in the snow and picking up salt to use for cooking. I can’t think of anyone that would find road salt good for cooking or preserving food. It has been cast out and is trodden under foot. Jesus lays this out as He calls us to be the salt of the earth. He tells us salt that is not salty is good for nothing but to be cast out and trodden under foot by men.
As we are pressed into this wicked world we must maintain our saltiness. We cannot be of use to the Master if we have become bland and lost the power that is in us. Natural salt is formed and develops its flavor in the process of creation but once it has lost its savor there is no way to make it salty again. I am glad that is not true with the Child of God.
While we were bound in sin and far from Jesus, we were not salty. We might have believed the lies of the world and thought that we were exciting and dynamic but really we were poor, and wretched, and blind. We were bland! But when Jesus called us and we received His grace by faith something happened and we were changed. The old things passed away and the new thing began. The mourning, humble, meek, hungry, thirsty, merciful, pure, peacemaker that suffers persecution was born. Christ begin to live through us and His light shined brightly from our hearts. We became salt.
This is the source of our saltiness! Jesus! The more of His life that is lived through us the saltier we become. When this world begins to wear us down and the savor begins to lack in our lives we have a source that is eternal and can sustain us in the darkest of times. Jesus would leave His disciples and go off to pray. We find Him in the wilderness, in the desert, on the mountain side, by the seaside, and on the river bank but He always had a place where He could be refreshed by the Spirit. He carried the message of God to a world in need. He was rejected and abused. He worked the works of God and delivered those in bondage. Miracles followed Him everywhere He went. He showed us how to be salt and how to stay salty.
There is not one place where it is recorded that Jesus “burned out”. He remained faithful to the call of God and finished the course. How? He was tempted as we are. He got tired like we do. He became frustrated like us. Why didn’t He burn out? Jesus always had a place to pray. He stayed in the Spirit and the Spirit stayed in Him. He showed us what the fullness of the Spirit looks like in a man or woman that is willing to stay salty.
I have a salt water softener at my house. It does its job efficiently and effectively never requiring much attention until the salt level gets too low. At first a blinking red light warns of the impending low level. If I am too busy and ignore the warning the softener continues to work. Nothing changes. I still receive the benefit of its labors. Then as the salt continues to dissipate the level reaches a critically low level, alarms begin to go off demanding attention. I would be foolish if I were to take that warning sign as “burn out” and decide to throw the softener away. What I really need to do is just add salt. If we are suffering “burn out” and getting tired of the call that God has placed on our lives it is time to check our salt level. We need to “just add salt”. Get into that “secret place” and allow the Lord to restore your soul.
Showing posts with label prayer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label prayer. Show all posts
Friday, October 11, 2013
Friday, September 13, 2013
When It's Too Hard
Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy. Matthew 5:7
Corrie Ten Boom wrote of a meeting she had with one of the guards from the concentration camp where she had suffered and her sister had died in her book “The Hiding Place”.
“It was at a church service in Munich that I saw him, the former S.S. man who had stood guard at the shower room door in the processing center at Ravensbruck. He was the first of our actual jailers that I had seen since that time. And suddenly it was all there—the roomful of mocking men, the heaps of clothing, Betsie's pain-blanched face.
He came up to me as the church was emptying, beaming and bowing. "How grateful I am for your message, Fraulein," he said. "To think that, as you say, He has washed my sins away!"
His hand was thrust out to shake mine. And I, who had preached so often to the people in Bloemendaal the need to forgive, kept my hand at my side.
Even as the angry, vengeful thoughts boiled through me, I saw the sin of them. Jesus Christ had died for this man; was I going to ask for more? Lord Jesus, I prayed, forgive me and help me to forgive him.
I tried to smile, I struggled to raise my hand. I could not. I felt nothing, not the slightest spark of warmth or charity. And so again I breathed a silent prayer. Jesus, I cannot forgive him. Give me Your forgiveness.
As I took his hand the most incredible thing happened. From my shoulder along my arm and through my hand a current seemed to pass from me to him, while into my heart sprang a love for this stranger that almost overwhelmed me.”
There are times when mercy just doesn’t come naturally. Our flesh rises up against what we know to be right and truth takes a back door to the pain and suffering that we have endured. In this moment the enemy lays a trap for our soul.
It is easy to say that we cannot forgive. We can blame our fleshly nature. We can say that we are not yet “mature” enough in the Lord. We can reason that the offense was just too great. But whatever the reason the result is always the same. Our heart begins to harden. The Holy Spirit is grieved and we begin to lose our ability to love those that God has sent us to rescue.
It is comforting to know that when the road is too steep. God is always there if we will call on His Name. “Give me Your forgiveness.” I don’t have enough. I have reached the bottom of my barrel. I need you, Lord.
In the meeting with the SS guard it was not the guard who was set free but Corrie Ten Boom. She was rescued from certain disaster in her soul. A festering that only God had seen. I don’t think the meeting was an accident of fate. I know that God placed that man right in the path of His beloved daughter. Her love was multiplied and her effectiveness for God increased above anything that she could have planned. God has a way of doing that if we call on His Name when the enemy comes in like a flood. Don’t be afraid to face those overwhelming moments when you look into the impossible and quietly pray, “Give me your strength.” “Give me your forgiveness.” “Give me more grace.”
Corrie Ten Boom wrote of a meeting she had with one of the guards from the concentration camp where she had suffered and her sister had died in her book “The Hiding Place”.
“It was at a church service in Munich that I saw him, the former S.S. man who had stood guard at the shower room door in the processing center at Ravensbruck. He was the first of our actual jailers that I had seen since that time. And suddenly it was all there—the roomful of mocking men, the heaps of clothing, Betsie's pain-blanched face.
He came up to me as the church was emptying, beaming and bowing. "How grateful I am for your message, Fraulein," he said. "To think that, as you say, He has washed my sins away!"
His hand was thrust out to shake mine. And I, who had preached so often to the people in Bloemendaal the need to forgive, kept my hand at my side.
Even as the angry, vengeful thoughts boiled through me, I saw the sin of them. Jesus Christ had died for this man; was I going to ask for more? Lord Jesus, I prayed, forgive me and help me to forgive him.
I tried to smile, I struggled to raise my hand. I could not. I felt nothing, not the slightest spark of warmth or charity. And so again I breathed a silent prayer. Jesus, I cannot forgive him. Give me Your forgiveness.
As I took his hand the most incredible thing happened. From my shoulder along my arm and through my hand a current seemed to pass from me to him, while into my heart sprang a love for this stranger that almost overwhelmed me.”
There are times when mercy just doesn’t come naturally. Our flesh rises up against what we know to be right and truth takes a back door to the pain and suffering that we have endured. In this moment the enemy lays a trap for our soul.
It is easy to say that we cannot forgive. We can blame our fleshly nature. We can say that we are not yet “mature” enough in the Lord. We can reason that the offense was just too great. But whatever the reason the result is always the same. Our heart begins to harden. The Holy Spirit is grieved and we begin to lose our ability to love those that God has sent us to rescue.
It is comforting to know that when the road is too steep. God is always there if we will call on His Name. “Give me Your forgiveness.” I don’t have enough. I have reached the bottom of my barrel. I need you, Lord.
In the meeting with the SS guard it was not the guard who was set free but Corrie Ten Boom. She was rescued from certain disaster in her soul. A festering that only God had seen. I don’t think the meeting was an accident of fate. I know that God placed that man right in the path of His beloved daughter. Her love was multiplied and her effectiveness for God increased above anything that she could have planned. God has a way of doing that if we call on His Name when the enemy comes in like a flood. Don’t be afraid to face those overwhelming moments when you look into the impossible and quietly pray, “Give me your strength.” “Give me your forgiveness.” “Give me more grace.”
Thursday, August 29, 2013
Finding Strength
Matthew 5:5 (NIV) Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.
In the garden of Gethsemane we once again find Jesus in prayer as the principalities of this world were pressing in on Him. So many times in His life when Jesus faced a big decision or was facing great temptation or struggle he would retreat to a place of prayer. It is in this final battle with His flesh that we find the source of Christ’s meekness. Jesus was all God and all man. He faced temptation just as we do and had to overcome the weakness of this fleshly body. He also had an intimate knowledge of how Heaven works and the importance of prayer.
Today many view prayer as their opportunity to tell God about things that He may not know. To convince God that He needs to do something that He doesn’t really want to do or inform Him of what they want Him to do. Jesus knew that prayer is so much more than a divine drive thru where you place your order and wait for the delivery. He saw it as a source of power and restoration. Prayer was the place where you presented the problems of life and heard from God so that your heart was prepared to do His will. There in the garden we see this at work.
Jesus cried out “Father let this cup pass from me.” That night the Romans soldiers were coming to arrest Him. He knew the prophets had foretold that He would be beaten beyond recognition and die on a cruel cross. The flesh resisted! There had to be another way. The temptation was great to avoid the confrontation, to find another way, any way but the one that lay ahead. So Jesus went to the place where He routinely met with God and prayed. There He found the strength to say “not my will but thine be done”.
We find in Christ the perfect example of “strength under control”. His meekness was evident in the compassion He showed for those that beat Him and spat on upon as He cried “Father, forgive them”. Even there in the garden when Judas betrayed Him with a kiss Jesus responded by calling him “friend”. There was no vindictiveness or anger. He was able to accept the injustice of the cross with the strength that came from knowing God was in control. Yet, it was only a few days earlier that Jesus had rebuked the Pharisee’s for their hardness of heart and cleansed the Temple by chasing out the moneychangers. This was no wimp! When the soldiers asked if he was the one they were looking for Jesus replied, “I Am”. When He spoke that name they all fell to the ground. He could have destroyed them right there. But instead He commanded Peter to put away his sword and healed the ear of the His tormentor. He was showing us the way.
Remember when Jesus came back to the disciples in the garden. He had been praying and wrestling with the flesh where He had found that place in God where He could say “not my will but thine”. When Jesus returned He found the disciples sleeping instead of praying. He awakened them and said,
“Could you not pray with me one hour? Watch and pray, that you enter not into temptation, the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”
This was His last instructions to them. It is the secret to living like Jesus, to inheriting the earth, to overcoming this world, to living a life of meekness. “Watch and pray that you enter not into temptation.”
In the garden of Gethsemane we once again find Jesus in prayer as the principalities of this world were pressing in on Him. So many times in His life when Jesus faced a big decision or was facing great temptation or struggle he would retreat to a place of prayer. It is in this final battle with His flesh that we find the source of Christ’s meekness. Jesus was all God and all man. He faced temptation just as we do and had to overcome the weakness of this fleshly body. He also had an intimate knowledge of how Heaven works and the importance of prayer.
Today many view prayer as their opportunity to tell God about things that He may not know. To convince God that He needs to do something that He doesn’t really want to do or inform Him of what they want Him to do. Jesus knew that prayer is so much more than a divine drive thru where you place your order and wait for the delivery. He saw it as a source of power and restoration. Prayer was the place where you presented the problems of life and heard from God so that your heart was prepared to do His will. There in the garden we see this at work.
Jesus cried out “Father let this cup pass from me.” That night the Romans soldiers were coming to arrest Him. He knew the prophets had foretold that He would be beaten beyond recognition and die on a cruel cross. The flesh resisted! There had to be another way. The temptation was great to avoid the confrontation, to find another way, any way but the one that lay ahead. So Jesus went to the place where He routinely met with God and prayed. There He found the strength to say “not my will but thine be done”.
We find in Christ the perfect example of “strength under control”. His meekness was evident in the compassion He showed for those that beat Him and spat on upon as He cried “Father, forgive them”. Even there in the garden when Judas betrayed Him with a kiss Jesus responded by calling him “friend”. There was no vindictiveness or anger. He was able to accept the injustice of the cross with the strength that came from knowing God was in control. Yet, it was only a few days earlier that Jesus had rebuked the Pharisee’s for their hardness of heart and cleansed the Temple by chasing out the moneychangers. This was no wimp! When the soldiers asked if he was the one they were looking for Jesus replied, “I Am”. When He spoke that name they all fell to the ground. He could have destroyed them right there. But instead He commanded Peter to put away his sword and healed the ear of the His tormentor. He was showing us the way.
Remember when Jesus came back to the disciples in the garden. He had been praying and wrestling with the flesh where He had found that place in God where He could say “not my will but thine”. When Jesus returned He found the disciples sleeping instead of praying. He awakened them and said,
“Could you not pray with me one hour? Watch and pray, that you enter not into temptation, the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”
This was His last instructions to them. It is the secret to living like Jesus, to inheriting the earth, to overcoming this world, to living a life of meekness. “Watch and pray that you enter not into temptation.”
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