So, there are several little devotional books out about the promises of the Lord. I have had one on my book shelf for quite a while “praying the promises of God”. I would open it up sometimes and look for something that spoke into the situation I was in and I would try my best to believe that it was true. It rarely if ever worked for me. I would usually end up thinking, “well, that sounds good, but I don’t see how its true in my life. I sure would like to believe it though.”
A little over a year ago, I had to do one of the hardest things I have ever done. I knew it was what the Lord was asking me to do, but nothing in me actually wanted to do it. I reluctantly obeyed. Afterwards, I was flooded with doubts and confusion. How could being obedient to the Lord feel so terrible? I was a wreck.
That night I spent the night on a friends couch. After crying myself to sleep, I was woke up at 4 am to the sound of someone moving around in the kitchen. The lights were off and my eyes couldn’t make out who it was. I was surprised that anyone was up, so my eyes strained to see who it was. I couldn’t see anything. The noise stopped and I assumed they had gone back to bed, whoever it was. Well, at that point I was wide awake and totally aware of the anguish I had felt before falling asleep. I sat on the couch and began praying.
As I sat there listening for the Lord, He reveled to me a profound truth. I wouldn’t know until months later the depths of that truth and the way that it would affect how I lived my life.
That morning, the Lord told me that I was about to enter into a season of learning to stand on His promises. He told me how I had let my feelings control me for so long. For my whole life, my feelings had dictated what I perceived as right or wrong, good and bad, etc. My emotions were always up and down depending on what was going on in my life. The Lord wanted to change that.
That morning He told me that this was a season of digging into His word and learning to believe what it said. After the Lord told me this, my spirit was settled and I drifted back off to sleep. Later that morning I asked everyone in the house who was up at 4 am rustling around in the kitchen. To my surprise no one admitted to being up…but I don't think that is any coincidence.
That day I decided to start in the book of psalms and read all the way through. And for the next few months, every morning I would sit at my kitchen table and read the psalms as I ate my breakfast. Something happened in me over those few months as I saturated my mind with the promises of the Lord for His children. It didn’t happen immediately, but slowly I saw a change taking place. For the first time in my life I actually began to believe God’s promises and believe that they were for me. Also, during that time I committed 2 of the psalms to memory. When days would come where doubts and confusion would try to reign I was begin to quote those psalms and my attitude would shift. The Word (and promises) of the Lord really is living and active. It changes things.
That season was over a year ago, but I am still seeing fruit in my life from it. It has affected how I react to and view all situations. It has brought about a steadiness in my life that I never knew before. It gives me an unshakable hope and a calm assurance.
I never thought this was possible in my life, but by grace of God it is and it is possible for you too!
