Always Rejoice!

Current health issues I face, seasoned with an ever-nagging feeling of inadequacy and self-doubt, found me inadvertently sinking into the quick sand of worry.  I have always struggled with worry.  People who know me well say that they don’t worry because they know I’ll do it for them.  I’m not proud of it, but that’s what I do…I worry.

The flip side of my “condition” is that I have seen and experienced first-hand the Holy Spirit working in me through the years in amazing ways.  He has walked with me through many fires and showed me that as long as I stick by Him, He will rescue me and deliver me unharmed.  The Lord in His majesty has been patiently teaching me that worry is just a sovereign waste of time and energy which could be otherwise employed in a more efficient manner (let alone a huge sign of my lack of faith!).

Through several trials that range from infertility and family disunity to chronic illness of loved ones and career dissatisfaction, Our Heavenly Healer and Redeemer has carried me to the other side of anguish to the calm shore of peace, time after time.  With love, He constantly reminds me that He is in control and that no matter what; He will take care of me and my beloved today as He has done in the past and will do in the future.

Though I have never heard the audible voice of God, He speaks to me in His Word.  He directs me to passages that contain exactly what I need to hear.  That’s how I landed on Philippians 4: 4 where Paul commands us to rejoice always, not just sometimes or when things are going well and we feel happy.  He says, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit to “Rejoice in the Lord always.”  And in case we missed it or didn’t understand it, he repeats it again in the same verse:  “I will say it again, Rejoice!”

In days like these, when things don’t seem to go my way, I go back to this verse and let the energy of the Holy Spirit inject me with His sustaining breath of life and remind me that, "Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will be joyful in God my Savior." (Habakkuk 3: 17-18) For He is Faithful and I know that He is who He says He is and that He will do all He promised and that I am His child and He loves me, therefore He will not forsake me. He is my Redeemer and He lives! He is the same today as He was yesterday and He will be tomorrow.

I will not let my circumstances cast a dark shadow over me. I will call on the power of He who lives in me to chase the darkness away and wipe the tears off my face. It is a difficult thing to do, particularly when immersed in the depths of a drowning sea of problems, worries, difficulties, negativity, despair, and fear; but it is not impossible if I relay on the Lord. If I depend on my own strength, yes, I am done, but I do not! I rest on the strength of He whose power is made perfect in my weakness. He grace IS, indeed sufficient for me. (2 Corinthians 12: 9)

I will have other days when I see the gathering of the dark clouds in the horizon heading toward me. It is inevitable. I will probably feel the sting of worry pock me like a needle, but I will not allow it to make me turn my face away from my Lord! Empowered by the Holy Spirit, I will let His loving hand guide me to a place of rest and quiet. He will take me to a place where I can pause and tune in to His Word and pray for a keen awareness of His presence. His presence will then carry me through all my trials and fires to the other side where Mercy waits for me with open arms.