See, God has come to save me. I will trust in him and not be afraid. The Lord God is my strength and my song; he has given me victory.” With joy you will drink deeply from the fountain of salvation! In that wonderful day you will sing: “Thank the Lord! Praise his name! Tell the nations what he has done. Let them know how mighty he is! (Isaiah 12:2-4 NLT) When a person gives their lives to the Lord, asking him for the forgiveness of their sins, there is something that begins within them - sanctification. That is just a big word that means your life is about to change for the better. The things that gave you so much worry and angst will not immediately be gone in a magical poof of smoke, but your perspective will change until one day you gradually see those things no longer as threats to your peace or security. The Lord's strength becomes our strength - an exchange that is definitely no equal in any measure! The things we used to attempt to do on our own are no longer ours to 'mu...
The Lord had said to Abram, “Leave your native country, your relatives, and your father’s family, and go to the land that I will show you. So Abram departed as the Lord had instructed, and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he left Haran. He took his wife, Sarai, his nephew Lot, and all his wealth—his livestock and all the people he had taken into his household at Haran—and headed for the land of Canaan. (Genesis 12:1, 4-5 NLT) If God were to tell you to pick up and go, would you? Having been settled for so long in a particular job, community, and relationships - would you be able to disconnect from those things and go as he asked? It might come as a little bit of a surprise to some, but most of us would have a very hard time with this 'ask' from God, wouldn't we? Why? We have become 'rooted' in our comfort and it would be hard to 'disconnect' from that level of comfort to go into the 'discomfort' of the unknown. The very idea ...