The Plumbline

All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is our merciful Father and the source of all comfort. He comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort others. When they are troubled, we will be able to give them the same comfort God has given us. ( 2 Corinthians 1:3-4   NLT )  Did you ever stop to consider the present is preparation for the future - what you go through now is actually going to be the platform from which you can actually bring comfort into the lives of others going through similar circumstances to what you are now living through? With God, there is no "wastage". He uses each circumstance to bring untold lessons into our lives, and then into the lives of others who are either directly or indirectly touched by our lives. God uses "multiplied grace" to reach a world hurting beyond measure - all because he can use our lives as platform from which that grace can be declared and shared! Comfort comes most frequently in this sense...

Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. Point out anything in me that offends you, and lead me along the path of everlasting life. ( Psalm 139:23-24   NLT ) Scripture reminds us that our heart is utterly defiled - it deceives us and others at every opportunity it gets. Why? It is bent toward our sin nature - it wants a way opposed to the way God wants for us. It often demands a way opposite of the way God would outline for our lives. Yet, no one quite knows our heart like God does - despite our attempts to cover-up the real us, God is fully aware of what dwells at the basis of each of our decisions, every action, and even all our thoughts. Who better could search out the intents and "attitude" of heart each of us possesses? Our heart needs some scrutinizing - because it is continually manipulating things to get at whatever it wants! Some of you may have cringed when I said our hearts are more than a little manipulative, but hear me out ...

Have you ever noticed how quickly you can dig a pit and easily fall into it - then how slowly and difficultly you find your way out of it again? The pit wasn't hard to dig. It might have started by a little rut we created by walking in the same place for just a little too long - longer than we might have wanted to and without paying much attention to the fact that forward progress just wasn't being made. Then in a matter of time, that small rut began to take on the form of a deeper rut which "morphed" into some pit of astronomical proportion! There you were, smack-dab in the midst of a pit, surrounded by the four walls you actually dug yourself - maybe without even noticing! I waited patiently for the Lord to help me, and he turned to me and heard my cry.  He lifted me out of the pit of despair, out of the mud and the mire.  He set my feet on solid ground and steadied me as I walked along. He has given me a new song to sing, a hymn of praise to our God. Many ...