It's Hot! - Pt 2

My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:9-10 ESV).

If you have ever driven through a Chick-fil-A to order or pick up your food, you know that the lines are usually long, though they move efficiently and quickly. Mary and I like to eat some of their food from time to time and I am always amazed how quickly we are served. I am also amazed at how the servers seem to be comfortable even in our Texas heat. Not long ago I asked one of the young people working the lines why they were wearing those heavy looking backpacks. She quickly told me that they were really very lightweight and that they were personal air conditioners! Now that made sense to me. A principle came to my mind. Management had not changed their “journey”; but they had made it a little less difficult to endure. Yesterday I introduced the idea of how difficult our journey can be. Our reading today gives us one of the principles Paul used in coping with the many challenges he faced as a result of his faith. He clearly asserts that such experiences are simply a part of the believer’s journey. We will all have a wilderness experience which is an experience of attacks, oppression, rejection, grief and so forth. Some of these experiences may be shocking, embarrassing, sudden and self-afflicting. However, in all of the experiences of our lives, whether self-made or not, God oversees them all for the express purpose of bringing good into our lives. He empowers us and creates within us a strength that we cannot possess any other way. That knowledge is the sources of “contentment.” Additionally, God wants us to call to mind these experiences so that we may be either taught or corrected. The Lord understands revisiting our wilderness experiences from time to time will keep us mindful, grateful and “in check”. Even if mistakes, regrets and sin is what comes to mind we can be sure that every experience, good or bad, is for our edification as well. We must be careful not to forfeit our thoughts and feelings of our wilderness experiences for the thoughts and feelings of complacency; contentment and “fullness” once the Lord brings us out of the wilderness into our promised land of fulfilled dreams, goals, prophecies and desires. Today, why not spend some time remembering a wilderness experience God has already brought you through. Recall the lonely and scary, uncertain, draining parts of your path. And once you recall these experiences, thank Him again for bringing you out! It will be like putting on a personal air conditioner for the heat of you present journey.