MY GOD SHALL SUPPLY EVERY NEED

#1 · May 11, 2006, 3:41 pm

Quote from Forum Archives on May 11, 2006, 3:41 pm
Posted by: henkf <henkf@...>
MY GOD SHALL SUPPLY EVERY NEED

Phillippians 4:4-20

     "My God shall supply every need." Think of what a tremendous statement of faith that is: "My God shall supply every need." It is sometimes very hard for us to believe that it is only our own negative minds that keep us from achieving peace and joy in this world.

     Dr. Joseph Murphy shows how true this is in his book THE POWER OF YOUR SUBCONSCIOUS MIND. He says:

     "A number of years ago, I stayed for about a week in a farmer's house in Connemarra on the west coast of Ireland. He seemed to be always singing and whistling and was full of humour. I asked him the secret of his happiness, and his reply was: `It's a habit of mine to be happy. Every morning when I awaken and every night before I go to sleep, I bless my family, the crops, the cattle, and I thank God for the wonderful harvest.'" (Prentice-Hall Publishers, 1963. )

     That farmer found the secret -- the secret of faith-filled living, the secret to being happy. Can you relax, my friend, and believe that God will supply your needs?

WE LIVE IN AN AGE OF ANXIETY.

Fear - dread - worry - call it what you will, it is a very destructive force in our lives. In fact, according to Dr. Jack Downing, the word "worry" means "to tear apart." And that is apt, because when we worry, that's what we do: we tear ourselves apart. And we lose our perspective on life.

     Just like the duck that Joseph Wood Krutch tells about who was frantic in protecting her ducklings. She flew into a flurry even at the approach of well-meaning human friends who had cared for her for years. She sometimes became so distressed that she forgot what she was doing and attacked her own young. But that's what anxiety can do to us.

     OF COURSE IT'S TRUE THAT MOST OF US ARE NOT REALLY VERY CONCERNED ABOUT OUR NEEDS, ARE WE?

It is our "wants" that keep us awake at night. We never worry about where our next meal will come from, we worry about how to make that next car payment, or which weight-loss program would work best for us. Our sense of values is so off centre today that we place a terrible burden on ourselves. Take a look at the minister in the following story and think about what you see.

     The minister in question had stopped at a small cafeteria to eat, but he ate with little appetite, for he was quite angry at having been refused honorary membership in the country club. Obviously, he thought, people did not appreciate him as they should, and he hated the idea of still having to pay greens fees.

     He was walking back to his car, which, he ruefully reflected, was already a year old, when his eye was caught by a beggar. This fellow had some real problems physically. His right arm was missing from the elbow down, his right foot was twisted ninety degrees to the side and was sheathed in three or four layers of automobile casing. His right eye was grotesquely out of line, and his left leg -- which apparently ended somewhere near the knee -- terminated in a homemade peg leg tipped with metal. (Webb B. Garrison. CREATIVE IMAGINATION IN PREACHING. (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1960), p. 125. )

     Suddenly the good pastor's concerns came into startling perspective.

     Jesus said don't be like the heathen. They take pride in all these things and are deeply concerned about them. But your heavenly Father already knows perfectly well what you truly need, and He will give them to you.

     Don't be anxious about tomorrow, because God will take care of your tomorrow. Live one day at a time. (Matthew 6:30-34)

     Put down your burden of worry and fear. There is no purpose in it.

DO YOU REALIZE THAT IT IS NOT YOUR PROBLEMS, BUT YOUR PERSPECTIVE THAT DETERMINES YOUR ABILITY TO COPE WITH LIFE?

Your perspective.

     Have you read the fable of the philosophical clock which one day meditated about its future? It had just been bought and placed on a shelf in a large farmhouse room. As soon as it was wound up for the first time it began to worry about all the work it had to do. It had to tick twice every second. That meant 120 ticks every minute, or 7,200 ticks every hour, or 172,800 every day. Each year it would have to tick 63,072,000 times, and in ten years it would have to tick 630,720,000 times. Those kinds of numbers were just too much for the clock's nervous system, and it "passed out."

     But when it came to again, it had a flashing insight: it realized that it only had to tick one tick at a time. Not 63 million, or even 63. Just one! And anyone can tick once. This insight gave the clock a powerful injection of courage, and it went about its duty of ticking, which it has been doing for twenty-five years now. (Walter L. Cook. MEETING THE TEST. (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1960). )

     Just one tick at a time. Sounds pretty easy, doesn't it? Someone else put it this way:

               By the yard, life is hard;

               By the inch, it's a cinch.

     All too often we allow ourselves to be overwhelmed by our problems, and we lose our perspective. We think to ourselves that it is the end of the world. But I can assure you that it is not. Tomorrow the sun is going to rise again. Somewhere birds will be singing and flowers will be blooming. You will still have food to eat and clothes to wear, and you will be able continue with your life.

     Norman Vincent Peale once put it this way:

     "Sailing to the Near East last summer, I often talked with the ship's 1st officer. He told me a ship riding out a storm keeps going ahead by relaxing in the waves. . .

     "`The ocean is a tremendous force,' he said, `and a ship is only a very small force, but we know how to make our powerful engines adapt themselves to the timing of the sea. We don't drive them relentlessly through the waves; instead, we adjust our speed to the timing of the waves, so we are practically carried along by the sea."

     Now this wonderful technique can be applied to people as well as to ships. Get yourself in time with your difficulties. Then get in harmony with God, and you will ride out your difficulties without strain.

"MY GOD WILL SUPPLY EVERY NEED. . ." AND YOU CAN COUNT ON THAT.

You don't even have to strike up a bargain with Him to receive His blessings. It's a lot like the two sailors who were adrift on a raft when they had just about given up hope of rescue. One began to pray, "O Lord, I've led a worthless life. I've been unkind to my wife, and I've neglected my children, but if you'll save me, I promise..."

     And the other shouted, "Hold it! I think I see land!"

     You do not need to strike up a slick bargain with God. Most of us probably wouldn't keep a bargain like that anyway. But we don't even need to try, because everything He has is yours. He will supply your needs just because you are His child.

     Our problems will become just as the clouds in a painting by a German artist called "Cloud Land." On first looking at the picture it appears to be nothing but masses of clouds -- one cloud upon another. But anyone who studies the picture closely will notice that each cloud is actually an angel's face or an angel's wing. The picture is just filled with angels. And so it is with all the clouds in our lives: when God comes close to us in our anxiety the clouds turn into ministering angels. Clouds may not seem to be very desirable to us, and in our foolishness we would always walk in the sunshine. However, "All sunshine makes a desert." Our heavenly Father knows what is best for us, and He would never send the clouds if they were not for our good. (William Dawson).

     Of course, some of us are our own worst enemies. God offers us blessings untold, but sometimes we refuse to receive them. We want to go our own way, even though we can see destruction ahead. Even God cannot give a gift to someone who doesn't want it. We must be willing to actively receive His gift.

     One day Henry Drummond was preparing to leave the home of some friends in the hills of Scotland. They offered him the use of their coach to drive him to the village where he would catch the train for his next appointment. "Our coachman is a very wonderful man and quite an unusual scholar," they told Mr. Drummond, "but he has been defeated by drink. We were hoping that you might have an opportunity to say something to him that will help him."

     So when the time came to go, Henry Drummond climbed up onto the seat next to the coachman, and before the driver realized what was happening, Mr. Drummond had won his way into the coachman's mind and heart. He began confessing his failures and expressing regret for the collapse which had so tragically torn his life. "Suppose," said Mr. Drummond, "that as we rode along these curves and hills, the horses you are driving somehow got out of control, and you realized that you could not manage them. However, you suddenly remember that the man sitting next to you was the finest horseman in Scotland and that there has never been a span of horses which he could not control. What would you do?" "Oh," exclaimed the coachman, "is that what Christ expects me to do?" "Exactly!" replied Henry Drummond. "Turn the reins of your life over to him!" (G. Ray Jordan. RELIGION THAT IS ETERNAL. (New York: The MacMillan Company, 1960))

     Could you do that? Could you accept that gift from Christ? God will supply your needs, and He will help you cope with your life. But you must be ready to live your life one day at a time. Turn the reins of your life over to Him, and you will discover just how rich you are.

------------------

http://www.worldoutreach.ca/DearGod/

…
  ************************************  Weekly messages of hope and comfort for those who want to learn more about Jesus and His glorious plan for our lives.  To find out more about our ministry go to : worldoutreach.ca/sotn.htm  visit our "Cartoon Site"  www.worldoutreach.ca/DearGod/  *************************************                                                                            --  To unsubscribe, send ANY message to: sermonsonthenet-unsubscribe@welovegod.org  

Posted by: henkf <henkf@...>

MY GOD SHALL SUPPLY EVERY NEED

Phillippians 4:4-20

"My God shall supply every need." Think of what a tremendous statement of faith that is: "My God shall supply every need." It is sometimes very hard for us to believe that it is only our own negative minds that keep us from achieving peace and joy in this world.

Dr. Joseph Murphy shows how true this is in his book THE POWER OF YOUR SUBCONSCIOUS MIND. He says:

"A number of years ago, I stayed for about a week in a farmer's house in Connemarra on the west coast of Ireland. He seemed to be always singing and whistling and was full of humour. I asked him the secret of his happiness, and his reply was: `It's a habit of mine to be happy. Every morning when I awaken and every night before I go to sleep, I bless my family, the crops, the cattle, and I thank God for the wonderful harvest.'" (Prentice-Hall Publishers, 1963. )

That farmer found the secret -- the secret of faith-filled living, the secret to being happy. Can you relax, my friend, and believe that God will supply your needs?

WE LIVE IN AN AGE OF ANXIETY.

Fear - dread - worry - call it what you will, it is a very destructive force in our lives. In fact, according to Dr. Jack Downing, the word "worry" means "to tear apart." And that is apt, because when we worry, that's what we do: we tear ourselves apart. And we lose our perspective on life.

Just like the duck that Joseph Wood Krutch tells about who was frantic in protecting her ducklings. She flew into a flurry even at the approach of well-meaning human friends who had cared for her for years. She sometimes became so distressed that she forgot what she was doing and attacked her own young. But that's what anxiety can do to us.

OF COURSE IT'S TRUE THAT MOST OF US ARE NOT REALLY VERY CONCERNED ABOUT OUR NEEDS, ARE WE?

It is our "wants" that keep us awake at night. We never worry about where our next meal will come from, we worry about how to make that next car payment, or which weight-loss program would work best for us. Our sense of values is so off centre today that we place a terrible burden on ourselves. Take a look at the minister in the following story and think about what you see.

The minister in question had stopped at a small cafeteria to eat, but he ate with little appetite, for he was quite angry at having been refused honorary membership in the country club. Obviously, he thought, people did not appreciate him as they should, and he hated the idea of still having to pay greens fees.

He was walking back to his car, which, he ruefully reflected, was already a year old, when his eye was caught by a beggar. This fellow had some real problems physically. His right arm was missing from the elbow down, his right foot was twisted ninety degrees to the side and was sheathed in three or four layers of automobile casing. His right eye was grotesquely out of line, and his left leg -- which apparently ended somewhere near the knee -- terminated in a homemade peg leg tipped with metal. (Webb B. Garrison. CREATIVE IMAGINATION IN PREACHING. (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1960), p. 125. )

Suddenly the good pastor's concerns came into startling perspective.

Jesus said don't be like the heathen. They take pride in all these things and are deeply concerned about them. But your heavenly Father already knows perfectly well what you truly need, and He will give them to you.

Don't be anxious about tomorrow, because God will take care of your tomorrow. Live one day at a time. (Matthew 6:30-34)

Put down your burden of worry and fear. There is no purpose in it.

DO YOU REALIZE THAT IT IS NOT YOUR PROBLEMS, BUT YOUR PERSPECTIVE THAT DETERMINES YOUR ABILITY TO COPE WITH LIFE?

Your perspective.

Have you read the fable of the philosophical clock which one day meditated about its future? It had just been bought and placed on a shelf in a large farmhouse room. As soon as it was wound up for the first time it began to worry about all the work it had to do. It had to tick twice every second. That meant 120 ticks every minute, or 7,200 ticks every hour, or 172,800 every day. Each year it would have to tick 63,072,000 times, and in ten years it would have to tick 630,720,000 times. Those kinds of numbers were just too much for the clock's nervous system, and it "passed out."

But when it came to again, it had a flashing insight: it realized that it only had to tick one tick at a time. Not 63 million, or even 63. Just one! And anyone can tick once. This insight gave the clock a powerful injection of courage, and it went about its duty of ticking, which it has been doing for twenty-five years now. (Walter L. Cook. MEETING THE TEST. (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1960). )

Just one tick at a time. Sounds pretty easy, doesn't it? Someone else put it this way:

By the yard, life is hard;

By the inch, it's a cinch.

All too often we allow ourselves to be overwhelmed by our problems, and we lose our perspective. We think to ourselves that it is the end of the world. But I can assure you that it is not. Tomorrow the sun is going to rise again. Somewhere birds will be singing and flowers will be blooming. You will still have food to eat and clothes to wear, and you will be able continue with your life.

Norman Vincent Peale once put it this way:

"Sailing to the Near East last summer, I often talked with the ship's 1st officer. He told me a ship riding out a storm keeps going ahead by relaxing in the waves. . .

"`The ocean is a tremendous force,' he said, `and a ship is only a very small force, but we know how to make our powerful engines adapt themselves to the timing of the sea. We don't drive them relentlessly through the waves; instead, we adjust our speed to the timing of the waves, so we are practically carried along by the sea."

Now this wonderful technique can be applied to people as well as to ships. Get yourself in time with your difficulties. Then get in harmony with God, and you will ride out your difficulties without strain.

"MY GOD WILL SUPPLY EVERY NEED. . ." AND YOU CAN COUNT ON THAT.

You don't even have to strike up a bargain with Him to receive His blessings. It's a lot like the two sailors who were adrift on a raft when they had just about given up hope of rescue. One began to pray, "O Lord, I've led a worthless life. I've been unkind to my wife, and I've neglected my children, but if you'll save me, I promise..."

And the other shouted, "Hold it! I think I see land!"

You do not need to strike up a slick bargain with God. Most of us probably wouldn't keep a bargain like that anyway. But we don't even need to try, because everything He has is yours. He will supply your needs just because you are His child.

Our problems will become just as the clouds in a painting by a German artist called "Cloud Land." On first looking at the picture it appears to be nothing but masses of clouds -- one cloud upon another. But anyone who studies the picture closely will notice that each cloud is actually an angel's face or an angel's wing. The picture is just filled with angels. And so it is with all the clouds in our lives: when God comes close to us in our anxiety the clouds turn into ministering angels. Clouds may not seem to be very desirable to us, and in our foolishness we would always walk in the sunshine. However, "All sunshine makes a desert." Our heavenly Father knows what is best for us, and He would never send the clouds if they were not for our good. (William Dawson).

Of course, some of us are our own worst enemies. God offers us blessings untold, but sometimes we refuse to receive them. We want to go our own way, even though we can see destruction ahead. Even God cannot give a gift to someone who doesn't want it. We must be willing to actively receive His gift.

One day Henry Drummond was preparing to leave the home of some friends in the hills of Scotland. They offered him the use of their coach to drive him to the village where he would catch the train for his next appointment. "Our coachman is a very wonderful man and quite an unusual scholar," they told Mr. Drummond, "but he has been defeated by drink. We were hoping that you might have an opportunity to say something to him that will help him."

So when the time came to go, Henry Drummond climbed up onto the seat next to the coachman, and before the driver realized what was happening, Mr. Drummond had won his way into the coachman's mind and heart. He began confessing his failures and expressing regret for the collapse which had so tragically torn his life. "Suppose," said Mr. Drummond, "that as we rode along these curves and hills, the horses you are driving somehow got out of control, and you realized that you could not manage them. However, you suddenly remember that the man sitting next to you was the finest horseman in Scotland and that there has never been a span of horses which he could not control. What would you do?" "Oh," exclaimed the coachman, "is that what Christ expects me to do?" "Exactly!" replied Henry Drummond. "Turn the reins of your life over to him!" (G. Ray Jordan. RELIGION THAT IS ETERNAL. (New York: The MacMillan Company, 1960))

Could you do that? Could you accept that gift from Christ? God will supply your needs, and He will help you cope with your life. But you must be ready to live your life one day at a time. Turn the reins of your life over to Him, and you will discover just how rich you are.

------------------

http://www.worldoutreach.ca/DearGod/

…

  ************************************  Weekly messages of hope and comfort for those who want to learn more about Jesus and His glorious plan for our lives.  To find out more about our ministry go to : worldoutreach.ca/sotn.htm  visit our "Cartoon Site"  www.worldoutreach.ca/DearGod/  *************************************                                                                            --  To unsubscribe, send ANY message to: sermonsonthenet-unsubscribe@welovegod.org