Quote from Forum Archives on March 13, 2003, 8:03 pm

Posted by: masinick <masinick@...>

Dear friends,

I've been writing about how God provides a way for everything,
how our most important response to God is to love Him with all
of our energy and essence, and how God directs our lives. As we
pray, we want to be in line with the will of God for our lives.
Like yesterday's theme, several devotional writers today have
written clear messages about how God has a plan for each of us,
how we should ask God for what we need and God will answer.

When we ask for something, we like it when what we receive is
precisely what we ask for. Neil Anderson takes a slightly
different path in his discussion about this topic today, and I
think that he makes some interesting observations.

Dear Lord,

I thank you for Your Word, which records and demonstrates Your
great love for Your people, Your great patience as You patiently
wait for people to respond of their own will to Your call.
Wonderful, merciful Savior, I appreciate You, I love You, and I
worship You, with every part of my being.

I certainly have my own interests and concerns to pray about
today, and high on my list are personal concerns I have about
providing for my own family. Lord, I'd like a good job, and You
already know some of the places where I've been looking. I'd
like to adequately provide for my family, but I'm also deeply
interested in going where You want me to be. Please direct my
searching to the area that You have planned for me, and open my
eyes so that I may clearly see it and properly pursue it, and
encourage me as I continue to seek, yet wait upon You for Your
very best.

I praise You that we've seen the Good News, not only of your
Promised Son (which is truly Good News) but also of a father and
daughter reunited after such a long search. Thank You for moving
in the hearts of people so that we could see this good news, and
also that You DO care about the every day affairs of Your people.

Please direct our nation and our world in matters of war and
peace. In my humanness, I dislike conflict and war. Yet Your
Word records numerous times in history where war was necessary.
If resolution to conflict can be found without war, I pray for
that. If not, I pray for an end result that will restore a more
lasting peace, ultimately, Your peace. Please lead not only our
nation, but all nations, in a way that accomplishes Your divine
purpose, whether that makes me comfortable or not.

Forgive me for those times when I forget just how much You mean
and how much I need You. You are worthy of my love and praise,
not just when it is convenient for me, but at all times. I
openly confess my need of You and earnestly seek You. Amen.

Your Brother in Christ,
Brian

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NEIL ANDERSON'S DAILY IN CHRIST
from Freedom in Christ Ministries

March 13

GOD'S FEEDBACK SYSTEM

"For I know the plans that I have for you," declares the LORD,
"plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and
a hope" (Jeremiah 29:11).

I believe that God desires all His children to be successful,
significant, fulfilled, satisfied, joyful, secure, and to live
in peace. From birth you have been developing in your mind a
means for experiencing these values and reaching other goals in
life. Consciously or subconsciously you continue to formulate
and adjust your plans for achieving these goals.

But sometimes your well-intended plans and noble-sounding goals
are not completely in harmony with God's plans and goals for you.
"How can I know if what I believe is right?" you may be
wondering. "Must I wait until I am 45 years old or until I
experience some kind of mid-life crisis to discover that what I
believed was wrong?" I don't think so. I believe that God has
designed us in such a way that we can know on a regular basis if
our belief system is properly aligned with God's truth. God has
established a feedback system which is designed to grab your
attention so you can examine the validity of your goal.

That system is your emotions. When an experience or relationship
leaves you feeling angry, anxious or depressed, those emotional
signposts are there to alert you that you may be cherishing a
faulty goal which is based on a wrong belief. If our goals are
blocked, we become angry. If our goals are uncertain, we feel
anxious. If we perceive our goals as impossible, we become
depressed because the heart of depression is hopelessness.

Can any God-given goal be blocked, uncertain or impossible? Put
another way, if God wants something done, can it be done? Of
course! The question is do we have a biblical understanding of
success, significance, fulfillment, satisfaction, joy, security
and peace? When we see and pursue these values from God's
perspective, we will reach our goals because they are God's
goals for us.

Lord, help me recognize when my goals today are not in line with
Yours and make the proper adjustments in my belief system.

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=====
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Brian Masinick, mailto:masinick@yahoo.com
Home page: www.geocities.com/masinick/

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