DayBreaks for 3/28/24 – The Fatal Fantasy

The Fatal Fantasy The following is from Christianity Today’s Easter in the Everyday series dated 3/27/24. It was written by Eniola Abioye: “We may note . . . that [Jesus] was never regarded as a mere moral teacher. He did not produce that effect on any of the people who actually met Him. He produced mainly three effects— Hatred—Terror—Adoration. There was no trace of people expressing mild approval.” – C. S . LEWIS, GOD IN THE DOCK We don’t get to pick the version of Jesus we will worship. We love him as he is. Anything else is idolatry. Anything else is fantasy. Anything else is less than what Jesus died for us to have. A man once followed Jesus, counted as one of his disciples. He was released to do works only Jesus could empower, and tasked with guarding the resources of their assignment. However, at some point on his three-year journey with the Messiah, he succumbed to the sickness of disenchantment. His life, which ended at Akeldama, or “the field of blood” (Acts 1:19) reveals both the limitations of our human perspective and Jesus’ invitation to complete trust. But let’s take a step back from the famous fatality of his story and observe the climate that seemed to surround him. How could life in proximity to the Source of all hope, all beauty, all joy, end with such anguish and despair? Could the poison of comparison have embittered his heart? Was his imagination captivated by a fantasy of a heroic monarch who would topple an oppressive empire? Did he see a disorienting contradiction in Jesus’ gracious response to Mary of Bethany pouring out precious oil to anoint his feet? Fantasy tethers a person to a false vision. It takes up the space faith and hope should fill. When things don’t go as expected, spirals of disillusionment and disappointment unfurl. Someone is to blame. Although it’s tempting to blame God for not bringing about the good we imagined, if we catch a glimpse of reality in the mirror, it turns out we are the ones yielding to the seductive call of illusion. When faced with the reality of Jesus, Judas’s allegiance to his own aims ended up blinding him, and he missed the story that he could have lived. Jesus stays away from our pigeon holes and boxes. He continually shatters our expectations. His kingship is established in truth and grace, not in meeting our expectations. He has an intention, a goal, a gravity in his every step and every decision. Grief, pain, confusion, unmet expectations, and unanswered prayers tend to reveal the depths of our hearts—do we love Jesus for who he truly is, or the fantasy we’ve created? Jesus was the King who toppled an oppressive empire, but contrary to Judas’s expectations that empire was not Rome, but sin, hatred, and, ultimately death. Jesus is not disappointing. He is the King who blasts our most exciting dreams to pieces and reveals a story rich with possibility, faith, and joy. In the story of Judas, we grieve the false promise of the flesh and our desire for worldly gain. We also lift our eyes from the fantasy we built for ourselves, toward the One whose life provokes us to desire things that are more profound, more beautiful, more authentic, and more enduring than our minds can conceive. When our fantasies shatter and we feel exposed, we can turn away in disappointment, or turn vulnerably toward Jesus and let his everlasting nature swallow up the make-believe and be our living, breathing, and resurrected hope. REFLECT: Identify truths about Jesus that you’ve found challenging to agree with or accept. What aspects of his nature have you wrestled with? Envision the impact on your life if you wholeheartedly loved Jesus for who he is. How would embracing and loving him authentically shape your daily experiences and overall perspective? PRAYER: Jesus, thank you for toppling the empire of death and sin. Help us to have clear minds and not fall for the fatal fantasies Satan throws our way. In Jesus’ name, Amen. Copyright 2024 by Galen C. Dalrymple. The Fatal Fantasy The following is from Christianity Today’s Easter in the Everyday series dated 3/27/24. It was written by Eniola Abioye: “We may note . . . that [Jesus] was never regarded as a mere moral teacher. He did not produce that effect on any of the people who actually met Him. He produced mainly three effects— Hatred—Terror—Adoration. There was no trace of people expressing mild approval.” – C. S . LEWIS, GOD IN THE DOCK We don’t get to pick the version of Jesus we will worship. We love him as he is. Anything else is idolatry. Anything else is fantasy. Anything else is less than what Jesus died for us to have. A man once followed Jesus, counted as one of his disciples. He was released to do works only Jesus could empower, and tasked with guarding the resources of their assignment. However, at some point on his three-year journey with the Messiah, he succumbed to the sickness of disenchantment. His life, which ended at Akeldama, or “the field of blood” (Acts 1:19) reveals both the limitations of our human perspective and Jesus’ invitation to complete trust. But let’s take a step back from the famous fatality of his story and observe the climate that seemed to surround him. How could life in proximity to the Source of all hope, all beauty, all joy, end with such anguish and despair? Could the poison of comparison have embittered his heart? Was his imagination captivated by a fantasy of a heroic monarch who would topple an oppressive empire? Did he see a disorienting contradiction in Jesus’ gracious response to Mary of Bethany pouring out precious oil to anoint his feet? Fantasy tethers a person to a false vision. It takes up the space faith and hope should fill. When things don’t go as expected, spirals of disillusionment and disappointment unfurl. Someone is to blame. Although it’s tempting to blame God for not bringing about the good we imagined, if we catch a glimpse of reality in the mirror, it turns out we are the ones yielding to the seductive call of illusion. When faced with the reality of Jesus, Judas’s allegiance to his own aims ended up blinding him, and he missed the story that he could have lived. Jesus stays away from our pigeon holes and boxes. He continually shatters our expectations. His kingship is established in truth and grace, not in meeting our expectations. He has an intention, a goal, a gravity in his every step and every decision. Grief, pain, confusion, unmet expectations, and unanswered prayers tend to reveal the depths of our hearts—do we love Jesus for who he truly is, or the fantasy we’ve created? Jesus was the King who toppled an oppressive empire, but contrary to Judas’s expectations that empire was not Rome, but sin, hatred, and, ultimately death. Jesus is not disappointing. He is the King who blasts our most exciting dreams to pieces and reveals a story rich with possibility, faith, and joy. In the story of Judas, we grieve the false promise of the flesh and our desire for worldly gain. We also lift our eyes from the fantasy we built for ourselves, toward the One whose life provokes us to desire things that are more profound, more beautiful, more authentic, and more enduring than our minds can conceive. When our fantasies shatter and we feel exposed, we can turn away in disappointment, or turn vulnerably toward Jesus and let his everlasting nature swallow up the make-believe and be our living, breathing, and resurrected hope. REFLECT: Identify truths about Jesus that you’ve found challenging to agree with or accept. What aspects of his nature have you wrestled with? Envision the impact on your life if you wholeheartedly loved Jesus for who he is. How would embracing and loving him authentically shape your daily experiences and overall perspective? PRAYER: Jesus, thank you for toppling the empire of death and sin. Help us to have clear minds and not fall for the fatal fantasies Satan throws our way. In Jesus’ name, Amen. Copyright 2024 by Galen C. Dalrymple.

DayBreaks for the Week of 2/19/23: Disappointment – Struggling With Prayer

1 John 5:14-15: This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that he hears us – whatever we ask – we know that we have what we asked of Him.

Do those verses describe your own personal experience with prayer? Do you have faith? Have you received everything you prayed for? Of course not. I’m asking silly questions, aren’t I? Yet the experience of having prayed – and not received – is real and troubling when we wrestle with life. Eugene Peterson once noted: Most of the people we meet, inside and outside the church, think prayers are harmless but necessary starting pistols that shoot blanks and get things going.

Was John wrong? I don’t think so. John had a confidence born of an intimate, personal relationship with Jesus. It wasn’t so much a conviction about the power of God (though that is implied and a given), but a confidence rooted in knowing God is listening. 

In Jesus’ teaching on faith and prayer, he said faith the size of a mustard seed could move mountains, that the size of the faith didn’t need to match the size of the request before God would act. We often act as if we can only get more people to pray that God will have to pay attention, so we recruit “prayer warriors” to smash down the doorway to God’s throne room. We read, we meditate, we try so hard to increase our faith. But Jesus never said for us to increase our faith. The problem is that we don’t rely or act on even the smallest amount of faith. God doesn’t require great faith – a small one will do just fine, thank you! If we are like the disciples (people of “little faith”), chances are we have enough.

Faith isn’t the same as confidence. The disciples, if anything, were too confident – thinking they had been successful before, so surely they could be successful again – trusting in their own ability to cast out demons. That’s not biblical faith. Biblical faith isn’t confidence as much as it is a dependence – not blind, but justifiable dependence. Faith may be smaller than its object, but the effect of faith cannot be any greater than its object. Or, said differently, that mustard seed of faith is sufficient when I pray not because my faith is stronger than my need, but because God is more powerful than my faith. 

As John Koessler said: Prayer’s greatest demand may be that it requires that we restrain our tendency toward activism and wait for God. But this gets to the crux of our disappointment with prayer: we address Him but get no answer, so we think He is unmoved. But have we forgotten that silence is also the mark of a good listener? Isaiah 65:24 says he listens so well that he knows what we’ll say before we speak.

Another possibility: we may be waiting for God to speak when we should be talking to ourselves. We may have focused so much on hearing from God that we have neglected to address ourselves in response. It is popular to think of prayer as a two-way conversation (and in my experience, sometimes it is), but if the Psalms are models of prayer then prayer isn’t a two-way conversation but a one-way conversation that moves in two directions – 1) we speak to God; 2) we speak to ourselves. Martyn Lloyd-Jones said “..you have to take yourself in hand…to address yourself, preach to yourself, question yourself.“

Prayer can be frustrating and disappointing when we don’t receive what we prayed for or “hear” from Him. No, it’s not easy, but it is simple. Koessler: It is as simple as the infant’s cry or the beggar’s reach. The power of prayer does not lie in the rigor of its method or the beauty of its vocabulary. Its strength is not in the supplicant’s posture or the prayer’s length. The essence of prayer is in the asking. Prayer is fundamentally an expression of our need…We cannot impress Him with our language. We will not shock Him with our bluntness.

When you are next frustrated with prayer, ask yourself: 1) Is God perhaps just being a good listener, waiting for me to come to the point I pray in accordance with His will? 2) Am I preaching to myself (as David so often did) after addressing God? It was often in addressing God that David came to realize what was real and what was really his need…and then he preached to himself. For the most part, God has already given us the answers in His Word. We just don’t want to have to wrestle with how to apply it to our lives and we think prayer may be an easier way out. God doesn’t do things the easy way or He’d not have sent His Son. He won’t let us off easily, either, for struggle is the pathway to growth and maturity.

Don’t let disappointment with prayer/God dissuade you. Pour it out. Then, address yourself with what He has already told us. That is what worked for David, and I suspect it will work for us, too.

PRAYER: Father, forgive us for thinking You don’t hear and don’t care! Thank You for being the best listener and Father possible! Help us in our weakness to apply Your truth to every situation, to discern where the Word has already spoken answers and revealed truth about who You are and what You are like. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright 2023 by Galen C. Dalrymple, all rights reserved.

DayBreaks for 11/19/21 – The Story of the White Horse

Some years ago, Max Lucado told the story of an old South American man, and Ann Voskamp recently recalled it this way:  

“… a white stallion had rode into the paddocks of an old man and all the villagers had congratulated him on such good fortune.

“And the old man had only offered this: “Is it a curse or a blessing? All we can see is a sliver. Who can see what will come next?”

“When the white horse ran off, the townsfolk were convinced the white stallion had been a curse. The old man lived surrendered and satisfied in the will of God alone:  “I cannot see as He sees.”

“And when the horse returned with a dozen more horses, the townsfolk declared it a blessing, yet the old man said only, “It is as He wills and I give thanks for His will.”

“Then the man’s only son broke his leg when thrown from the white stallion. The town folk all bemoaned the bad fortune of that white stallion. And the old man had only offered, “We’ll see. We’ll see. It is as He wills and I give thanks for His will.”

Ann continue with her reflection: “Hasn’t that been the lie right since our Genesis beginning – that we can see?

“When we ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, Satan hissed then that we’d know what is good and evil — that we’d really see.

“But the father of lies, he’d duped us in the whole nine yards. Though we ate of that tree we did not become like God.

“We have no knowledge of good and evil apart from God. Our heart optics are not omniscient.

“How can I really see if a seeming disaster or dilemma, is actually dire? 

“How do we know if what looks like it’s the worst might be for our best, how do we know if what looks all wrong could turn things all right, how do we know if what seems wrong isn’t actually part of writing a redemptive story?

“My focus need only be on Him, to only faithfully see His Word, to wholly obey.

“Therein is the tree of life.”

There is a lot to chew on with Ann’s thoughts. I have had white horse moments and I’m sure you have, too. Things I thought were good turned out to be bad and vice versa. It happens all the time. And when something bad happens, we rail at God. When something good happens but then winds up being bad, we rail at God. I fear we’re far better at railing at him than at thanking him.

But we shouldn’t despair at the impossibility of our seeing things clearly, for what they really are. As Ann put it so well:

“If there’s:
“An accident? White Horse.

“A disappointment? White Horse.

“A seeming failure? White Horse.

“Everything going wrong? White Horse.

“All of our hours on this side of heaven are White Horse hours, until, someday heaven will be “standing open and there was …. a white horse, whose rider is called Faithful and True” Rev. 19:11.

“Only the Rider of the White Horse, the One who is Faithful and True, can faithfully know how things truly are.”

Today, don’t look at the circumstances surrounding you and name them good or bad. Look to the Rider of the White Horse and entrust your situation to him.

PRAYER: Lord, how we’d love to see you come today riding on that white horse! But if today is not that day, let us keep looking skyward in the midst of it all and trusting in you. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright 2021 by Galen C. Dalrymple. ><}}}”>

DayBreaks for 9/22/21 – In Good Time

I Peter 5:6 – So humble yourselves under the mighty power of God, and in his good time he will honor you.

On a plaque marking Abraham Lincoln’s birthplace near Hodgenville, KY, is recorded this scrap of conversation:

“Any new down ‘t the villagle, Ezry?”  “Well, Squire McLain’s gone t’ Washington t’ see Madison swore in, and ol’ Spellman tells me this Bonaparte fella has captured most o’ Spain.”

“What’s new out here, neighbor?”  “Nuthin’, nuthin’ a’tall, ‘cept fer a new baby born t’ Tom Lincoln’s.  Nothin’ ever happens out here.”

Sometimes, it seems as if no one ever notices the good things you try to do – let alone the effort that went into doing those things.  You may not ever receive even a “Thank you!” for your troubles.  Certainly no one sees it when you bite your tongue and keep from saying hurtful things or harsh words.  At such moments, we may be tempted to wonder if anyone will ever notice.  You have done “the right thing” but not even God seems to be all that excited about it because one trouble after another comes down on your shoulders.  It doesn’t seem fair (and it isn’t fair).  It doesn’t seem right, either.

The simple truth is that some events and even the daily decisions we make to do what Christ would have us to do, may not seem to amount to much.  It could be a birthday (as in Hodgenville, KY or in the ancient city of Bethlehem), it may be a spiritual rebirth…these things may not make much of an earthly splash at all.  They seem insignificant even now, let alone in the light of eternity.  But those things have lasting importance…and God Himself will see to it that you will be honored for it!

PRAYER: Our frustrations sometimes boil over, Lord, and we get discouraged and down-spirited by trying to do what is right…but it seemingly passes unnoticed.  Help us to rest in the calm assurance that anything done for you will not escape your attention.  But at the same time, help us not to do things just to receive honor from you, but rather to bring honor TO you!  In Jesus’ name, Amen. 

Copyright 2021 by Galen C. Dalrymple. ><}}}”>

DayBreaks for 4/16/21 – There is Hope!

From the DayBreaks archive, April 2012:

And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us. Romans 5:5

Do you ever struggle to find hope?  Day after day, you get up and go to the same job where you’ve worked for 20 years.  Your finances don’t seem any better, maybe worse, than they were 10 years ago, and your dreams of a retirement vanish into the mist of the future.  Perhaps you’ve suffered a long time with a disease or some physical or mental problem.  Your marriage is disappointing, frustrating and loveless.  And you see no hope for any of the above.

In the early part of World War II, a Navy submarine was stuck on the bottom of the harbor in New York City. It seemed that all was lost. There was no electricity and the oxygen was quickly running out. In one last attempt to rescue the sailors from the steel coffin, the U.S. Navy sent a ship equipped with Navy divers to the spot on the surface, directly above the wounded submarine. A Navy diver went over the side of the ship to the dangerous depths in one last rescue attempt. The trapped sailors heard the metal boots of the diver land on the exterior surface, and they moved to where they thought the rescuer would be. In the darkness they tapped in Morse code, “Is there any hope?” The diver on the outside, recognizing the message, signaled by tapping on the exterior of the sub, “Yes, there is hope.”

If there is a message from Christianity Easter that everyone needs to hear it is that there is hope!  At the darkest hour in human existence, the Son of God was killed and stuck into a sealed tomb.  Dreams had been shattered, hopes dashed, life snuffed out.  And the minions of hell were shrieking in delight and laughter, celebrating their victory. 

There were NO humans who expected to see Christ alive again.  No one.  Not one of his followers spent that Saturday night in breathless anticipation, unable to sleep because they were so excited to run to the tomb in the morning and see the risen Lord.  No, if they were sleepless, it was because they were destroyed spiritually, emotionally, physically, mentally – by the events of Friday – and they were afraid for their own skin.  There was no anticipation.  There was no expectation.  There was no hope.

Then, on Sunday morning, Christ came tapping on their awareness and hearts, presenting himself to them physically and in person…and hope was born again.

How full is your “hope tank”?  This week, be reminded that nothing is impossible with God – NOTHING, not your work, not your marriage, not your finances, not anything.  Hope lives because Jesus lives!

PRAYER: God, I thank You for hope that keeps us moving forward, that helps us face each day not with resignation, but with expectation!  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright 2021, Galen C. Dalrymple. ><}}}”>

DayBreaks for 08/10/20 – Failure Doesn’t Have to be Fatal

From the DayBreaks archive, August 2010:

In 2001, Reader’s Digest included the following anecdote about Jack Kilby.  Jack had applied for admission to the very prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), but was turned down because they said that his math scores were too low to be admitted to their engineering school.  As a result, Kilby never received much training in physics and was not able to secure the education that he desired.  But on December 10, 2000 the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences gave him the Nobel Prize in physics.  Why?  Because he invented something that has changed the life of virtually every human being on this planet: the microchip. 

Kilby could have given up after his rejection from MIT, but he didn’t.  He may have seen his not being accepted as a failure, but he refused to let that failure have the last word in his life.  He pressed on and did something extraordinary.  He, and many others in many walks of life, have shown us that failure doesn’t have to be fatal.

As Christians we feel rejected at times.  We know we’ve failed – and failed many, many times.  Some people let it destroy them and wind up wasting their God-given talent and ability because of some rejection.  Some feel like such failures when it comes to sin that they walk away from their faith.  There are times when failure can be fatal – but Jesus can even take dead things and breathe life back into them again. 

Have you suffered a moral or spiritual failure?  Jesus wants you to know that failures need not be fatal.  Run to Him, clothed in your failure, and receive His victory!

PRAYER: Thank you for second, third and many chances because of your love for us!  Thank you for the victory that is Yours which You share with us!  In Jesus’ name, Amen. Copyright by 2020 by Galen C. Dalrymple.  ><}}}”>

DayBreaks for 8/24/19 – Misplaced Expectations

DayBreaks for 08/23/19: Misplaced Expectations

From the DayBreaks archive, August 2009:

We all have expectations.  We have expectations of others, we have expectations of our pets, of our employers, of our employees, of our spouses, children, friends, government…we even have expectations of ourselves.  If only having expectations meant that they would be lived up to and realized!!!!  But alas, such is not the reality of the world in which we live.  I so often fail to live up to my expectations for myself…why should I be so insistent that others should live up to the expectations I have of them? 

God sees us much better than we see ourselves.  He sees us with perfect clarity.  I know that often He sees things in me that he doesn’t care for.  I would like to delight His heart at all times, though I know I don’t.

In The Gospel According to Job, Mike Mason contemplates the expectations we have of ourselves as Christians.  Though we may often find others have failed to live up to our expectations, the inevitable conclusion that Christians must reach is that we fail miserably to live up to the holy and righteous demands of God.  And that can cause us massive turmoil and anxiety – because we KNOW, plain and simple, that we just don’t cut it.  As a result, many re-double their efforts to “be good” and to “make God happy with me.”  Isn’t that just another way of trusting in our own perfection (or as close to perfection as we can get)? 

Mason insightfully wrote: “God’s delight is not in a life lived in undeviating virtue, but rather in seeing the most twisted and chaotic life turned in humble expectation towards Him.  The truly righteous person, it turns out, is the one who places no expectations upon himself.  From God he expects everything, but from himself he expects nothing, because he knows he is but dust.” 

Are you discouraged in your Christian walk because you just can’t seem to “get it right” no matter how hard you try?  Do you get down on yourself because of that?  Does it lead you to work all the harder?  Guilt will never be a kind task-master, nor will it ever be a wonderful motivator.  Love is a much better motivator, but even our love won’t be perfect – but the good news is that our love doesn’t have to be perfect, because His love is! 

A truly humble, righteous person doesn’t have expectations of themselves other than that they will get it wrong – over and over again – and that God will get it right.  If our expectations are based on my getting better, on my slow but steady improvement, my expectations are in the wrong place.  May my expectations, like my hope, rest in His goodness alone! 

And this expectation will not disappoint us. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love. – Romans 5:5 (NLT)

PRAYER:  What a relief it is that You are a good God, One who will never disappoint us nor let us down!  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright by 2019 by Galen C. Dalrymple.  ><}}}”>

 

DayBreaks for 6/26/19 – Unfulfilled Expectations

DayBreaks for 06/26/09: Unfulfilled Expectations

From the DayBreaks archives, June 2009:

The boy was 10 years old. He was known as Phineas. His grandfather, in his will, had left him an island – Ivy Island. Phineas had never seen the island, but dreamt of it often. He pictured how he’d build a house, raise cattle and grow prosperous. But he’d never seen it. All that was about to change. After several requests and years of asking, his father finally agreed to take him to see the island. The father, young boy and a hired hand climbed into the wagon and slowly made their way toward the coast of Connecticut. Finally, as they crested a hill, the father told Phineas that if he ran to the tree line and looked toward the sea, that he’d see his island. The young boy leaped down from the wagon, ran though the trees and caught his first glimpse of Ivy Island – the place of his dreams. However, what he saw wasn’t what he expected. Instead of a beautiful, green island surrounded by the beautiful blue sea, he saw 5 acres of swampy marshland.

Phineas grew bitter and it affected the rest of his life. In fact, later on, Phineas (who was to become known as P.T.), coined the phrase, “There’s a sucker born every minute.” You know him as P.T. Barnum, the circus huckster who lured people with promises of freaks and absurdities.

There is something about bitterness that is ugly. Scripture talks about bitterness in this way from Heb 12:15: See to it that no one misses the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many.

Brain tumors are sometimes very difficult to remove because they grow “roots” that intertwine with the brain stem and other parts of the brain. These roots are very difficult, if not impossible, to extract. Bitterness has the same potential to get into our heads and grow into all the little, dark places where it settles in and makes itself at home.

When it seems like life lets you down, we can become bitter. The promise of a raise wasn’t kept, the recognition that was earned wasn’t delivered, the marriage that was supposed to last forever doesn’t. These are facts of life. They do happen and they happen in some way or form to everyone.

What do you do about it? First, in the Hebrews passage, part of the solution seems to be to not overlook God’s grace – rather than meditating on the wrong has been done to us, focus on how much we have received from God that we had no right to expect. Second, realize you can’t stay in a protective shell – you have to move on. You could choose to shelter your heart if your love has been betrayed, but what a horrible life that would be! Love again – take the risk. Let Jesus bring you healing. Don’t give bitterness a place to grow in your heart. It was meant to hold God’s love, not bitterness.

PRAYER: Give us hearts that hold no bitterness.  Give us eyes to see that we deserve nothing from You.  Give us hope in Your eternal love for us!  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright by 2019 by Galen C. Dalrymple.  ><}}}”>

DayBreaks for 4/15/19 – Easter and Disappointment

From the DayBreaks archive, April 2009:

When was the last time you were disappointed? My guess is that you are disappointed in some things every day.  I know I am.  I think of the story of the disciples on the Emmaus road.  As they trudged along on their way, the disappointment drips from their lips like honey from the honeycomb.  But we were hoping that it was He who was going to redeem Israel. Indeed, besides all this, it is the third day since these things happened. (Lk. 24:21, NASB)
But we were hoping…hopes are now dashed, broken into pieces like shattered glass.  Their disappointment was so deep that they couldn’t even recognize that the One of whom they were speaking was walking beside them.  As Max Lucado points out in He Still Moves Stones, “Disappointment will do that to you.  It will blind you to the very presence of God.  Discouragement turns our eyes inward.  God could be walking next to us, but despair clouds our vision.  Despair does something else…it hardens our hearts.  We get cynical.  We get calloused.  And when good news comes, we don’t want to accept it for fear of being disappointed again.” 

You may be disappointed right now about your job, your marriage, your children or yourself.  There are several things to note about the Emmaus’ disciples and their encounter with Jesus that might be instructive:

FIRST: they kept walking and they talked about their disappointments.  They didn’t try to hide them – in fact, it seems that their disappointment was so palpable that they couldn’t NOT talk about it.  But they knew what direction they were going and they kept moving.  They didn’t stop and stew in their disappointment.  They moved onward.

SECOND: it took Jesus to turn their disappointment into rejoicing and celebration.  He did that by coming to them…not once they’d already started to celebrate, but when there were at their point of deepest pain.  It was then that they needed him the most, perhaps.  On the one hand, they were blaming God for not doing what they thought He should have done or for not doing what they thought He was doing.  Many of our unfulfilled expectations we blame on God, but remember: they may just be our own expectations, created out of our own imagination and we project them onto God as His responsibility to fulfill.  They surely thought they knew what Jesus was supposed to do – and felt he’d tricked them all.  So, who else but Jesus could turn the situation around? 

THIRD: Jesus began to heal their disappointment by telling them a story: the story of God’s faithfulness and activity throughout history.  Why?  To show them that God was still in control.  Nothing is finished until God says it is finished – surely, Jesus wasn’t finished even though they thought he was.  Those who are disappointed need to remember that God is still in control.  And what can be bad about that?

If you are walking a disappointment-filled road today, keep walking and talking with Jesus about your disappointment.  He will meet you in your pain.  Let the Word remind you that God is still in charge – not just of world events, but of your life and destiny.  And that’s not a bad thing to remember!

Prayer: In our disappointments, Lord Jesus, let us not just listen for your voice, but look for your face as  you walk next to us, reminding us that you know, you understand, and you have it all under control!  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright by 2019 by Galen C. Dalrymple.  ><}}}”>

 

DayBreaks for 1/21/19 – The Most Tragic Figure

DayBreaks for 01/21/2019: The Most Tragic Figure

From the DayBreaks archive, January 2009:

If you were to pick the most tragic figure in all of Scripture, or in all of history, who would it be?  I suppose one could argue for a variety of persons:

ADAM: here is a man who walked and talked with God in the garden, and yet was overcome by sin.  If anyone had motivation to continue to walk uprightly because he had recognized so many blessings from his relationship with God, you’d think it would be Adam.  Yet, one whisper from the serpent and he and his wife fall!

CAIN: it didn’t take long for hatred, envy and jealousy to rise to the point that a man would kill his own brother.  Tragic, indeed.  And over something as foolish as whose sacrifice was most pleasing to God?!?!?!  Why kill your brother instead of taking up the matter directly with God?????

SAUL: this king had it all going for him: he was big, brawny, and popular with the people.  Maybe that’s why it all went to his head and he fell from the throne to madness, wallowing in self-pity and taking his own life.

Perhaps JUDAS is the most tragic figure in all of human history.  He certain is one of the most vilified – at least by believers – who shake and wag our heads at the heinous act he perpetrated. 

The, of course, there are the Atilla the Hun’s, Idi Amin’s, Joseph Stalin’s, Adolph Hitler’s, Genghis Khan’s…sadly, the list is rather long.  You may feel at times that your life has been the most tragic in all of history because it has been so difficult.  At times, we’re all prone to believing we’ve got it bad until we’re reminded of someone who truly is in dire straits. 

There is, of course, another totally different point of view.  While most of the people mentioned above were, well, not nice folks, perhaps the most tragic figure in history is God.  Every single human who has ever lived has wounded the heart of their loving Father.  And not just once, but over and over and over – countless times.  And we continue to do so, even knowingly many times.  And yet His love endures forever.

We need to stop thinking so much about the pain in our lives and consider more the pain in God’s existence.  We need to stop thinking about obedience so much as an act of submission to His will as a response to His heart of love.

Prayer: For all the pain You bore on the cross, and for all the pain we cause You now, we seek Your mercy and forgiveness.  Teach us to obey out of love for a heart that has always loved us!  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright by 2019 by Galen C. Dalrymple.  ><}}}”>