All the Way My Savior Leads Me
All the way my Savior leads me
What have I to ask beside?
Can I doubt His tender mercy
Who through life has been my guide?
I know that many times in life, when I ask for something, God withholds it. And He’s allowed me to see that part of the reason He does that may be to redirect the desires of my heart, so I can know what’s truly important. I am so thankful for His grace in showing me that He is really all I need. Sometimes a “no” turns into a far greater blessing than a “yes” would have been.
But because I know this so well, I think sometimes I don’t expect a “yes” at all. I forget that God is still my Father, the one who loves to give good gifts to those who ask Him (Matt. 7:11). I’m so used to relating to God through sadness and difficulty, that I forget He is also the God of joy and comfort.
Yesterday, God reminded me that He is indeed the source of all joy and comfort. Being back in the school environment had brought many of my thoughts of self-doubt and self-hatred and self-consciousness (yes, so much self wrapped up in all of that) back in full force. These are areas I thought I had made progress in, and suddenly they were with me again, and were very unwelcome.
This went on all day, and it was especially heightened right before my Public Speaking class last night. I was so nervous about it and I wanted desperately not to be anxious. Before I left I prayed that God would give me the right circumstances to feel comfortable. When I arrived at class and found that we had to give an impromptu speech that evening, I was even more anxious.
I thought of all the people in the Bible who didn’t think they could speak, and the ways God spoke through them. And I thought of how Jesus told the disciples not to be afraid when they were called to be witnesses for His name, for the Holy Spirit would teach them what to say at just the right moment. If they didn’t have to be afraid in that situation, how much less did I need to be afraid in a situation where the intimidation factor pales in comparison!
It was amazing. As soon as I went up to speak, all of my nervousness faded away, and even as I talked about having dreaded the class and wanting to learn to enjoy it, I was enjoying it. It was just what I had prayed for, and somehow, my faithless heart thinks that Jesus won’t come through for me. I can almost hear Him saying, “You of little faith, why did you doubt?” (Matt. 14:31).
That little incident was kind of an image of what the whole day was like for me. My feelings of self-focus and fear led me to the Savior’s feet. And that was the best place to be. Not only did He comfort me, but He listened to me, and He answered me. I want to find Him all in all no matter what His answer is next time, but it is such a gift to know that He cares for the small particularities of my life.
Filed under: Christianity, Personal Reflection, Struggles on August 28th, 2007
I argue with my ex-wife about that all the time. Does God care about the small things in your life?
The way I look at it is that if He can talk to everybody at the same time, then He can surely be as involved and invested as you allow Him to be.
But… that begins with you.
I have a sincere issue when people start limiting to what God can do. I love it how we measure His intellect against all own where his wisdom is not only there from the beginning but has been there until the end of time.
God’s power is unlimited. Sure, he can move mountains, dry up oceans or set His Kingdom down on this Earth. But His true power is how His love, compassion, grace, justice and mercy changes the hearts and minds of any human being on this earth. He will not go in, alter your brain and change your mind. That would defeat the purpose of creating us with free will in the first place. It is when we stand at the evidence of His power and might, we would have to be the greatest fools to ever walk the earth to deny that God is the Almighty God. It is also when we kneel down at His feet and He bends down and heals you of your wounds is when we witness that same power.
If you like the lyrics to that song you should see if you can find a copy of it sung by Rich Mullins. It is on The World As Best as I Remember It.-but I don’t know if it is volume 1 or 2