Behold upon the mountains the feet
of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace! O Judah, keep thy
solemn feasts, perform thy vows: for the wicked shall no more pass through
thee; he is utterly cut off. Nahum 1 v 15
Our problems and
challenges in life are the mountains on which our feet rest and walk in the
name of the Lord. He will enable us to surmount them and give us the
grace to hear and experience good tidings of great joy. Every challenge or test
we confront and overcome will be a cause for rejoicing, testimony and
celebration. Just before going overseas recently the Lord had told us that we
would have many testimonies during our journey. Early one morning after
we had disembarked from a bus from Washington to China Town, New York, I
had forgotten to collect three small bags including my laptop bag I had placed
on the pavement while I was taking the bigger boxes from the cargo hold.
Half the way to a cousin’s place, the Lord reminded me that I had forgotten
to take the bags, one of which held the passports of the four of us. To
the surprise of my cousin who is a traffic police officer in NYPD, the three
bag were exactly where I had left it. When I shared this incident
with others both in New York and back at home in India, they marveled.
It gave me and my family greater joy than all the delicacies we can feast
on in a celebration.
Even our lowly feet are described as beautiful in the eyes of the Lord.
We are His messengers to bring the good news to those who do not believe
or perceive or experience the goodness of God. The gospel of
Christ is not just good news that you hear only once but great news that give
us reason to rejoice and celebrate all our days and all our lives. We are
publishers of good news and peace. In order to be a publisher of news, the
events reported have to be true, happening real time. We need to collect every
detail of the event or happening. We need to be faithful in reporting it on
time and reach it to all persons possible. We have the inheritance of Judah,
the elder son of Israel and we need to keep our commitments to and before
the Lord. We are not to keep secret
and confidential the marvellous things the Lord has done in our lives. Rather
we are to share it openly so that we are truly His messengers to the world, to
unbelievers so that they too gain faith and to believers to encourage them to
grow further and stronger in their faith. Every day is a festival to
rejoice. Every person we meet is an audience for the message from the Lord.
Every experience is a testimony.
The presence of the Lord
in our lives makes our lives a continual feast where we enjoy many choice
dishes represented by the promises of God. But we are to know the limits
that God has set for us- remember His commandments to be faithful, diligent and
obedient. We need to be conscious of the promises and commitments we have made
to the Lord. When we do this, it will lend a solemnity to our celebration of life.
We need to take time to remember to praise and thank the Lord for His goodness,
love, mercy, kindness and grace and for His wonderful acts in the lives of our
children. The wicked, the unrepentant, the ungodly, the fiercely jealous
have no place or influence in our lives. We need not feel threatened,
intimidated or fearful of such as these. We can be unmindful of their
hostile attitudes, actions and words. Their power to harm us has been
completely annulled and negated. Part of the great news of our
lives is the way the Lord deals with our adversaries, spiritual and human.
No comments:
Post a Comment