The Beating Heart

The title of the blog is a phrase I read in a tweet from a friend this week. It stood out to me among the other information (under 140 characters) about a crisis in the early pregnancy of her daughter. That gets my attention!

In spite of the bleeding and pain, this baby's will was TO LIVE! This tiny heart kept beating and is still beating! God's people around twitter gathered and prayed and that matters to God. Imagine that, everything that we go through here on earth matters to the God that created all things. God hears our cries and answers us. (We can never say, "nobody listens to me!") We are so thankful! There was unity in that prayer for life in this baby, for healthy delivery and a long life serving and loving the Lord. I expect this baby to be a blessing to everyone who knows him.

The beating heart is from God.

What Endures?

From the looks of our dumps around the United States, not much endures. Even our lives here on earth will not last forever, so that means God wants us to look elsewhere for the enduring things. The King James version of the Bible calls the enduring, "spiritual" and the unenduring is "temporal." Very fitting for those temporary things in our lives.

God has a lot to say about the enduring, so just what is it that lasts beyond this life? It took an entire page of 8.5x11 notebook paper to get all the notes written down on the enduring from God's point of view. Most of the scriptures declare these enduring qualities and virtues to last forever.

The Lord shall endure forever Ps. 9:7
Fear of the Lord endures forever Ps. 19:9
His name shall endure forever Ps. 72:17
God's goodness endures continually Ps.52:1
His truth endures to all generations Ps. 100:5
His righteousness endures Ps. 111:3
His praise endures forever Ps. 111:10
His righteous judgements endure Ps. 119:160
God's dominion endures Ps. 145:13
Word of the Lord endures forever 1Peter 1:25

The mercy of the Lord is through-out the Bible. A good beginning place is Psalms 136:1-26, then with a sturdy copy of Strong's Concordance, the Strong's EXHAUSTIVE Concordance, begin to find the other verses on the enduring of the Lord's mercy. If anything, after reading this word we should be fully convinced that our mission here is to spend our time living in the spiritual which lasts forever.

God hasn't left us out of this enduring process either. Ready?

David's seed and throne will endure Ps. 89:29, 36
He that endures to the end shall be saved Matt.24:13
Endure hardships as a good soldier (P. Jeff
mentioned this verse on the Freedom video) 2Tim. 2:3
I (Paul) endure all things for the elect's sake 2Tim.2:10
Endure afflictions 2Tim. 4:5
IF we endure chastening, then we are sons Hebr. 12:7
Blessed are those who endure James 5:11

Here are a few more, 1Peter 2:19, Hebr. 10:32, 34, Hebr. 11:27, Ps. 30:5

Hebrews 12:2-3 KJV "Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him ENDURED the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider him that ENDURED such [hostility] of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your [souls]."

Seek those things that endure forever and we will endure to the end.

Common

"No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it." 1Cor. 10:13

The answer that God gives us in this verse is the completion of so many things. First of all, the trouble we go through is COMMON! We aren't the only one on earth that has unusual problems. No matter what it is, every temptation remains, COMMON.

All the disciples were in the boat when a great storm came. That story is the metaphor for 1Cor. 10:13. So, we can stop saying things like "...but you don't understand." Or, "you've never been through what I go through." Then there's this one, "Why is God doing this to me?" These are arrogant statements said when we think we are different than everyone else when it comes to trials and temptations. This attitude opens the "it's ok" door to self-pity.

Here is the counterweight to our imposed long-suffering or self-pity. "But God is faithful." All the air is taken out of the complaining with "but." He is faithful. He is so faithful that He will help us out of our trouble before we are overcome with sorrow. Unless we have opened the "it's ok" door to extended self-pity which becomes a comfort zone.

Problem with the self-pity comfort zone is the isolation. People have become tired of whining and complaining. Self-pity creates blind spots, we can't see who we have become because we live in our whining and complaining. The blind spots cut off our vision of the way of escape.

Remember, this is our way of escape, "that you may be able to bear it," (ESV uses 'endure') That's right. It doesn't say the problems will disappear, our escape is enduring through it, whatever 'it' is. Not to avoid it or dance around it, but to bear it with and in the Lord's generous help overcome. Learn everything God wants us to learn in the time of trouble.

God is more than able to deliver us immediately out of trouble and temptation, but many times we remain like Daniel in the lion's den or Joseph in his Egyptian prison. Jesus asked God for deliverance three times and each time He told God, "your will be done Father." There are many saints and martyrs who cried out to God to be delivered from torture, the fire, lions, swords. Some escaped, but many died and they came to a far greater place with God.

In faith, believe we are all in the same boat, we all have things in common and we all serve the living God.

Remember, God tempts no man or woman.