I received a few heart-breaking phone calls this week. Both brothers and sisters in the Lord that are going through very, very difficult trials. Not one of them has faith that is wavering nor love that is waning. They have no doubts about God's goodness or faithfulness. They are just hurting and growing weary in their circumstances.
I have a wonderful devotional that I was given by my father-in-law called "The Bow in the Cloud" or "Words of Comfort for Hours of Sorrow" reprinted from 1880. It is one of the most incredible devotionals I have read in a very long time for this season of loss in my own life. I'd like to share an entry with you and provide a link at the end, if you'd like to read more. I found a transcribed copy of the book online for free and it may bless some of you.
What a blessed motto and superscription over the dark lintels of sorrow! “If need be!” Every arrow from the quiver of God is feathered with it! Write it, child of affliction, over every trial your God sees meet to send! If He calls you down from the sunny mountain-heights to the dark glades, hear Him saying, “There is a need be.” If He has dashed the cup of prosperity from your lips, curtailed your creature comforts, diminished your “basket and your store,” hear Him saying, “There is a need be.” If He has ploughed and furrowed your soul with severe bereavement; extinguished light after light in your dwelling; hear Him therefore stilling the tumult of your grief—“There is a need be.”
“Yes! believe it, there is some profound reason for your trial, which at present may be indiscernible. No furnace will be hotter than He sees to be needed. Sometimes indeed, His teachings are mysterious. We can with difficulty spell out the letters, God is love!—we can see no “bright light;” no luminous Bow in “our cloud.” It is all mystery; not one break is there in the sky! No! “Hear what God the Lord speaks.” “If need be.”
If, even now, afflicted one, these clouds are gathering, and the tempest sighing, lift up your eye to the divine scroll gleaming in the darkened heavens, and remember that He who has put the Bow of promise there, saw also a “need be” for the cloud on which it rests!
“And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be in the cloud.”
If you'd like to read the 31 day devotional or see the entire entry from today,click here. May God bless you and encourage you...
1Peter 1:6-9 "...though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations: That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ: Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory: Receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls."
I have a wonderful devotional that I was given by my father-in-law called "The Bow in the Cloud" or "Words of Comfort for Hours of Sorrow" reprinted from 1880. It is one of the most incredible devotionals I have read in a very long time for this season of loss in my own life. I'd like to share an entry with you and provide a link at the end, if you'd like to read more. I found a transcribed copy of the book online for free and it may bless some of you.
Day 7
A Gracious Condition
“If need be”—1 Peter l:6
A Gracious Condition
“If need be”—1 Peter l:6
What a blessed motto and superscription over the dark lintels of sorrow! “If need be!” Every arrow from the quiver of God is feathered with it! Write it, child of affliction, over every trial your God sees meet to send! If He calls you down from the sunny mountain-heights to the dark glades, hear Him saying, “There is a need be.” If He has dashed the cup of prosperity from your lips, curtailed your creature comforts, diminished your “basket and your store,” hear Him saying, “There is a need be.” If He has ploughed and furrowed your soul with severe bereavement; extinguished light after light in your dwelling; hear Him therefore stilling the tumult of your grief—“There is a need be.”
“Yes! believe it, there is some profound reason for your trial, which at present may be indiscernible. No furnace will be hotter than He sees to be needed. Sometimes indeed, His teachings are mysterious. We can with difficulty spell out the letters, God is love!—we can see no “bright light;” no luminous Bow in “our cloud.” It is all mystery; not one break is there in the sky! No! “Hear what God the Lord speaks.” “If need be.”
Be still, and know that He is God! That “need be,” remember, is in the hands of Infinite Love, Infinite Wisdom, Infinite Power. Trust Him in little things as well as great things, in trifles as well as emergencies. Seek to have unquestioning faith. Though other paths, doubtless, would have been selected by you had the choice been in your hands, be it yours to listen to His voice at every turn in the road, saying, “This is the way, walk in it.”
If, even now, afflicted one, these clouds are gathering, and the tempest sighing, lift up your eye to the divine scroll gleaming in the darkened heavens, and remember that He who has put the Bow of promise there, saw also a “need be” for the cloud on which it rests!
“And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be in the cloud.”
If you'd like to read the 31 day devotional or see the entire entry from today,click here. May God bless you and encourage you...
1Peter 1:6-9 "...though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations: That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ: Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory: Receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls."
