The Real Problem with Anxiety

 The Real Problem with Anxiety

“But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?” (Matthew 6:30)

Jesus says that the root of anxiety is inadequate faith — “little faith” — in our Father’s future grace. 

One reaction to this might be: “This is not good news! In fact, it is very discouraging to learn that what I thought was a mere struggle with an anxious disposition is rather a far deeper struggle with whether I trust God.”

My response to this discouragement is to agree, but then to disagree. 

Suppose you had been having pain in your stomach and had been struggling with medicines and diets of all kinds, to no avail. And then suppose that your doctor tells you, after a routine visit, that you have cancer in your small intestine. Would that be good news? You say, emphatically not! And I agree.

But let me ask the question another way: Are you glad the doctor discovered the cancer while it is still treatable, and that indeed it can be very successfully treated? You say, yes, I am very glad that the doctor found the real problem. Again I agree. 

So, the news that you have cancer is not good news. But, in another sense, it is good news, because knowing what is really wrong is good, especially when your problem can be treated successfully.

That’s what it’s like to learn that the real problem behind anxiety is “little faith” (as Jesus says) in the promises of God’s future grace. And he is able to work in wonderfully healing ways when we cry out, “I believe; help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:24).

Every day in the God's Word

 EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!

MONDAY NOVEMBER 03, 2025.

SUBJECT : THE ENDURING MERCY OF GOD! 

MEMORY VERSE: "O give thanks to the LORD, for He is good! For His mercy endures forever." (Psalm 136 vs 1.)

READ: Zechariah 3 vs 1 - 5:

3:1: Then he shewed me Joshua the high priest standing before the Angel of the LORD, and Satan standing at his right hand to oppose him.

3:2: And the LORD said to Satan, “The LORD rebuke you, Satan! The LORD who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Is this not a brand plucked from the fire?”

3:3: Now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments, and stood before the Angel.

3:4: Then He answered and spoke to those who stood before Him, saying, “Take away the filthy garments from him. And to him he said, “See, I have removed your iniquity from you, and I will clothe you with rich robes.”

3:5: And I said, “Let them put a clean turban on his head.” So they put clean turban on his head, and they put the clothes on him. And the angel of the LORD stood by.

INTIMATION:

Mercy is a translation of a Hebrew word that includes aspects of love, kindness, mercy, and faithfulness. It is the outward manifestation of pity. It assumes need on the part of him who receives it, and resources adequate to meet the need on the part of him who shows it. It is used of God who is rich in mercy (Ephesians 2 vs 4), and who has provided salvation for all men. God is merciful to those who fear (reverence) Him. We never have to worry that God will run out of love because it flows from a well that will never run dry. All that exists is the result of the mercy of God. God could have existed alone in eternity, but He chose not to. 

Mercy has literally been defined as not giving a person what he or she deserves in punishment. This is exactly what God does to us. Our disobedience demands God’s wrath! But God is merciful to us sinners; He shows mercy toward us by providing an escape from sin’s penalty through Jesus Christ, Who alone saves us from sin. When we pray for forgiveness, we are asking for what we do not deserve. Yet when we take this step and trust in Christ’s saving work on our behalf, we can experience God’s forgiveness.

Countless times throughout the Bible we see God showing His love and patience toward men and women in order to save them. Although He realizes that their hearts are evil, He continues to try to reach them. When we sin or fall away from God, we surely deserve to be destroyed by His judgement. But God has promised never again to destroy everything on earth until the judgement day when Christ returns to destroy evil forever. God reminds Himself of this promise by every change of season made by Him.

God’s mercy is unbelievable, it goes far beyond what we can imagine. Even when we deliberately walk away from Him and ruin our lives, He would still take us back, and give us inward spiritual renewal. God wants to forgive us our sins and bring us back to Himself, too, and will not remember them anymore. Most of us will not learn this until their world has crashed in around them. Then the sorrow and pain seem to open our eyes to what God has been saying all along. Are you separated from God by sin? No matter how far you have wandered, God promises a fresh beginning if only you will turn to Him.

The passage we read today regarding Zechariah’s vision portrays how we receive God’s mercy. We do nothing ourselves. God removes our filthy garments (sins), then provides us with fine, new clothes (the righteousness and holiness of God (Second Corinthians 5 vs 21; Ephesians 4 vs 25; Revelation 19 vs 8). All we need to do is repent and ask God to forgive us. When Satan tries to make you feel dirty and unworthy, remember that the clean clothes of Christ’s righteousness make you worthy to draw near to God. 

Satan accused (opposed) Joshua, who here represents the nation of Israel. The accusations were accurate—Joshua stood in filthy garments (sins). Yet God revealed His mercy, stating that He chose to save His people in spite of their sin. Satan is always accusing people of their sins before God (Job 1 vs 6). But he greatly misunderstands the breadth of God’s mercy and forgiveness toward those who believe in Him. Satan the accuser will ultimately be destroyed (Revelation 12 vs 10); while everyone who is a believer will be saved (John 3 vs 16). To be prepared, we can ask God to remove our clothing of sin and dress us with His goodness. 

We should be thankful that God’s mercy extends to us. Many times God has withheld us from sinning against Him in many ways unknown to us, and we can’t even detect. We have no way of knowing, but He does. God works just as often in ways we can’t see as in ways we can. It is easy to view sin lightly in a world that sees sin as inconsequential, but we should view sin as serious. Even when we sin in the worst imaginable way, we can turn to God in prayers and repentance. 

Prayer: Abba Father, You are full of compassion, gracious, long suffering, ready to forgive, and plenteous in mercy to all those who call upon You. Thank You, O Lord, for Your grace and mercy upon my sinful life and may Your mercy speak for me all the days of my life, in Jesus’ Name I have prayed, Amen.

PRAISE THE LORD!

The Meaning of Suffering

 The Meaning of Suffering

He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward. (Hebrews 11:26)

We do not choose suffering simply because we are told to, but because the One who tells us to describes it as the path to everlasting joy.

He beckons us into the obedience of suffering not to demonstrate the strength of our devotion to duty, or to reveal the vigor of our moral resolve, or to prove the heights of our tolerance for pain, but rather to manifest, in childlike faith, the infinite preciousness of his all-satisfying promises — the all-satisfying greatness and beauty of his own glory as the fulfillment of all of them.

Moses “[chose] to be mistreated with the people of God rather than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin. . . . For he was looking to the reward” (Hebrews 11:25–26). Therefore, his obedience glorified the reward — all that God is for him in Christ — not the resolve to suffer.

This is the essence of Christian Hedonism. In the pursuit of joy through suffering, we magnify the all-satisfying worth of the Source of our joy. God himself shines as the brightness at the end of our tunnel of pain.

If we do not communicate that he is the goal and the ground of our joy in suffering, then the very meaning of our suffering will be lost. 

The meaning is this: God is gain. God is gain. God himself is gain. That’s the meaning of our suffering.

The chief end of man is to glorify God. And it is truer in suffering than anywhere else that God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him.

Every day in the God's Word

 EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!

SUNDAY NOVEMBER 02, 2025.

SUBJECT: THE BELIEVER’S ERROR OF SELF-CONDEMNATION! 

Memory verse: "There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.” (Romans 8 vs 1.)

READ: Second Corinthians 5 vs 17 - 19:

5:17: Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; Behold, all things have become new.

5:18: Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation,

5:19: that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation.

INTIMATION:

Guilty conscience is a deep feeling of self-reproach which stems from a belief that one has done wrong. Consequently, this results to self-condemnation under the weight of our sins. Such conscience or self-condemnation hinders our faith life in Christ. This problem of guilt feeling results in the inability of the believer to stand in the Father's presence without the sense of guilt, condemnation or inferiority. With such complex, the believer harbors doubt in his or her mind. And obviously, the doubter cannot ask in faith, and consequently, receives nothing from the Lord (James 1 vs 6 - 7). 

It is noteworthy that a believer has the right to stand in the Father's presence and make his or her petitions known to Him without any sense of condemnation. Here are few things that every believer should know: The believer is actually a “new creation”—brand-new person on the inside. The Holy Spirit gives the believer new life, and he or she is not the same anymore; “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation, old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new." (Second Corinthians 5 vs 17.) 

Believers are created, and living in vital union with Christ, and have received into their spirits the life and nature of God. The old things of his nature of sin and disobedience, spiritual death, union with Satan, and slavery to sin have passed away. Consequently, the new creation is the product of God, created in Christ Jesus. The new creation is born from above, born of the Holy Spirit, through the Word. And the new thing stands un-condemned before the Father, and reconciled with the Him. 

The moment that we become new creations, we become the righteousness of God. The righteousness of God means the ability to stand in the Father's presence without sense of guilt, condemnation or inferiority. We are at that moment sons and daughters of God by His adoption. 

At conversion the believer do not merely turn a new leaf; he or she begins a new life under a new Master—Jesus Christ. The Master has sacrificed His life for the believers to make them right with the Father: “For He has made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.” (Second Corinthians 5 vs 21.) 

When we trust in Christ, we make an exchange: He takes our sin and makes us right with God. Our sins were laid on Christ at His crucifixion. His righteousness is given to us at conversion. It would be an abnormal thing if He should recreate us, impart to us His own nature, and leave us under the blighting curse of condemnation, unable to stand in His presence without the sense of guilt and inferiority. 

Sin has been preached to us so long and we have been told so often that we are unworthy and unfit, and this has kept us with a sense of inferiority which has been destructive to a faith life. It is noteworthy that no man can work with God as long as he is under condemnation, and we should realize that God has given us His own righteousness in Christ Jesus so that we can fellowship with Him. God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation.

The Scripture says this about Jesus, “He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. (John 3 vs 18.) All have sinned and all stand condemned already before God. However, by God’s mercy and love, He made a way of escape from this condemnation by sending His Son as a propitiation for our sins, and only those who believe in the sacrificial death of Jesus for our sins are not condemned. 

People often try to protect themselves from their fears by putting their faith in something they do or have: good works, skill or intelligence, money or possessions. But only God can save us from the one thing that we really need to fear—eternal condemnation. We believe in God by recognizing the insufficiency of our own efforts to find salvation and by asking Him to do His work in us. When Jesus talks about unbelievers, He means those who reject or ignore Him completely, not those who have momentary doubts. 

Prayer: Abba Father, thank You for the inexplicable and undeniable gift of salvation. Thank You so much for the unparalleled privilege of Your adopting me as Your son, an heir, and joint heir with Christ. Thank You, O Lord my Father, for the privilege of imputing Your righteousness to me in Christ, that I can stand before You without any sense of condemnation or inferiority, in the mighty Name of Jesus I have given thanks, Amen.

PRAISE THE LORD!

Rejoicing in Pain

 Rejoicing in Pain

“Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven.” (Matthew 5:11–12)

Christian Hedonism says that there are different ways to rejoice in suffering as a Christian. All of them are to be pursued as an expression of the all-sufficient, all-satisfying grace of God.

One way of rejoicing in suffering comes from fixing our minds firmly on the greatness of the reward that will come to us in the resurrection. The effect of this kind of focus is to make our present pain seem small in comparison to what is coming: “I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us” (Romans 8:18; cf. 2 Corinthians 4:16–18). In making the suffering tolerable, rejoicing over our reward will also make love possible.

“Love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great” (Luke 6:35). Be generous with the poor “and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just” (Luke 14:14). Confidence in this promised reward cuts the cord of worldliness and frees us for the costs of love.

Another way of rejoicing in suffering comes from the effects of suffering on our assurance of hope. Joy in affliction is rooted not only in the hope of resurrection and reward, but also in the way suffering itself works to deepens that hope.

For example, Paul says, “We rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope” (Romans 5:3–4).

In other words, Paul’s joy is not merely rooted in his great reward, but in the effect of suffering which solidifies the hope of that reward. Affliction produces endurance, and endurance produces a sense that our faith is real and genuine, and that strengthens our hope that we will indeed gain Christ.

So whether we focus on the riches of the reward or the refining effects of suffering, God’s purpose is that our joy in suffering be sustained.

Every day in the God's Word

 EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!

SATURDAY NOVEMBER 01, 2025.

SUBJECT: STOP MAKING EXCUSES!

Memory verse: "For I wish that all men were even as I myself. But each one has his own gift from God, one in this manner and another in that." (First Corinthians 7 vs 7.)

READ: Romans 12 vs 4 - 8:

12:4: For as we have many members in one body, but all members do not have the same function, 

12:5: so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one another. 

12:6: Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, let us use them: if prophecy, let us prophesy in proportion to our faith; 

12:7: or ministry, let us use it in our ministering; he who teaches, in teaching; 

12:8: he who exhorts, in exhortation; he who gives, with liberality; he who leads, with diligence; he who shows mercy, with cheerfulness.

INTIMATION:

All God’s works are marvelous, and all His creations are wonderful and are useful to Him for His predetermined purposes. Nothing that He created is useless to Him. All natural positions are gifts from God. And none is morally better than the other, and all are valuable to accomplishing HIs purposes. It is important to us to accept our present situation, knowing that your present situation is a tool in God’s hands to achieve His purposes. Our limitations does not limit God, therefore, cannot be an excuse in our ministry or service.

If you're not involved in any service or ministry in this world to God's glory, what excuse have you been using? No excuse is admissible in ministry. All the people used by God in the Bible had their limitations which never excused them in ministry or service. Abraham was old, Jacob was insecure, Leah was unattractive, Joseph was abused, Moses stuttered, Gideon was poor, Samson was codependent, Rahab was immoral, David had an affair and all kinds of family problems, Elijah was suicidal, Jeremiah was depressed, Jonah was reluctant, Naomi was a widow, John the Baptist was eccentric to say the least, Peter was impulsive and hot-tempered, Martha worried a lot, the Samaritan woman had several failed marriages, Zacchaeus was unpopular, Thomas had doubts, Paul had poor health, and Timothy was timid. 

That is quite a variety of misfits, but God used each of them to render service in this world to His glory. He will use you if you stop making excuses. We have our different callings to serve, and each service is significant. God created us for His specific purposes, and it's His desire that we identify our pathway and follow it to achieve His purpose of creating us. But He left us a choice—to choose His pathway or ours. Obviously, your choice is made when you give your life for something. What will it be; a career, a sport, a hobby, fame, wealth? Or God's pathway for you to serve Him, and others. No choice you make, outside your God's destined pathway of service will have lasting significance. 

When you identify your own gifts, ask how you can use them to build up God’s family. At the same time, realize that your gifts can’t do the work of the body of Christ all alone. Be thankful for people whose gifts are completely different from yours. Let your strengths balance their weaknesses, and be grateful that their abilities make up for your deficiencies. The apostle Paul uses the concept of human body to teach how Christians should live and work together. As the human body is, so is the Body of Christ. Each human part finds its significance on its vocation, but all function under the direction of the brain. So Christians are to work together under the command and authority of Jesus Christ, using our different gifts. 

Service is the pathway to real significance. It is through ministry that we discover the meaning of our lives. As we serve together in God's family, our lives take on eternal importance. In human body, the eyes cannot do the work of the legs, nor the tongue the work of the stomach. When any part tries to do the work of another, it fails, and loses its significance. The Bible, in First Corinthians 7 vs 7, 20, 24, says, "..But each one has his own gift from God, one in this manner and another in that. Let each one remain in the same calling in which he was called. Brethren, let each one remain with God in that state in which he was called." 

When you are in the state you were called, God remains with you, hence your significance, because It is only in Him your hope of glory lies; "..Christ in you, the hope of glory." (Colossians 1 vs 28.) When one is outside of his calling, we hear them complain, "Upon all I am doing nobody notices me," "I am putting in my best, but it seems like nothing is done," "nobody sees my contribution, but when the other person does the same thing, people will be full of praise for him."

God wants to use you to make a difference in His world. He wants to work through you. What matters is not the duration of your life, but the donation of it. Not how long you lived, but how right you lived. What you might look at as a disadvantage may turn out to be an advantage in your ministry. In acknowledging God's uniqueness and goodness, the psalmist in Psalm 139 vs 14 says, "I praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Marvelous are Your works, and that my soul knows very well." God is perfect, and His works also are perfect. He never makes mistake, and is forever the same. Find your God's ordained path and follow it, and you will find real significance.

Prayer: Abba Father, thank You most precious God for Your marvelous works in me, and how You fearfully and wonderfully made me for Your predetermined purposes. Give me the grace to identify my ordained pathway that I may walk in it, and be relevance in service to You, in Jesus’ Name I have prayed, Amen.

PRAISE THE LORD!

Christ’s Sufferings in Us

 Christ’s Sufferings in Us

Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church. (Colossians 1:24)

Christ has prepared a love offering for the world by suffering and dying for sinners. It is a perfect sacrifice. It pays in full for all the sins of all his people. Nothing can be added to make a better gift. It is lacking in nothing — except one thing, a personal presentation by Christ himself to the nations of the world. 

God’s answer to this lack is to call the people of Christ (people like Paul) to make a personal presentation of the afflictions of Christ to the world. In doing this, we “[fill] up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions.” We finish what they were designed for, namely, a personal presentation to the people who do not know about their infinite worth. 

But the most amazing thing about Colossians 1:24 is how Paul fills up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions.

He says that it is his own sufferings that fill up Christ’s afflictions. This means, then, that Paul exhibits the sufferings of Christ by suffering himself for those he is trying to win to Christ. In his sufferings they are to see Christ’s sufferings. 

Here is the astounding upshot: God intends for the afflictions of Christ to be presented to the world through the afflictions of his people. 

God really means for the body of Christ, the church, to experience some of the suffering he experienced so that when we proclaim the cross as the way to life, people will see the marks of the cross in us and feel the love of the cross from us.