When I remember what the Lord has done ....
Sometimes it is good to just stop, and think back to all the good things that God has done for you. We soon forget the positives and give all our attention to the troubles and challenges that face us in these unprecedented days.
We used to sing a song which went, 'When I remember what the Lord has done, I'll never go back anymore'. We need to call to mind all the times he saved us out of our troubles, delivered us from our enemies, caused us to escape when we really did not deserve it, and saved our lives from destruction, time and time again.
I would run out of space if I even began to write the story of my life so far, and all of the benefits that God has showered me with over the years. The Bible says that his mercy is higher than the heavens, and endures forever. His mercy reaches me and you when we are in trouble, and it has done more times than any of us will ever realize.
He saves us from our own stupidity at times and from our own sinful inclinations.
'Our soul is escaped as a bird out of the vicious trap of the fowlers (the bird hunters): the trap is broken, and we are escaped.' That comes from Psalm 124, and is such a truth. Through our own folly as well as the hatred and attack of those our enemies, we have sometimes got caught in a snare, our feet trapped by a deadly situation that sought to ruin us and finish us off.
Such traps are usually hidden well and disguised as something of interest, and we think ourselves safe and secure, until we discover we have been foolish and allowed the hunter of souls to immobilise us and prevent us from gaining freedom. In such a helpless condition we blame ourselves and seek for a way to get free. It is the mercy and goodness of God that overlooks our folly and stupidity, and rescues us from the thing that would otherwise have finished us off.
It could have been a business wrongly entered, a decision we should not have made, a friendship or acquaintance, or something of this world that took away our hearts from God for a time.
Look back, and discover for yourself just how many times God has reached down and rescued you!
Do not ever forget the mercies and benefits of the Lord upon your life. He forgives all of our iniquities, heals all of our diseases, redeems our feeble lives from destruction (even self-destruction), and crowns us with loving-kindness and tender mercies. (Psalm 103)
It is because of his great mercies that we are not dead and finished, because the Bible says that his compassions fail not. Notice, not just 'compassion' (singular), but because of his multitude of compassions toward us we are still here. (Lamentations 3:22)
We could go on and on in our thinking of what the good Lord has done for us through all the years of our lives, and yet we hardly acknowledge those occasions, and rarely remember to give him thanks.
Our very breath comes from him, along with our daily food, shelter, income, and material provisions. The beauty we see in creation, the friendships and acquaintances, the abilities and talents that we may have, all come from him and by him. Our work, and even the strength to do it; our skills, and even the wisdom to learn them, our vocation and even the ability to succeed in our careers, all comes from him, and by him.
None of us should boast in our own strength or wisdom, for without God we are nothing and can do nothing.
We have everything to be thankful for, and should have no reason to grumble or mumble (as the Israelites did so many times, and which lost them so many blessings that they should have inherited). God loves a cheerful and thankful heart, and whoever lives with such a continual attitude will know the blessing and goodness of God in a daily manner.
He [or she] that has a merry heart (a happy and content disposition) has a feast continually. (Proverbs 15:15)
Psalm 1 tells what it is to be a blessed person. Do not sit with the scornful, the critics, the moaners and the negative takers.
Walk in faith, and give thanks always for all things, for with such a heart you will please God, and he will rejoice over you with joy.
JGM 2022
