Third Day

“Joy is withered away from the sons of men…Is not the meat cut off before our eyes, yea, joy and gladness from the house of our God?” (Joel 1:12, 16).

Joy!  What a scarce commodity this is.  There are many who say they are abiding in Christ.  There are few who show that they are abounding in Him.  Joy seems to be elusive.  How indescribably blessed is the believer who has his soul filled with it.

This joy is as real at the graveside as at the fireside.  Joy does not evaporate under the heat and pressure of adversity.  Joy does not collapse in the presence of calamity.  Joy does not sour under the test of poverty.  Joy is alive and deep down in the bottom of the heart of a Spirit-filled believer.

Joy is not created by possessions, or by positions, but by a Person — Him!  Joy can stand all pressures Satan or circumstances bring against it, but, and ponder it well, the sun of joy in the soul can be eclipsed by our own disobedience.

Joy requires two conditions:  submission and service.  “If ye abide” — submission — means staying put when you feel like quitting, or you think it smart to quit.  Joy also comes through service.  Most Christians are activists, they do a lot of things —  unprayerfully.  Winning the lost at any cost, abiding in Him, allowing Him to live through you — service — brings unqualified joy.

“I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly” (John 10:10).

Why do sheep have the desire to leave the shepherd’s side and travel to places of danger and distance?  There is an inward pull that sheep have that tend to lead them away.  They follow the tract of land that looks greener and more desirous, leaving behind that which is safe and filled with contentment by the shepherd’s care.

Why does God give Pastors to the local congregation?  So that they may instruct and teach the little flock to the perfecting of the saints for the work of the ministry that edifies the body of Christ.  It is God who gives the pastors and teachers so that they may equip the saints for the work and for the building up of His church.  It is God who gives the Shepherds.  It is the under shepherds who are led by the Chief Shepherd.

As in that day, the Old Testament days and the New Testament days, shepherds were looked down upon.  Many people looked and pick out their words, mannerisms, and ways and accosted them for not being the smartest people in town.  But the Shepherds were important in the eyes of God.  Sheep can’t just get along anywhere.  There is no other class of livestock that requires more careful handling, more detailed direction, than do sheep.

The Pastor Shepherd keeps the sheep on the move.  They are shifted from one pasture to another.  The habits sheep form and the desires that sheep have, when left to themselves, are dangerous.  So the Pastor Shepherd is always leading them to go forward.  Let us listen, not only to the voice of the Good Shepherd, but to the leadership of the kind, prayerful, life of the under shepherd.  Why?  Because he cares for your soul.

“And he said unto them, Look on me, and do likewise; and, behold, when I come to the outside of the camp, it shall be that, as I do, so shall you do” (Judges 7:17).

God is looking to those to whom He can trust His life to.  Gideon was one of those men who knew he was weak but he found God to be strong.  So in this belief and faith in God, Gideon commands the three hundred men by his side to do as he does because the end result will be victory.

What was Gideon asking the men to do?  He was asking them to hoist the sails of their faith and wait for the wind of God to blow.  Everyone who is born of the Spirit tests his life by the Word of God, and by doing so, he is setting his sails to catch the breath of God.  We place our hands on the rudder, but we are totally dependent on God’s wind to blow.

Gideon blew the trumpet, broke the clay vessel wherein was the candle, and the light inside began to glow outwardly.  When you and I are ready for God to work we will blow the trumpet of proclamation of life in Christ, and those around us will see the light of illumination in us because of our broken consecration before God.

Are you ready to take steps to discipline your inner man?  If you are, what course corrections need to be made in your life even today?

“For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine but, after their own lists, shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears” (2 Timothy 4:3).

In this diet, fitness-crazed world especially found in America, there are many conversations when it comes to good cholesterol, bad cholesterol, fat, fiber, calories and carbohydrates.  The wellness teams are coming up with all kinds of programs to help us lead better and healthier lifestyles.  They want us to live a long time.

I read about two elderly ladies who died and went to heaven.  As they walked the streets of gold, one said to the other, “Just think, if we hadn’t eaten all that bran, we could have been here years ago.”  We are in a fitness craze today.  We live longer and we enjoy it less.

I only wish that the Christian community was as into a rigorous spiritual exercise as they are with their physical exercise.  We are so focused on the temporal more than the eternal.  We worship dust when we are more concerned about our temporal bodies than the eternal body.

Firm faith is better than firm bodies.  We have promoted buns of steel and brains of silly putty.  This is a scandal and a sin.  We have dumbed down our minds.  Although there are more Christian Bookstores today, only 10-12% of American Christians ever visit them.

The majority of the Christian world would rather be ignorant than learn.  People no longer read, or think.  And because of that fact we have raised a generation that cannot endure sound doctrine.  There are many in our church pews today who desire not to be taught or to teach.  And when we watch the news we see the Philistine mindset which promotes untruth.

There needs to be a return to seeking the face of God and the mind of Christ.  We must call people to discipline their minds as well as their bodies.  God expects us to take care of our physical bodies but not at the expense of not exercising our spiritual minds for the glory of God.  There needs to be a real turn to Christ and His Word.

“I looked on my right hand…no man cared for my soul” (Psalm 142:4).

When it comes to witnessing for the Lord Jesus Christ, I remember while I was in college that no one every spoke to me about my soul.  As a matter of real knowledge, I do not ever recall anyone speaking to me directly about my eternal destination.  It was all so vague to me.  As a young man, a teen of maybe fifteen, I remember shutting my Bible during a worship service and saying to myself, “One day I will understand but for now I choose to wait it out.”

I did not shut my Bible in rebellion but in mild frustration.  I said “Maybe one day I will understand.”  I just didn’t get it.  I wasn’t trying to harm or hurt anyone; I, with all of the changes going on in my body, mind, and soul of a teen, just gave up and I just shut down.

There are a lot of youth walking around the same way today.  They don’t know what the Bible, Jesus, the Church, and prayer, etc., is all about.  They are lost and headed toward a dream world that does not exist.  And there are hardly any out there who care enough to pray and prepare their own lives to tell the good news to them.

Do you remember in the first paragraph that I remarked that no one spoke up for my soul?  Well there was one.  I was in my second year of college and I traveled to the State Fair in Raleigh, NC.  While there, minding my own business, I was walking with a girl and out of nowhere God appeared.  You say, “What?” Yep!  In just a moment in time this girl stopped out in front of us and asked ME “If I were a Christian?”  I said, “Yes,” for I was taken by surprise.  The next step, I took after giving her my answer, the Holy Spirit of God stopped me dead in my soul and in such a real way said to my lost soul, “You are lying.”  And He was right.  Never before had I been confronted in that manner.

God used that girl to speak to me.  He was awakening my soul out of the lap of the evil one.  Later I understood the gospel!  He opened my eyes.  I have never gotten over it.  Someone cared for my soul.  She doesn’t know what she did for me.  I laughed inside when I saw her in front of me with her “Howdy Doody smile“.  But now it is me who has the smile.  I can’t wait to see her.  I don’t know exactly how it will happen, but one day I will thank her for her bravery, courage and her love for a lost college boy headed toward Hell who didn’t understand.  And one day I will thank the Lord God Almighty for using this young college girl in my life who stood up for Him!