11-7-2021

 Good Morning All!

        Joshua 1:5; “No man shall be able to stand before you all the days of your life. Just as I was with Moses, so I will be with you. I will not leave you or forsake you.” 

     A few years ago, we purchased a refrigerator. The salesman promised that we would be happy with it and would have years of trouble-free use.  Then he tried to sell us the extended warranty. It kind of made you wonder about his promise of years of trouble-free usage.

    Many years ago, my dad bought a boar from a guy. Dad asked him if he guaranteed the boar; the guy said yes. Dad asked what if the boar was sterile. The guy told him he guaranteed that he would sell dad another boar. He did not bring a boar home that day.

    We can go through life and have a lot of promises made to us. Many come with a lot of fine print attached. Many are not worth the time it takes to listen to them. But some are made to be kept. We promise our spouse that we will love, honor, cherish and be faithful until death do us part. This is probably the most important and sacred promise that we make.  Yet even this one can fail. Sin even has its tentacles in this.

    It would appear that we live in a world where there are absolutely no promises worth hearing.  This is because we are unable to truly keep any promise we make. We may try but eventually we fail. Sin does that to us.

    This is what makes God’s promise so extraordinary. This is what makes it so important for us to have faith in Him. He promises to never leave or forsake us. This is a most wondrous gift to us. Yet many, even believers, fail to grasp the width and depth of this promise.

    Many think that God is sitting in heaven watching us, even watching out for us. Yet his promise is so much more than that. He is with you. Through his Holy Spirit he lives in you and thus experiences your life. God is not some distant entity; he is the eternal, loving Spirit which gives us meaning to our life, which gives us hope. God has shown this to us by the birth of Jesus. In that birth, God became man and experienced all that this life has to offer. Through Jesus’ life, death, resurrection, and ascension we have the new hope for the new life. We have the forgiveness of sins. We have the promise that God is with us.

    We have the same experience which the Israelites had when they were in the wilderness and God’s Presence rested in the Tabernacle. God’s Presence is with you every day and he will never leave you. The glorious fact is that this promise depends on the nature of God and not on our qualities. God is with us to share our life and to carry our burden. The devil and the world will fling all sorts of junk at us, but God is there to shield us, to protect us and to keep us safe within his loving arms.

Dear Father, we give you wondrous praise for your promise to never leave us. Even when we try to leave and go our own way, you are there to return us to your arms and safety. Continue to keep us within your gentle hold. In Jesus’ precious name we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret