Deacon’s Corner
There used to be a television game show called, “Who Do You Trust?” Today’s Old Testament reading from Jeremiah begins, “Cursed is the man who trusts in human beings, who seeks his strength in flesh, whose heart turns away from the Lord.” Our world is filled with distractions of money, sex, power, popularity and possessions. Each of these comes with gilded edges. Distractions come with the purpose of drawing us away from God. The more we focus on the Lord in our life and create a space for Him, the more content we are. I have been counseling a man for almost 5 years. His life for the last 10 years has been very difficult. He seems to be constantly under attack from either, his work, his wife, finances and frankly the devil. There are people in his life who go out of their way to make fun of him. When we first met he was considering suicide. Now he places a greater emphasis on prayer. God is with him.
I, too, in my life have gone through very difficult times and found ultimately that when my focus was on the world, I suffered. When my focus was on the Lord, I did not. The more I focused on the Lord and placed my trust in Him, the happier I was. In prayer I was given to see that when we turn ourselves over to the Lord we end up surrounding ourselves with a Holy protection. I will never forget a certain Saturday about 15 years ago. In the morning I led a wonderful group of prayer warriors in prayer and then led a Benediction that involved praying over those in need. That afternoon, I was driving a trolley for a wedding party. When you do that, the driver has a lot of down time waiting for the wedding party. During that down time, I kept getting calls from other drivers in our company who were having mechanical issues. The last thing you want when you are transporting wedding parties is to have mechanical issues and here I was unable to do anything but field the calls. The only thing I could do was put it in the Lord’s hands. That entire afternoon I was filled with the grace of the Holy Spirit. Instead of being beside myself because of the difficulties, I was completely at peace. At the end of the day, each of these problems resolved themselves. The Lord provided.
So, I have counseled this man to place his focus on the Lord. Problems come and go. People come and go, but the Lord is always there and we are called to be there for others. When we carry Christ in our heart, we then carry Christ to others. Jesus is The Way, The Truth, and The Life. So for each of us the answer to the question, “Who do you trust?” There is only one answer. JESUS I TRUST IN YOU.
Deacon Ed
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