(Ezekiel 20:7 ESV)
It should be simple right? Give your life to God and then float along on a cloud until you depart this earth to be with Him in heaven. And it makes sense. God, after all, lead his people with a cloud (Exodus 13:21) so why wouldn’t he allow us to ride on one while he blows it, and us, across the finish line.
It should be simple, yet winds of change can often, and sometimes too easily, (and violently) knock us off our clouds and cause us to become disillusioned with God.
But here is the thing, we were never meant to become cloud-sitters. We were called to be cloud-followers.
Yet this is not always easy. Take for instance God’s own chosen people. He chose them and yet
While living in Egypt, the Jews began secretly to worship the gods of the Egyptians… When God opened the way for Israel to leave Egypt, some of the Jews took their Egyptian gods with them! God had sworn by an oath (“lifted up my hand”)7 that He was Israel’s God (v. 5) and that He would set them free and give them the Promised Land (v. 6). The true God set them free, but they carried false gods with them!1
He chose them, swearing an oath to them, and they, in turn, chose to trust in false Gods.
Who will you choose to follow today?
God says,
“STOP putting all your trust in your friends, your bank account, your abilities, your plans and your schemes, or even your newspaper and START trusting me, for I alone am able to make your path straight. It is NOT about what you see in front of you. Look up and trust that I, the God of the Universe, who sees the end from the beginning, know what doors need to be opened for you and which doors need to remain tightly shut. You are here for such a short time, make the most of it by putting fully your faith in me alone and see what I will do through you. I will not fail you!”
Choosing to trust God when it is hard is not, by definition, easy, but as you make the choice every day to follow him it will get easier and easier, until the day it almost seems as easy as floating on a cloud.
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1. Warren W. Wiersbe, Be Reverent, “Be” Commentary Series (Colorado Springs, CO: Chariot Victor/Cook Communications, 2000), 93.
When I was pregnant with my last child something happened to my face. I am not sure why my face chose to betray me, but the truth was that I looked bad. huge bumps all over my face. It was so bad that children would literally ask me questions like “why is your face so ugly?” It was so bad that when I went to an eye doctor they doctor would not allow me to rest my chin on the chin rest and even told me not to touch her equipment with my face. She even lectured me about allowing my face to get like that.
Though my medical doctor was never able to figure out what caused it, he said that he knew it had nothing to do with what I was eating or how I was cleaning my face. He knew it was something biological. Something in me that I was not aware of and had no control over caused the outward manifestation.
Though the way that people treated me during that time should have caused me to look back on this season with sadness, instead I look on it with joy.
Why?
Because my husband, a man of few words never noticed the change in my appearance. Ok, Scratch that. I am sure that he noticed, he wasn’t physically blind.
But his love for me caused him to react as if he never saw any imperfections. It filled me with such joy that he still looked deep into my eyes and called me beautiful. He still hugged me tight and told me he loved me, and he never ever flinched when he looked at me. This amazed me because it was something that I would do myself when I looked in the mirror.
Why did he treat me this way?
I am sure that it had to do something with the fact that the love he had for me caused him to look at me differently. He did not see my imperfections but saw the real me.
This is how God views us.
Though we may see nothing but our past imperfections when we look in the mirror, though out guilt may cause us to think of ourselves as ugly (inside and out), or maybe people in the world treat us as if we are, without us even knowing why. Yet God does not see us that way. He looks at us through lenses of love.
Though our past may cause us to want to hang our head, God is the lifter of our heads.(Psalm 3:3).
If you are struggling with looking in the mirror, because of any reason, feel the nudge of Gods hand under your chin.
Feel him raise up your chin until your eyes meet his.
Hear these word from him:
You are beautiful!
You are the apple of my eye!
Do not hold on to the past, let it go!
Know that your best days are ahead!
You ARE the apple of my eye!
I Love you!
I Am Trusting God 