"Thy will be done" Luke 22:42
When I was praying for my husbands cancer I knew I was praying for a miracle but ultimately I knew my prayer was for my heart to accept and receive God's perfect will which meant to love the Lord at all costs and that involved Him loving others through all that He laid upon us and how He would choose to do it. It would involve giving my all to Him as He chose long ago to dwell within me and use me however He would choose. It would require giving to Him my will and relationships of all who knew us to have His perfect way in their lives as well.....it involved my will to be in a place that I often call the 'Great Exchange'. An outcome that is always unknown but always the place that puts faith out in front believing that..."God...cannot lie" Titus 1:2. This means His ways are Sovereign and it is not up to me to understand but to trust in Him in the deepest places in my heart that He desires and exchanging my will for His.....and the words to speak to my God.... 'Thy will be done'. These words bring transformation to me and to others...these words allow God glory now and forevermore as His purposes through us are Eternal in all that He does.
Last May brought us to this place of great unknowns as we were preparing for a series of tests and another MRI. Before heading back to Duke we went to our local hospital and the results of this very important MRI would go with us the following day for the specialists to read and give a prognosis of a very aggressive tumor that the previous month showed signs of a great healing....but in the recent days we were seeing symptoms that were speaking differently. In the imaging room I had been sitting, waiting and praying for Randy as I needed the Lord more than ever....and as I looked up there appeared this artwork which I posted above and God showed me instantly a picture of the Cross through it....a vivid reminder of His love and grace that was with me in a time of great despair. God gives us what we need and when we need it...His presence with us wherever we go and in that moment He spoke to me of the laying down of myself for Him...in all that He was asking of me.
I had witnessed many miracles in our life and truly knew God was capable of more.... I remembered the words of Jesus......'now the hour has come for the Son of man to be glorified' 'except a corn a wheat fall into the ground and die it abideth alone but if it die it brings forth much fruit'. Nothing will ever come out of a seed unless it falls...into the dark and unknown, in death, but out of it comes a harvest. This Exchange is in me giving Him my deaths and He gives me life...I give Him my weakness He gives me His strength I give Him my loss He gives me His gain...My husband always brought a godly perspective to life's difficult circumstances...the Biblical truth that "our life is not our own it belongs to Christ...and it will involve a physical cost as we have given Him our body to dwell in and to use to speak through...regardless however He chooses...through health or sickness in strength or weakness...because all is in His hands and he trusted Him with his all."
His faith being lived out allowed me to be transformed in my early days as a believer. So often we think that as Christians our life is now going to be smooth and difficulties will not come and God will lead us down a comfortable path as we follow Him. Our feelings still want to feel fuzzy and warm and we think struggles were a thing of the past. Then when cancer comes, prodigals wander, financial problems squeeze us tight we think we have been forgotten and ask many questions....but nothing can be further from the truth.
How undone Mary was when her brother Lazarus died. From Mary's perspective Jesus seemed very unconcerned. Mary needed her Savior and things were not what she expected. This was Mary, who anointed her Saviors feet with ointment and wiped his feet with her hair (John 11:2). Weeping and broken in the death of her brother she then rose quickly and went to Jesus when He came and called her. At this time, in her sorrow, she was incapable of ministering to others or helping them. Mary had nothing to give to Jesus, only her questions. When the Jews who were with her in her house were consoling her and then seen her rise up and quickly and go to Jesus they followed her. This is so beautiful because in her sorrow she chose to move toward Jesus...with even her doubts and questions...she knew she needed Him despite all...and because of her desire to go to Jesus many of the people mourning her brothers death followed her...and they witnessed a miracle, Lazarus' resurrection. And an even bigger miracle took place as many then 'believed'!
The Lord had a bigger plan and used her sorrow and suffering. The Lord used Mary to draw others into the kingdom even at a time where she felt helpless, alone, confused and in despair. Her behavior spoke louder than her words as she obeyed the Lord and followed Him despite the heaviness in her heart. Remember how Mary had sat at Jesus' feet...heard His teachings...and now through her weakness His power was made perfect....she came to Him when He called her...God used her in her weakness and in her inadequacies and she was used for His glory despite what she had seen and the sorrow she experienced. In our afflictions and in our brokenness He so often uses us to carry out His Eternal plans...nothing can thwart His plans for our lives as He is always preparing us for what is next.
This principle is found when we remember the Cross. The principle where life always come out of death. Afterward we read in John 12 that Mary anoints Jesus' feet, worshipping Him at the supper at Bethany. A beautiful picture of a woman worshipping and sacrificing her best for Jesus. We then read of His triumphal entry into Jerusalem being hailed and called Hosanna, we see how the people cried out and honored Him....many coming who believed and who witnessed the miracle of Lazarus being raised from the dead but then Jesus predicts His death and sufferings....and spoke of 'the fruitful grain of wheat'....life being brought out of death that if this grain a wheat dies it will produce much grain...spiritual fruit...much gain in the loss which brings eternal life because Jesus goes on to say that 'anyone who love his life will lose it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. If anyone serves Me, let Him follow Me; and where I am, there My servant will be also. If anyone serves Me, him My Father will honor' (John 12:23-26) .
The scriptures tell us in Nehemiah that 'when we set forth to do the work of the Lord opposition sets in'. Opposition comes to try to discourage and defeat us, to hinder the work of God in our lives but the scriptures tell us that we are indestructible until the Lord takes us home. Throughout my husbands 20 years of ministry at CCR....a ministry and work of God He believed in and knew God had wrought a great work in his heart and ministry...came with opposition. Satan is never happy when gaps are being filled in and Gods work is going forth! Many trials, toils and pain....but it all pales in comparison to the victory's as God was beginning a work and growing His kingdom. All the great men and woman of faith in the scriptures had miraculous stories written of their faith, because of their unending trust in their God...and the miracles that took place in their life transpired because of there yielded heart to God to allow Him to use them at all costs. The scriptures tell us that they were written of for our own admonition and encouragement and I thank God for loving us so much that He shared their lives with us throughout His Word.
With each trial...came a full surrender and dying to self for Gods will to be done...'if you loose yourself for My sake you will find it' and this is the 'great exchange'....when we offer them to Him He always has something to give us in return and ultimately it is used to feed others. Surrender, sacrifice and glory...this is the principle of the Cross of Calvary. The exchanged life....for the glory of God. And this time was no different for us...all, for the glory of God.
What is God's glory? Is it only God's miracles in our lives? Or is it what is most important to God for His Upmost glory? Something that He allows and determines that will be used for His greatest purposes in me...and in the life of others? If we die in death or to self...out of it will come the harvest. We give Him our many deaths and He will give us His life...His power...His purpose.
Giving up our life for transformation...for the world. Broken bread and poured out wine for the world. We see this at the Mt of Transfiguration...as Moses and Elijah spoke of Jesus' death on the cross as they seen His transfiguration before them, Him in all His glory. We will be transformed, a transfiguration will take place as we receive and accept all that God allows in our life, giving back our life for Him.
It is a natural consequence in life... a coming death....a separation which God has willed for us in this time...my husband now dwelling in the fulness of God's glory...and I still dwelling here with a work still to do for Him...but I truly believe that someday when I join him there we will have a blessed reunion and remembrances of our earthly love and worship and joyful service to the Lord and of the blessings that we shared in our life united together here. A fellowship that was rooted in love, suffering and service together here on earth. Such blessings there will be in the communion of saints in the presence of the King seeing His beauty and beholding His face...the face of the Savior, our Redeemer.
This year has been indescribable with a suffering that no words can explain...but through Randy's going home and through the vows made to God and to him in the beginning of our life together I was fully resolved to give him to the Lord years ago to a willing service and my commitment to the Lord as his wife and to always depend on the Spirit to enable me to carry out my commitments and vows to come by his side and fit in to his plans for his consecrated life to God. To joyfully surrender God's servant to God's plans....and that came throughout our life and through his death.
God's plans for his life came with demands at work and in ministry along with those in our family. It came with surrender, sacrifice, glory and transformation in both of our lives. It came with a relentless love and trust in the Lord as we desired for God to teach us His ways each day, knowing all else can first wait, because all else is in His hands. It is Jesus alone and more of Jesus we always need each new day.
Our service to the LORD never stopped despite our many trials...and this in the Christian life....the LORD showed us early on of the blessings we receive as we continue to pour ourselves out to others. Not only to pray for the strength we need but to pray to give our strength to others. Not just to pray for a Word we need but to give the Word to another....not just for God to feed our souls but that we in turn would feed another. This is such a beautiful spiritual truth for blessings...for 'light to break forth' within our own hearts and especially during times of heaviness, trials, hardships...the blessing of serving others...Proverbs tells us that as we refresh others we will be refreshed.
"If you pour yourself out for the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then shall your light rise in the darkness and your gloom be as noonday. And the Lord will guide you continually and satisfy your desire in scorched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters do not fail, and....your people will rebuild..and will raise up the age old foundations....and you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to dwell in {another translation, 'paths leading home'}. Isaiah 58:10-12
Sacrifice, suffering, service, glory and transformation seen in this beautiful promise.....in us and in others. A beautiful promise of the blessings God gives us; light for guidance, satisfaction, strength and great refreshment and restoration to others as we are used as part of His work in their lives....and the one condition of all these blessings rests on one thing...."If you pour yourself out"!
May the words of this most widely and long lasting chorus written in 1926 from a Revival that took place in Orlando, Florida be our prayer as it speaks of a simple sincerity to the devotion and surrender to Christ...to be used by Him through the power of His Holy Spirit.........that His glory would be seen and a great transfiguration would take place in all of our lives...this is the Great Exchange.
"Spirit of the living God, fall afresh on me. Melt me, mold me, fill me, use me. Spirit of the living God fall afresh on me"
Michelle Ann Guerra
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