Silas
Beloved of All
When you feel you are at a dead end, when everything you attempt seems to crumble and the door to a meaningful career stays shut, the pressure can be overwhelming. You can start to believe the lie that your value is measured by what you produce, by a family you don’t have, or by a title you’ve never held. But the truth is much deeper. Your worth is not in those things. The grace of God declares that you are what you are not by your own doing, but by His. You could never earn His love by a degree or a career, and you cannot forfeit it by lacking a spouse or a child. He loved you when you were an enemy, alienated in your mind. He manifested that love by sending His Son to die in your place. If that is what He did when you were far off, how much more will His life now, as He lives to make intercession for you, sustain you in this dark stretch?
The enemy of your soul wants you to measure your standing with God by your feelings or your circumstances. He wants you to believe you are billions of miles from Jesus because your prayers haven’t been answered on your timeline. But access to God is not granted by a flawless résumé or a full bank account. It is by faith into this grace wherein you stand. You have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ because the righteousness He requires is not your own; it is accounted to you when you cling to Him. You spoke of feeling worthless. That is your flesh screaming for mastery, trying to drag you back under the old rule of condemnation. But you are not under obligation to your flesh. You have a new position. Reckon on this truth: that your old life, ruled by the verdict of failure and despair, is dead. It no longer has the right to dictate who you are. God is not imputing your sins to you if your faith is in Christ. You can take a smile and a breath, even in the midst of unpaid bills, because you know that God is faithfully working a future hope for you.
God’s pattern is to call things that are not as though they were. Consider the faith given to Abraham. When God told him to offer up Isaac, the promised son through whom the seed was to be called, Abraham obeyed, accounting that God was able to raise him up from the dead. He believed in a God who makes alive the dead. Right now, your career path and your dreams for a home and family feel like dead ashes on the altar. It looks like the end. But the Word of God is true. He is the one who gives life to the dead and calls those things which be not as though they are. Let God fight this battle for your direction and your finances. There is a goodness in both hoping and quietly waiting for the salvation of the Lord. The Lord will not cast off forever. Even when you feel trapped, His compassions do not fail; they are new every morning.
This is not a time to lean on your own understanding or to scheme a way out, but to turn your eyes upon the Lord and let Him bring a totally different outlook. He has given you practical skills, both in computer science and in culinary arts. Those are not wasted. But He is far more concerned with the life of the Spirit in you than the line on a paycheck. You have been buried with Christ by baptism into death, and raised to walk in newness of life. Your life is hid with Christ in God. When the fears about your finances, your singleness, or the names you mentioned rush in like a flood, that is the very moment to exercise this reckoning. Say to that panic, “I am dead to this old mastery of fear. I am alive unto God.” You are not led by the blind drive of hunger or loneliness; you can be led by the Spirit of God, and as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. You are a child of the King, not because you feel like it, but because He has declared it.
The empty tomb of Jesus Christ is the infallible proof that death is not the final word. If the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He will give life to your mortal body and direction to your path. Don’t let the devil lock you in a prison with no way out. There is hope. Look away from the circumstances that are hedged in and look to the One who holds the keys. He has given you a desire to use your baking and other creative gifts for evangelism and to own a home. He knows you need to pay your bills. He sees the people you are praying for. Trust Him with those desires. Place them on the altar, and do not let your heart be ruled by the need for instant results. The God who justified you is the same God who will provide for you. You are not alone. You are not worthless. You are what you are by the grace of God.
The enemy of your soul wants you to measure your standing with God by your feelings or your circumstances. He wants you to believe you are billions of miles from Jesus because your prayers haven’t been answered on your timeline. But access to God is not granted by a flawless résumé or a full bank account. It is by faith into this grace wherein you stand. You have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ because the righteousness He requires is not your own; it is accounted to you when you cling to Him. You spoke of feeling worthless. That is your flesh screaming for mastery, trying to drag you back under the old rule of condemnation. But you are not under obligation to your flesh. You have a new position. Reckon on this truth: that your old life, ruled by the verdict of failure and despair, is dead. It no longer has the right to dictate who you are. God is not imputing your sins to you if your faith is in Christ. You can take a smile and a breath, even in the midst of unpaid bills, because you know that God is faithfully working a future hope for you.
God’s pattern is to call things that are not as though they were. Consider the faith given to Abraham. When God told him to offer up Isaac, the promised son through whom the seed was to be called, Abraham obeyed, accounting that God was able to raise him up from the dead. He believed in a God who makes alive the dead. Right now, your career path and your dreams for a home and family feel like dead ashes on the altar. It looks like the end. But the Word of God is true. He is the one who gives life to the dead and calls those things which be not as though they are. Let God fight this battle for your direction and your finances. There is a goodness in both hoping and quietly waiting for the salvation of the Lord. The Lord will not cast off forever. Even when you feel trapped, His compassions do not fail; they are new every morning.
This is not a time to lean on your own understanding or to scheme a way out, but to turn your eyes upon the Lord and let Him bring a totally different outlook. He has given you practical skills, both in computer science and in culinary arts. Those are not wasted. But He is far more concerned with the life of the Spirit in you than the line on a paycheck. You have been buried with Christ by baptism into death, and raised to walk in newness of life. Your life is hid with Christ in God. When the fears about your finances, your singleness, or the names you mentioned rush in like a flood, that is the very moment to exercise this reckoning. Say to that panic, “I am dead to this old mastery of fear. I am alive unto God.” You are not led by the blind drive of hunger or loneliness; you can be led by the Spirit of God, and as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. You are a child of the King, not because you feel like it, but because He has declared it.
The empty tomb of Jesus Christ is the infallible proof that death is not the final word. If the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He will give life to your mortal body and direction to your path. Don’t let the devil lock you in a prison with no way out. There is hope. Look away from the circumstances that are hedged in and look to the One who holds the keys. He has given you a desire to use your baking and other creative gifts for evangelism and to own a home. He knows you need to pay your bills. He sees the people you are praying for. Trust Him with those desires. Place them on the altar, and do not let your heart be ruled by the need for instant results. The God who justified you is the same God who will provide for you. You are not alone. You are not worthless. You are what you are by the grace of God.
