Today was hard, from the very beginning until I had the time to rest, refresh and spend time in God’s Word. God chose to use words spoken to me by a friend to set me up for what He knew I would read later. Today, I am thankful for His Word – whether spoken by a friend or read – or both.
I love words. I love to play with them, write them, and read them. Words expand my imagination, fuel me with their power, and help me to focus on truth. Words can create a new path or give strength to walk the current one. Words can build us up and encourage us. Words can help us make sense of thoughts and feelings that we don’t understand. Words create beautiful pictures and beautiful sounds in the head of a reader. Words, the right words, are a gift.
God’s Word is the most precious book of words to me. My daughter will tell you that we have plenty of Jesus around here because I have so many Bibles. I have almost every version because the words change slightly. I can spend hours reading those words that God wrote just for me, and you. I am grateful that He knew how much words would mean to me and so He had men write words that would help me understand who He is, who I am in Him, and how dearly I am loved. It also contains vast amounts of wisdom, such as, Love others, be kind, work hard, and seek truth.
There are also some words that I struggle to understand, or to understand how they fit together. The good news is that God allows me to wrestle with those and through His Holy Spirit, will explain them as I seek truth. I am always up for a good challenge.
Today, I wanted to turn to my favorite verses. Those verses that tell me how valued I am, how much He loves me, and how He will be close to me always. Trouble was, I like to read one book of the Bible at a time, and I just started Exodus. It is not the first time I have read Exodus, and I don’t remember it being full of warm fuzzies. It is however, full of examples of God’s power and strength. Truth is, right now, I need to remember His strength and His power.
Then there were these words, “But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and the more they spread abroad.” Exodus 1:12 The didn’t shrink back, they didn’t die out, and they didn’t give up, they got bigger. Then this, “And the people multiplied and grew very strong.” Exodus 1:20 Pharaoh did everything he could think of to try and destroy the entire people group. He failed, miserably, in fact. Those words spoke to me about what my reaction needs to be when all the things seem hard. I need to grow and grow strong. God is not going to let me be destroyed. He will increase my strength as I depend on Him. I can’t make that make rational sense, but I don’t have to, I have seen it played out. God is bigger. God is stronger. I am so thankful that He recorded these times in the Bible so that I could read it, on this very day, and determine that I too, will grow stronger.
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