You Just Might Make Me Believe

"...for I know the one in whom I trust, and I am sure that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him until the day of his return." 2 Timothy 1:12 NLT

I have a simple question for you. Do you have trust issues? Yes, you who claim to be a joint heir with Jesus, you who believe in healing, deliverance, miracles, heaven's existence. Do you have trust issues with your Heavenly Father?

This is one of those areas people don't like to confront within themselves. It is tough to admit that although you love God, you don't actually trust Him; that begs the question, "Then do you really love Him?".

The Apostle Paul was writing to Timothy of the trouble he'd encountered in his travels as an evangelist, missionary and apostolic minister. Paul was constantly in trouble for adhering to and promoting the gospel of Jesus Christ. He was the apostle in chains and wrote most of his letters from jail cells throughout the known world at that time. Spreading the love of God, freedom from religion and redemption went hand-in-hand with opposition and hard times for Paul. Probably not what any of us would want our children to pursue as a lifestyle, right?

But Paul hits on something very important though, addressing the issue of trouble in evangelizing, "I know the one in whom I trust." Do you know the true character of your Heavenly Father? Can you, without a doubt,put your trust in Him? It is impossible for Him to lie, He will never hurt you and He is always on your side. These are facts about Him, about His character.

In our world those characteristics seem like a pipe dream. We put very little confidence in our leaders, our government, our institutions. Marriages fall apart, families split, businesses go bankrupt, our factories move overseas. There is not much to put your confidence in here in our world. But you must remember, this is GOD we are talking about. He doesn't work on the principles of this world! There is no need to become cynical and embittered because your breakthrough is still on hold. God's sense of timing becomes problematic when we measure it against our personal expectations.


The issue is quite simply taking your hands off those things that you want so badly. Sometimes this means we even have to take our hands off the promises of God! Yes! He has promised things to all of us, yet not all of us have seen these promises come to pass-even to the point where we have waited for YEARS to experience the fullness of what God said He would do!


Paul said God could be trusted with those things he had committed unto to him, those things he had left in His care. I think there is a key here. We have to let God have full reign of these things. He shouldn't be in the co-pilot seat, as the old bumper sticker put it. God should be in the pilots' seat, taking things at His pace, in His direction, with His itinerary determining our ultimate destination.


Let go. Let it go. Whatever 'it' is for you, turn it loose and leave it with Him to do with as He sees fit. In an email to my pastor last week, I made the comment that we are all guilty of imposing our agendas on each other and on God, as well. We make our plans and our way of doing things the priority. It is our Burger King mentality that tells us we can have it our way.


If having life fall into place the way you wish it would, in the acceptable frame of time as you see it means more to you than what God has determined is right for you, then your will has superseded God's!

I am going to be blunt: you cannot get God's stuff your way. You cannot plead with Him for help and when He brings it to you in a way you don't particularly care for, or at a pace you don't appreciate you then become resentful and reject Him. Here's a newsflash: God will not usually bring your breakthrough the way you expect Him to!


Stop blocking the blessings and the provision of God in your life by boxing Him into your idea of how it should be. Your God is limitless, boundless, and there is nothing He will not do for those who believe. " Everything is possible for him who believes.” Mk. 9:23 NIV This declaration was made by Jesus to a man who admitted he was full of doubt! I love it when He does stuff like that! It gives a frustrated, uncertain woman like me HOPE!

One thing I feel the need to remind you (and myself) of; there are a lot of uncertainties in this life. We are plagued with uncertainties. There is a situation in my own personal life right now that I so wish God would just give me resolve about-something close to my heart. But I haven't gotten that "gut feeling" that I so desire. I'm still just dangling, so to speak.

Nobody likes that feeling, nobody wants loose ends. I've stated this before: we all want the package wrapped up and perfect like we envision it. However, as believers we have to understand the inherent peace that passes understanding that is available to us. If we will spend time in the presence of our Lord, these uncertainties and unknowns that make believing a tough prospect will dissipate. His peace will come when we spend time with Him. We can remain steady and consistent in this shaky world. There are situations that make us weak in the knees and heavy in heart, but we can have peace because we know that God is still working in those situations...ALWAYS!

We have to trust Him, even when we cannot trace Him.

Can you leave these things in His hands, Beloved? I am not just addressing that question to you, I am also addressing my own questions and my own doubts. Can I leave these things in His hands and know this peace that seems to be so elusive to me right now?

I will, if you will. Perhaps together, we can find a place at His feet, take a deep breath and just BELIEVE that He has our best interests at heart and He will never, ever disappoint us, put us to shame, or harm us. That's the great thing about our Heavenly Father: He just doesn't work the way everyone else we know does! That in itself should make us breathe a sigh of relief and know He is moving by His Spirit and He is working it all out for our good.

Keep believing, and know that what you commit to Him, well, it's in the best place you could ever leave it-with the One who knows exactly what you need when you need it.

Be blessed today, my friends!

Jennifer Barnes
UPLIFT! Editor

THOSE People!

"It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery." Galatians 5:1

I recently spent a leisurely Saturday with one of my best friends. We decided we would go see a movie-a comedy-just because it had been a long time since we'd been to the movies. We discreetly sat in the back row, slumped down, relaxing and two minutes into the previews realized we were going to be "those people". You know, the ones other movie-goers turn around and stare at because the laughter is so loud and the giggling seems to never stop? The theater was small, and full and we stood out from all the other viewers simply because we were completely uninhibited in our enjoyment of what we were seeing. We'd spent good money, why not have a good time, right? Even the previews had us wiping tears from our cheeks. It was just good fun.

Yet there were those who objected to how we were behaving-go figure. It seems no matter what some of us partake in, we tend to set some folk on edge because we just won't 'rein it in'. We feel big feelings and we express them in a big way because that's who we are. There are always those who want to stuff us back into their idea of "proper behavior".

This is why Paul said what he did to the Galatian church. They ran into the same situation; a group of religious zealots had slipped into the congregation proclaiming the Mosaic Law (from which the blood of Jesus had freed them) was the ONLY way to be redeemed. And they believed it. Even after Paul had come to them, personally, to teach them about true spiritual freedom, they fell back into the rut of religious duty and DOING. They were about to become religious automatons-robotically moving through the ritual and rote of the Law.

I have to interject something here, simply because it's something I have learned in my own trek with God: for those of us who find it difficult to receive love, duty and doings and busy-ness serve as great substitutes for relationship. We feel we have earned the love which God so freely offers us, so it's okay to accept it THEN. We cannot receive freely because we deal with issues of worth, importance, significance and even pride! It's the way of the western world: you earn your own way-nothing good comes free! How many times have you and I heard THAT?!?

So that MINDSET (the WORLD'S MINDSET) infiltrates what we know about salvation (it's free, unearnable, undeserved and a gift...) and we go off on these crazy tangents, groveling at the feet of God pleading with Him, "WHAT CAN I DO FOR YOU, LORD! JUST TELL ME AND I WILL DO IT! OH PLEASE, PLEASE WHAT CAN I DO FOR YOU???"

God is sitting there looking at us thinking, "If you could have done something why did I send my Son?" The fact of the matter is this- Jesus paid it all. All means all. 100%, sum total, everything, to the last iota. There is NOTHING you or I could ever have done or will ever be able to do to earn what God is offering us.

What is that? What is it God offers you and I?

The freedom to be one of "those people". Paul calls them the, "children of promise" (Gal. 4:28 NIV). Children of promise are compared to Isaac, the Old Testament patriarch born of a promise, not of the maneuverings and manipulations of man. That child was born and named Ishmael. After the birth of Isaac, Ishmael and his mother, Hagar, were thrown out of the camp of Abraham. Now, Paul goes into great detail in Galatians 4 comparing the son of Sarah-a free woman, to the son of Hagar-a slave.

By birth, slaves have no rights to themselves. They are property, bought and sold for a price and under the command of others. Their decisions are not their own and they live to serve others. Their needs and desires are secondary to those who own them. Paul's great concern for the Galatian congregation was that they NOT return to the captivity of the law. The law would shackle them to a list of don'ts and do's and must's and must not's. It would inhibit them from living a life of true freedom-spiritual freedom.

Spiritual freedom is not some hippie-dippy thing that is nebulous and hard to describe. Spiritual freedom is simply being who God created you to be from the beginning of time, who HE intended you to be. It is knowing that you are redeemed from a life of struggling to be good enough, smart enough, savvy enough, etc. Because of the great sacrifice Jesus made on Calvary FOR YOU and ME, we have been accepted in the beloved (Eph.1:6 NKJV), just because He chose to do that for us.

If you and I have been accepted by the Lord of Lords and the King of Kings, then why do we make such a show of winning everyone else's approval? I have struggled with these issues myself. In some of us there is a bottomless pit that drives us to seek the approval of those closest to us, because we are driven to earn their love, their , "You are ok". I am addressing those of you who fall into this RUT . You are like a hamster on a wheel. GET OFF THE RIDE, IT IS TAKING YOU NOWHERE!

I love my family dearly. They have seen me through some tough times, but I am fully aware of the fact that I am going to do something at some point in time they are going to have problems with-because I am one of "those people". I love my pastor and I love the people in my church. They have knelt beside me in prayer and have travailed with me over some huge things, but at some point I must choose to PLEASE GOD, rather than the expectations of those around me.

In my last post, I wrote about the "yeast of the Pharisees". It's symbolic. This is the yeast of the Pharisees; the unquenchable thirst to please everyone and make oneself look good to everyone as much of the time as possible. The Pharisees lived for that, and that was what made the prospect of the Galatian church falling back into that mode so troubling to Paul. The law does not lend itself to grace and mercy-the two greatest gifts humanity needed, and could only receive from Christ. The law is about humans doing, not humans being. The law is about work and sweat and toil and always falling short. The cross is about favor and unearned benefits, it's about SACRIFICIAL LOVE.

As I close out on this today, I want to share with you what I practice with my five-year-old son, Isaiah. Zay is not very good at compliance. It's not that he is rebellious, he just tends to march to his own beat. Now, in a world where that is frowned upon, he often finds himself in trouble, not knowing exactly what he did to get there. Correction comes from his dad and me when it's needed, but we recognize, as his parents, some of what gets him into conflict is simply him doing things in the way that works best for him. Now, we never condone breaking hard and fast foundational rules. Respect, politeness, and generally behaving well are always encouraged and rewarded, but on those days where his Isaiah-ness gets the better of him I always remind him of this: "I love you no matter what. Whether you have a good day or a bad day, I love you. I don't love you because you do well, I love you because you are mine."

Beloved, those words come from God's mouth to you today. You are a child of promise, one of "those people" who should laugh, live and love as freely as you are loved. Isaac's name meant "laughter". I believe God laughs a lot. Not at us, but with us. He's got a great sense of humor and He enjoys us. He also appreciates us just the way He created us. Do we need Him? Absolutely. Life is so pale and dry without Him at the center of it. His love for us colors our world and drenches us in acceptance, appreciation and affection.

You are loved. You are valued. (Thank you Dr. Chironna!) You are blessed and highly favored and you need never feel the drive to earn God's love. He loves you because you are His, you are indeed, one of "Those People." So am I , and I am glad of it!

Be blessed today!

Jennifer Barnes, Uplift! Editor