He Knoweth the Way that I take

"He knoweth the way that I take" (Job 23:10)

Believer! What a glorious assurance! This way of thine--this, it may be, a crooked, mysterious, tangled way--this way of trial and tears. "He knoweth it." The furnace seven times heated--He lighted it. There is an Almighty Guide knowing and directing our footsteps, whether it be to the bitter Marah pool, or to the joy and refreshment of Elim.

 

That way, dark to the Egyptians, has its pillar of cloud and fire for His own Israel. The furnace is hot; but not only can we trust the hand that kindles it, but we have the assurance that the fires are lighted not to consume, but to refine; and that when the refining process is completed (no sooner--no later) He brings His people forth as gold.

 

When they think Him least near, He is often nearest. "When my spirit was overwhelmed, then thou knewest my path."

 

Do we know of ONE brighter than the brightest radiance of the visible sun, visiting our chamber with the first waking beam of the morning; an eye of infinite tenderness and compassion following us throughout the day, knowing the way that we take?

 

The world, in its cold vocabulary in the hour of adversity, speaks of "Providence"--"the will of Providence"--"the strokes of Providence." PROVIDENCE! what is that?

 

Why dethrone a living, directing God from the sovereignty of His own earth? Why substitute an inanimate, death-like abstraction, in place of an acting, controlling, personal Jehovah?

 

How it would take the sting from many a goading trial, to see what Job saw (in his hour of aggravated woe, when every earthly hope lay prostrate at his feet)--no hand but the Divine. He saw that hand behind the gleaming swords of the Sabeans--he saw it behind the lightning flash--he saw it giving wings to the careening tempest--he saw it in the awful silence of his rifled home.

 

"The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord!"

 

Thus seeing God in everything, his faith reached its climax when this once powerful prince of the desert, seated on his bed of ashes, could say, "Though he slay me, yet will I trust him." --Macduff

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What wonderful reassurance I found in this passage I read today. God has already planned out all of my tomorrows.  He has a plan for us, and no matter where we are or what happens He is always near, "A very present help in time of trouble."  What an awesome God we serve!

 

Oklahoma Breakdown

I know what you're thinking, "What a pitiful sight!" But this, my firneds, is a picture of God's goodness an mercy.

When we reached Oklahoma we were quite excited for several reasons.  1. It meant we were halfway home 2. We were going to be having dinner with the Hardings, who we hadn't seen in months! 3.  The first gas station we saw was selling gas at $2.79 a gallon!!!!!!!!  WHOO HOOO
So of course we stopped to get gas.  It was great to be able to FILL UP for $100.  We weren't totally empty...  AFter we got gas, CHad started up the engine and as we pulling out the engine cut off.  Chad started it again, and it cut off.  Instead of gttig back on the highway, Chad decided to try and drive down the road a ways to see what was going on.  We drove about 1/2 mile down and ever  minute or so, the engine would die.  We struggled to get the RV back to the gas station. Chad said, it must be the alternator.  It was a little discouragig, but I knew that an alternator was a quick fix.  We pulled into the gas station and called Good Sam.  They said we'd have to wait till the morning to get a tow.
So we settled in and I threw in our emergency frozen pizzas, and we played board games, and watched Brave!  We were thankful for the generator, but couldn't leave it running all night. 
The next morning the tow truck called and said they were on their way.  Chad asked if they were bringing an additional vehicle for the family.  They said, "No, we can transport one of you, the rest will have to stay".  Stay....Stay where???  At the gas station!!!   Oh, how the kids cried as they watched their daddy drive away with the tow truck...  
Windsor Hills was two hours down the road, so I called Christina Keister and she came to get us.  Praise the Lord, I like gas stations and all but sitting in them for hours with the kids was just not fun.  Jo Harding made arrangements for us to stay in the prophets chamber at WHBC.
Christina swung us by the grocery store and I picked up things to make the kids favorite dinner. 
The missions apartment was great, but we were all missing Chad.  It was Saturday Night, and we had to wait till Monday for repairs.  We went to WHBC, and Chad called a nearby church who picked him up for both services.
Monday morning, the mechanics were stumped as to what was wrong with the RV.  They decided to take the RV for a test drive.  While they drove it, the engine caught on fire!!!!  Yes, I said FIRE!!!  They towed the RV back to the garage.
Our RV has two sets of batteries.  The house-batteries, which are in the back and the engine battery in the front front.  There is a cable that connects the two and runs just under the floor of our RV.  The positive battery cable was shorting out against the body.  It melted the surrounding wires and the fuse box!  The entire RV could have caught on fire...but God was merciful and stranded us at a gas station instead!  He let the mechanics deal with the fire instead of our family.
As I sit here writing this from the comfort of my home (we're in MD), I am overwhelmed with God's goodness and mercy to us.  This little inconvienance saved our lives!

The Desires of our Heart

"Delight thyself also in the Lord; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart."  Ps. 37:4

I love the 37th chapter of Psalms.  This chapter is so full of good advice, and comfort.  It gives you something you can really grab ahold of and put into practice. 
My favorite of these verses is usually verse 4.  An exhortation to DELIGHT in God. I believe Isaiah 58:13-14 gives us a pretty good definition of how to "Delight in the Lord".
"...and call the sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honorable; and shalt honor Him, not doing thine own ways, not finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words: Then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord."
This particular passage is concerning the keeping of the sabbath day, but I think we can apply it to our lives today.  If we delight in something we enjoy it.  No one has to force me to enjoy a vanilla chai tea from Dunkin Donuts!  No one has to force me to enjoy vacations, or to enjoy Christmas!  To delight ourselves in the Lord is to delight in our time with Him in our Bibles, in prayer, in service, in worship, in giving, in ALL that we do.  And the Bible tells us that when we do this, He will give us the desires of our hearts.  I believe this is a two-fold giving of our desires. 

First, if we are in fact enjoying God and enjoying serving Him,  He will put HIS desires in our hearts.  We will want what He wants, we will love what He loves.  Really there is no other explanation for the abundant love I feel for a people that I have never met.  I feel overwhelmed with the desire to reach the Dominican people with the gospel, I carry them on my heart and think of them everyday.  I have a longing, yearning desire to be there and begin serving these people.  God has put those desires in my heart.

Secondly, if we are delighting ourselves in God, I believe He delights in answering our prayers and blessing us!  I believe God loves to answer the prayers of His children and give them those things that they want.  When I knew that we were going to be in California for Thanksgiving I began praying that the Lord would please provide a family to invite us over for Thanksgiving.  I know, it was such a dumb prayer request right?  But I guess you would just have to know me to understand that I LOVE spending the whole day cooking and being surrounded by a whole house-full of people!  For years our house was an open house to anyone who wanted to come for Thanksgiving. We always had tons of food and TONS of desserts!  I loved it, I enjoyed being a blessing and providing a place of sweet fellowship for others who didn't have anywhere else to celebrate the goodness of God.
 So I prayed earnestly, Lord please don't make us have Thanksgiving in the RV.  It would be soooo depressing not be able to cook a Thanksgiving dinner and all the fixin's and pie.  I know what you're thinking, "you're a missionary, get used to it".  But I have grand plans of cooking the biggest chicken I can find and making fixin's and pies in  the DR.  And I'm sure we'll have no problem finding someone to invite for dinner!  :-)

How good God was to answer this insignificant request.  A wonderful family invited us to dinner and though I had never met them before we had sweet fellowship centered around our Lord Jesus and His goodness.  It was wonderful, we had korean BBQ for dinner and wonderful sweets.  Isn't it amazing how God knits together the hearts of believers and makes us family.  I have every confidence that though we will be hundreds of miles away from home that God will give us this sweet fellowship in the DR.  The same God who puts His desires in our hearts will also grant us our desires just because He loves us.  Let us continue to pray for the small things and big things that our hearts desire. As we delight in serving our wonderful God we will find He delights in blessing us too!