Recovery Workout

Psalm 119:154
Revive me with your word!

Last week was a rough week for me, physically speaking. I did two CrossFit workouts that were some of the toughest I've done. That was followed two days later by three days of mountain biking doing a total of 44 miles. On the last day of biking, I hit the wall, my legs just wouldn't go any further. My body was spent, and I was considering not doing any physical workout for the next week, however, a couple of my friends and my coach said I need to do a recovery workout with-in 24-48 hours of my last ride. So two days later I went to do a CrossFit recovery workout. Let me tell you, it was painful! The result? I was kind of shocked. My body felt as if it had a little more life in it and my legs weren't as sore. The next day I felt even better!

The psalmist also knew what was a good "recovery workout" when he was spent. The word of God! The word "word" in Psalm 119:154 in Hebrew is "imrah" which means the word of God or the Torah (which is the first 5 books of the Old Testament). No matter how down, how defeated, how near death the psalmist felt, he knew that the word of God, the imrah, would revive him. The word of God has power! It has power that we will never fully understand. However, one thing I DO understand is that it DOES revive me when I'm struggling. 

One of the things I will do when I feel spiritually spent is start reading the psalms out loud. Now I won't read all 150 psalms at one time, I spread it out over a few weeks, so that each day I'm reading 2 to 3 psalms. When I start out I feel like it is a chore, much like starting out a recovery workout. However, after reading psalms for a few days, I feel life coming back into me! 

I give you a challenge: when you feel spiritually spent, or you are suffering, start reading the word of God. If you don't know what to read, start with Psalms.

Its A Positional Thing

Psalm 119:71 

It was good for me to suffer,
so that I might learn your statutes. 

When I got my first forecaster job in Bismarck, North Dakota, I thought I was "it on a stick!" "I got a forecaster job, I can forecast, I just came out of college, I know everything!" Yep, those were my thoughts. It wasn't too long after taking that job that I got humbled real quick. The forecast called for rain, and for the most part it was raining, but then one city after another started reporting freezing rain. None of the computer models said it would be freezing rain, so I decided not to update the forecast and just keep the forecast as rain. One of the lead forecasters saw what was happening, asked if I was going to update the forecast, I said "no, because the computer models said it wasn't going to happen." He quickly updated the forecast to put in freezing rain, and, it was a good thing he did. But that really humbled me...in front of everyone that was on shift that day. I realized I had a lot to learn!

A lot of people would look at Psalm 119:71 and ignore it because, "hey, why is it good for me to suffer, won't God take care of it so I don't have to suffer?" When things are going well for us, a lot of us don't even think about God much less thinking that we need Him, but when we start to suffer or hurt or things aren't going our way, we go right to Him. God really doesn't want us to suffer, He would really like for us to keep Him at the forefront of our minds, continually seeking Him. Unfortunately for most of us that is not the case. I find it interesting that the Hebrew word used in this scriputre for suffering is "anah." This also means humbled. When we humble ourselves before God, what happens? We positionally put ourselves where we are seeking God. I believe this is what the psalmist meant when he wrote this, that it is good to suffer/be humbled, because it reminds us that we AREN'T God, that we need Him...CONSTANTLY!

A Quicker Short-Cut

Psalm 119:10 

With all my heart I seek you.
Do not allow me to stray from your commands!

Last summer our wireless router went bad, so I had to purchase a new one for the house. When I got it home, I wanted to connect right away, so instead of reading the directions, I just plugged everything in and started it up...who needs directions, right? The lights came on, everything looked like it was working, but my phone nor my laptop would connect. I was surprised...it should've worked, right!!!!???? 

How many times have we tried to take a short-cut and not read the directions God has given us? Right here, many times! And why do we take short-cuts? Because we want everything quicker, faster, we don't want to expend that extra time reading directions when we could be doing something faster just so that we can do the next thing quicker and faster! When I went back to those directions on the WIFI, did what the directions told me to do, I realized I missed a lot of what was very important to the setup procedures. Once I did all of it, everything worked fine. If we stop, breathe, take the time to find out from God what is needed in a situation instead of trying to do it our way, a way we think is going to be quicker, we would find that in the process of doing it God's way, we learn more, we get closer to Him, AND the result of doing it His was is lasting!

Can't Play That Style

Revelation 12:11
And they have defeated him by the blood of the Lamb and by their testimony.

Many years ago I was asked to be in a band (I play keyboards). I agreed and over the next few weeks as we rehearsed, I began getting frustrated. I was asked to play a style I've never played before and didn't know how to play. I read about the style, listened to the style, but for the life of me, I couldn't play that style. The more we rehearsed, the more I started saying "I can't play this style." The more I said it, the more frustrated I became and it seemed like I was getting further and further away from playing that style. Finally, I had enough and met with the band leader. I told him I couldn't play the style they were asking me to play, so I'm going to have to quit the band. He said, "just give it one more try, you'll get it." I said okay, and as we went to rehearse, I said: "God, you are going to have to do this in me because I can't...and Kent (speaking to myself now), you are going to get this." No kidding, in the time it took for me to take my hands from my side and put them on the keyboard, I learned the style and started playing that style as if I've been playing it for years. We were all stunned!

So what happened? My testimony changed. The words I was speaking changed. I began trusting God and went from speaking negative, gloom and doom, to speaking life and positive words. If you think the words you speak don't make a difference in your life, think again. Scripture says it does, many times! There are people who have been speaking gloom and doom and negativity over their situation for so many years, it's become habit...and they are still in the same situation and wonder why! If we want to be overcomers, we've got to trust God Who is really the One Who is going to do it, and speak positive, life-giving words to our situation.

A House Meant To Be

Romans 4:18-19 (Amplified)
18 [For Abraham, human reason for] hope being gone, hoped in faith that he should become the father of many nations, as he had been promised, So [numberless] shall your descendants be. [Gen. 15:5.]
19 He did not weaken in faith when he considered the [utter] impotence of his own body, which was as good as dead because he was about a hundred years old, or [when he considered] the barrenness of Sarah’s [deadened] womb. [Gen. 17:17; 18:11.]

About 2 years ago my wife and I began the search for a new house. We had certain needs for a house that had to be met. One of the needs had to be at least 5 acres of land (I wanted to build some mountain bike trails), another was a house big enough where the basement would be large enough for a 2 bedroom apartment for my mother who would be moving in with us. Thirdly a location not far from my wife's work. This really narrowed down the number of homes that were available, but we were praying that God would lead us to the right house and we were standing in prayer and faith. We found a house at the very beginning of our search, but it didn't work out. About a month later another house came on the market, but it was well above our budget. However my wife wanted to check it out. (Men, always listen to your wives, remember, they are a gift from God). So we checked it out and it fit every one of our needs...except for the price. We made an offer that was below our budget and it was accepted. As we were getting close to the end of the due diligence period, one major thing came up, and then another until both of us decided to terminate the offer. We began losing hope that we would find a house for all of us. In fact, I was getting rather frustrated with the whole process that I didn't even want to look at other homes...and my wife was feeling the same way. 

Sometimes, in fact, I would say most of the time, when things don't go our way, or don't go fast enough for us, we lose hope and we give up. Unfortunately, in all of those cases, we give up WAY too early. Abraham had every right to give up, the man was 100 years old, fatherless...and Sarah was no spring chicken either. However, Abraham didn't lose hope, because he knew he had a BIG God! He knew the God of the impossible and improbable, and that even though he was 100 years old, he believed God's promises that he would be the father of many nations...and he held on to this hope.

The evening that we terminated the offer, the seller came back and asked what they could do to make the deal go through. We prayed, repented for giving up on God, and now we have been in that house for almost 2 years.

Circumstances are irrelevant to God, He can do anything. I encourage you to not give up too early, even when the odds are not in your favor. Remember what He did for Abraham and Sarah, and remember their God and your God are the same! What He did for them, He can do for you!

A Day of Unfortunate Happenings

Deuteronomy 28:6
You will be blessed when you come in
and blessed when you go out.

Did you ever have one of these days...

I woke up from what I thought was a decent nights sleep, and the first thing I do is step in dog pee. Fortunately I was on the way to the bathroom so I decided to go ahead and take a shower. As I stepped out of the shower and started to dry my hair, not only did I realize that I didn't shave (because of my aggravation with stepping in dog pee), but I also didn't rinse out the conditioner in my hair. Well after I take care of all that, I go to get my coffee, realizing that the reservoir for the Keurig needed to be filled...but we had no more distilled water. So tap isn't bad, so I filled the reservoir with tap water, then as I open the drawer for the coffee...there is NO coffee...only tea. Okay, so I make hot tea. I head upstairs to worship and read and pray...fortunately the internet is working as I stream some worship music. Then as I'm drinking my tea, I mis-judge where my mouth is and spill tea down the front of me. So back downstairs (not finishing my praying), change clothes, then head out to the truck to head to work because now I am running behind time. I get to the end of the first road and realize that I not only forgot to make lunch for the day, but I forgot to eat breakfast. Of course today would be the day that traffic would be the worse it has been in weeks, and of the 32 traffic lights I have to go through, I get a red light at 26 of them! You can imagine by now I'm grumbling, saying things I shouldn't say...and I've only been up for 2 hours! 

Things are going to happen, whether we like them or not. But its our attitude that dictates how we handle all of that. God says that I am blessed coming in and blessed going out. Now I can tell you that particular day I told you about I certainly wasn't feeling blessed that morning...but the truth is I AM blessed! God's word overrides all of our perceptions of what is going on. Although I had a bunch of "crap" go on that morning...the truth was I was still blessed! 

Unfortunately, the rest of my day was exactly as the beginning of it. Why? Because my attitude didn't change...in fact it got worse as the day went on. HOWEVER had I started speaking God's truth to the situation..."Kent, you are blessed going out AND coming in"...my whole attitude would've been different. All of those things probably would still have happened, but my attitude would've been different. I would have been more stable instead of wanting to take somebody out that day.

We have a choice each day that will determine how our day is going to go. We can believe God's truth that whatever happens, I am still blessed...or I can let circumstances dictate how my day is going to go. Its up to you!

That "Somebody" Has a Name

Psalm 108:3
I will give you thanks before the nations, O Lord!
I will sing praises to you before foreigners!

On a particular day, shortly after I moved to Atlanta, I remember walking into the office and stopping at the administrative assistants desk. I was telling her about something that happened to me. I really can't remember what it was, but what I do remember and it has stuck with me to this day. I told her that "somebody" was watching over me. The words she spoke struck me to the core. She said, "You better give the 'somebody' a name!"

I, along with so many other Christians, are so afraid that we will "offend" somebody that we have stopped acknowledging God in front of other people. God has done so many wonderful things for us, but even if He didn't, sending His Son to die for me would be enough to acknowledge and praise Him in front of others! King David had no problem giving thanks to God before other nations, and these were nations that denied the God of Abraham. King David had no problem singing praises to God in front of foreigners...he wasn't afraid that he was going to offend them. King David would rather offend the foreigners and other nations than offend God. And really that is what we are doing, we are offending God. When we choose not to offend others by holding back our praises to God, we are really offending the One Who has done a wonderful work in our lives, the One Who has answered our prayers. I'm not saying that every time you see someone you have to shout "Praise the Lord." What I am saying is that when someone asks you "how did you get through this?" or "how did you get that job?" or whatever...that's the time to speak out and give praise and thanks to God!