Ever feel abandoned?

Ever feel abandoned by God? Welcome to the journey of faith. Today’s words from the Psaltery are well known by most of us:

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Psalm 22:1

Most of us recognize these words as those spoken by Jesus on the cross in the last hours of his life. When Jesus spoke these words he was expressing his own anguish and he was also aligning himself with a common human experience: where is God in the deepest moments of human anguish? God is in the middle of our experience for God also is asking the question. Have you ever abandoned yourself? If you have, you know something about the power of these words. You understand that inside you is the seed of hope that will bear fruit in the moment of self-surrender to the Divine who breathed life into you. – Ron Friesen

I need more faith!

Have you ever said, “I wish I had faith like _________.” Many of us have made this declaration. I have heard it most often at the funeral or memorial service of a person whose life exemplified a strong faith in God. We are not alone in our desire to have more faith. The Psalmist thought about this when he talked about the faith that the ruler of the nation of his day exhibited in the 21^st Psalm, a song praising the king. Then the Psalmist flips the song at the end and writes:

Be exalted in your strength, Lord;
we will sing and praise your might. – Psalm 21:13

Here is the catch, we do not need faith like anyone; we need faith in the God they had faith in! We need to turn our eyes off those whose faith we admire and turn our eyes in the direction their faith is looking. Where are you looking today? – Ron Friesen

Want to be Successful?

Ever worry about being successful? You should be. You need to buy the book, Dress for Success, or at least that what we are advised to do by our culture. Madison Avenue advertising is built on trying to convince us that the right watch, the right cologne, the right dress, the right car, and the right _______ will make us successful. Since the desire for success is as old as the human race, we should not be surprised that about 3,000 years ago the Psalmist addressed the issue:

May he (God) give you the desire of your heart
and make all your plans succeed? Psalm 20:4

Wow, even God is interested in our success! But wait, this success is built not on some slippery slope of the right item of clothing; it is built on trusting the God who has our success in mind. Notice this instruction found in the same psalm:

“Some trust in chariots and some in horses,
but we trust in the name of the Lord our God.” Psalm 20:7

The key to success is to trust God! – Ron Friesen

Are you fearful?

A few years ago the pastor of a large congregation asked his congregation for sermon ideas for his summer sermon series. The number one request was for a sermon on fear. We know from the number of people who are on pills for anxiety that worry and fear are big concerns of our neighbors.

Fear is a paralyzing emotion. Caught in its snare, the fearful person is stuck in a spiral of negative thoughts, feelings resulting in an inability to move forward. The reality of fear is not new to us in the 21^st Century; thousands of years ago, the Psalmist addressed this concern:

The LORD is my light and my salvation—
   whom shall I fear?
The LORD is the stronghold of my life—
   of whom shall I be afraid? – Psalm 27:1

Since fear blackens the sky providing no way out; we need a God who will be our light and our way out. You can be caught in the grip of fear or you can place yourself in the fortress which is God. When we have light and hope and protection, we can move into the world with freedom and joy. Where will you go with your fear today? – Ron Friesen

The examined life

If you are at all prone to doing some introspection, you have likely been challenged by your friends telling you that you spend too much time thinking about your life. “Quit that navel-gazing!” declare your friends. Note this observation by Socrates:

“The unexamined life is not worth living.”

You can live your life without self-reflection; yet it is a trait of our humanity that we do have the capacity for reflecting on our lives, our dreams, our choices, our behaviors, our beliefs and the meaning and purpose of our lives. The Psalmist went beyond self-examination and invited the Divine to also examine his life:

Test me, LORD, and try me,
   examine my heart and my mind;

for I have always been mindful of your unfailing love
   and have lived in reliance on your faithfulness.  Psalm 26:2-3

To think of God reviewing our lives can strike holy terror in our hearts or it can be a moment of great comfort. If you view God as a tyrant you may indeed be terrified to think of God examining your life, however, if you view God as boundless mercy then you can rest in the assurance that forgiveness will be granted to you as you acknowledge before God what God already knows about you. – Ron Friesen