Happy Dance

Give It To God And Allow It To Become A Pearl

1 Peter 5:7

Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.

I have found that very often it is not the crises that happen in my life that wear me down, but it is the continual little irritations of life that do the damage, or what I perceive to be damage.

Maybe if we were to see those irritations of life as something more positive then we could really reap the benefits of those experiences in our lives. We can learn some good lessons about irritations from the humble but beautiful oyster.

There is a story I read about the oyster and it goes like this...

There once was an oyster whose story I tell,

Who found that sand had got under his shell;

Just one little grain, but it gave him much pain,

Now, did he berate the working of Fate,

Which had led him to such a deplorable state?

Did he curse out the government, call for an election?

No; as he lay on the shelf, he said to himself;

“If I cannot remove it, I’ll try to improve it.”

So as the years rolled by as the years always do,

And he came to his ultimate destiny -- stew.

And this small grain of sand which had bothered him so,

Was a beautiful pearl, all richly aglow.

Now this tale has a moral -- for isn’t it grand

What an oyster can do with a morsel of sand?

What couldn’t we do if we’d only begin

With all of the things that get under our skin?”

How does an irritating grain of sand become a pearl?

The oyster changed its attitude about this annoying grain of sand and made a choice to allow this irritation to grow into something positive in its life.... A beautiful and precious pearl.

We can do that, with the irritations in our lives.  We can allow them to annoy us and to fester into something unpleasant and drag us down and ultimately away from God, or we can make the choice to give it to God and allow Him to make it into a pearl in our lives...

We proberbly will not enjoy the irritation at the beginning, but as we allow God to work on it,  we will one day enjoy the positive results in our lives...

Those pearls that make our live so meaningful.

Whatever irritation we have, be it a broken heart or a feeling of loneliness, or pain, whatever it is, no matter how big or how small, we can give it to HIM.

Remember the story in the Bible about the boy that gave Jesus his five loaves and two fishes, the disciples said.... “What good is that to feed such a large crowd“...?   Look what Jesus did with that offering!

We underestimate our God so many times... Nothing is impossible to Him; He can take any negative thing in our lives and turn it into something beautiful.... Those irritations can become our precious pearls.

How often do we hold back thinking.... “What would God want with that problem, or that is not important enough for Him to be concerned about"....

However, we know that He is interested in every part of our lives, every irritation, wanting always to change that irritation into a pearl that will be something beautiful in our lives and will strengthen our walk with Him.

He will use whatever it is we offer to Him, He will use it for our good, and He will use it for His glory.

When we can learn to give all those things to Him, we also learn faith and trust in Him, it brings us to a place of truly recognising who He is....

And that blesses Him, and then we can offer that ‘blessing’ that pearl back to Him.

Blessings

Les

It has been a long time since I have attended a church regularly, for various reasons. I did go to a local church a few weeks ago, in response to an invite given to me by a friend to share in fellowship and worship with other brothers and sisters.

I belong to a home group and there are about 10 of us that meet every Wednesday evening for study, prayer, and fellowship.. We also share communion each week.

So I do have good Christian fellowship and sharing ... But I also love worshipping with other brothers and sisters in Christ as well, and that is the part I really miss about not going to a church.

I was thinking on this today...

Why do we go to church?
Is it out of a need to somehow be connected with other believers?  If it is, then I guess that is ok, but, if we are not careful, that can sometimes lead to being ‘us’ centred instead of ‘Him’ centred.  And that is not how our worship is intended to be.

I guess it means,  who is this all about?   Is it about Me and what I want or can get out of going,  or is it about HIM and what I want to give to Him?   It should be always HIM first.

Before I came to Christ, life was all about me and my life and my family etc, and my wants. Now that I am a believer in Messiah, if I don’t dethrone my self, then I will end up using God in the same way, to provide and fulfil my wants, whether it be praising, or praying or giving or anything else at all.

Ever heard anyone talk about going to church to ‘get something’ or coming out of church and saying I did not get anything there today?

I am reminded in Scripture of what God asked of Abraham. (Gen 15:10 One day God appeared to Abraham and said, “I am your shield, your very great reward “

And this is how Abraham responded to God; (Gen 15:2) “what can you give me?” Abraham missed the whole point, much like we all do at times, much like I do at times!

God was saying to Abraham “When you have me, you have everything you need.”

When God tested Abraham a second time (Gen 22:2) He said “Take now, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and offer him for a burnt offering... this time Abraham passed with flying colours, Why? Because now, Abraham understood something really important, that if we do not value something, and we then offer it to God, we will then find out that God is not interested, He just does not want that which has no value to us.

If what we offer to God does not mean anything to us, then it wont mean anything to Him either. Whether that be our time, our love, our selves, our families no matter what, we need to give to God those things or feelings that are precious and highly valued to us.

Does that mean we do not get anything out of worship?
No, we benefit the most from our worship to Him, but HE must always be the object and reason of it...

(Rev 5:13) Blessing and honour and glory and power be unto HIM

When I can take all those things that are precious to me and pass them on to Him, then I am learning to become a real worshipper, no matter where I am.

Worship is all about God, it is about Him and to Him, He is worthy and I can do that 24/7, whether I am in church or wherever I may be.