From Pity to Praise

Every prophet in the Bible carried a burden of heavy spiritual and emotional weight from God. It is both the solemn truth a prophet must speak and the deep pain they feel for people.

The nature of the burden is a divine weight from God that feels like a fire burning inside, that is impossible to hold back.

The emotional pain of sorrow from seeing things the way God sees them, often watching people turn away.

The hard truth that delivers messages of coming judgment, correction, and calls to turn back to goodness.

There is a cost that the prophet must endure as a messenger for God. They face anger, loneliness, and pushback from the very people they are trying to help.

The cost of exhaustion carries a strong sense of duty and urgency for the spiritual state of others.

Take the prophet Jeremiah, known as the weeping prophet because he cried often and felt deep sadness for his people.

He cried over the sins of Judah and the bad things nags that would happen to them. He wrote in Jeremiah 9:1 that he wished his eyes were a fountain of tears so he could cry day and night for his people.

It is said he was thought to have written the Book of Lamentations. A sad biblical book full of grief over the fall and destruction of Jerusalem.

He faced hard times. He lived alone because God told him not to marry or have children because of the coming trouble.

People made fun of him, hit him, put him in prison, and threw him into a muddy pit for speaking God’s warnings.

He faced severe rejection while serving a demanding 40-year ministry. His core duties involved warning Judah that judgment was coming through his scribe Baruch. He was burdened and paid the cost for being a messenger for God. He prayed and wept for the spiritual survival of his nation. He was chosen by God to be a messenger for a people who thought they knew better than God.

God demands total obedience despite our personal cost. Living in obedience to God sometimes brings Isolation, rejection, and speaking out an unpopular message.

God’s Word is an unstoppable Internal fire. It often comes from an internal conflict. Jeremiah 20:9: Jeremiah experienced deep depression and tried to quit speaking in God’s name. But he had a burning fire that was shut up in his bones, and he couldn’t hold it in. He was compelled to speak, because true prophecy is not a choice, and he was consumed by the weight of the message.

Our paths in life often serve a purpose that challenges us to grow and develop spiritually. This journey can lead to new heights and opportunities, as God guides us through obstacles and detours.

Understanding the Purpose of our Paths

Our paths in life are not just random occurrences, they serve a significant purpose that often challenges us to crow spiritually and personally. This journey can lead to news insights and opportunities, as we navigate through various obstacles and detours.

Spiritual Growth Through Challenges

• Obstacles as Opportunities: Challenges often present us with the chance to develop resilience and faith. They encourage us to seek guidance and trust in God.
• Learning from Detours: Just as a GPS may reroute us, life’s detours can leads to unexpected blessings and lessons. Embracing these changes can open our eyes to new possibilities.

God’s Guidance

• Divine Direction: Many people believe that God guides us through our paths, helping us to navigate life’s complexities. This guidance can manifest in various ways, such as through scripture, prayer, or the support of others.
• Trusting the Process: Trusting in God’s plan is essential. Proverbs 3:5-6 emphasizes the importance of relying on divine wisdom rather than our own understanding, promising that He will make our ways straight.

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and don’t lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your paths straight” -Proverbs 3:5-6

The purpose of our paths is to challenge us, foster growth, and deepen our spiritual understanding. By recognizing the value in our experiences, we can embrace the journey and trust in the guidance provided along the way.

Robert Frost echoed this famous wisdom in a poem he wrote in 1914 it was called “A servant to Servants.” It reminds us that running away from hard things does not work. Instead, facing our problems head-on is a true path to healing and growth.

I was reminded of this recently. I have been praying for God to show me why my mother treated me so badly when I was a child. I have struggled with this for years. I had no way to learn why on my own, but I had faith that God would prepare a way. Recently I received the reason. I finally have closure on that part of my life. She did it because she was ashamed of the Native American heritage on her side of the family. I recently wrote that I found my Native American bloodline with the help of an ancestry website. Once I learned everything, it started falling into place. Another path in my life closed and I can heal.

When we face our hardships we can stop delaying the pain. Pushing our problems away only hides them for a little while.

One thing I’ve learned is that going through hard times teaches us how to handle the next one. I believe there is a purpose to our path in life: growing, learning, and connecting with others. It helps us face hard times and gives us a reason to keep moving forward.

Did you know that our minds are a battlefield. And that Satan try’s to set up strongholds within them.

The truth is, God and Satan are not equals. Yet strongholds are real.

2 Corinthians 10:4-5 states, “For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but mighty before God to the throwing down of strongholds, throwing down imaginations and every high things that is exalted against the knowledge of God, and bringing every thought into captive to the obedience of Messiah.”

Our strongholds are fortified places. They are, according to the Bible, false arguments and lofty opinions that counter God’s truth. They are areas where we are in bondage that affect our thinking in the worst way. When we believe these false arguments, a terrible thing happens -we develop a new false way of thinking that captures every thought.

It is easy to see why the Apostle Paul tells believers to take every thought captive to obey Jesus.

God wants us to think like His Son because we should have the mind of Jesus. He doesn’t want us to allow Satan to set strongholds in our minds, because these false arguments can become our new way of thinking. Satan’s lies only brings nasty habits that cannot be unbroken until we recognize that we’ve believed false arguments.

Satan lies because he wants us to doubt God and continue down a path of habits that will hurt us. A stronghold opens the door to life sucking habits. But, God provides a way out.

I came from a home that was plagued with negativity. Satan attacked every one in that home. One brother who had everything going for in life turned to drugs and was later murdered. Another brother drowned on a boy scout trip because he wasn’t being watched closely, my step-brother was a sexual predator, one brother I have lost touch with, one day he just left the house and I haven’t seen him since. My sister lives about 4 hours away and we hardly speak. I’m telling you this not to feel sorry for me but as an of what Satan can do through strongholds in our minds. Satan ruins lives and he does it through our minds. He sneaks in and tells us lies to build strongholds that causes us to sin and run away from God.

God empowers us to change. He empowers us to change for the better.

Too many people think they have to stop sinning to choose God as their Savior. God knows we are flawed, and He knows Satan’s tactics. And He still accepts us because He loves us and wants to help us change. I’m not going to lie and tell you it’s easy because it’s not. We have to choose God every day, and we will still sin, but that’s what “The Last Supper” was for. To take communion, ask for forgiveness, and turn from that sin.

Philippians 1:6 says, “And I am sure of this, that He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.”

Relying on Jesus’s strength we can smash the strongholds in our minds and see victory.

We need to see ourselves as God sees us – accepted, blessed, forgiven, chosen, His precious children. And to accept the truth that we are completely loved now and that we cannot earn God’s favor because we have it now.

Ephesians 2:8-9 tells us, “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing, it is a gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”

There’s no doubt we live in a physical world and a spiritual world. And Satan and his demons want to stop all people from believing in Jesus, and if that doesn’t work, stop believers from growing spiritually in Jesus and stop them from enjoying the abundant life God has for us.

John 10:10 tells us, “The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life and have it more abundantly.”

I believe there is a spiritual war going on, and we are seeing the effects of that war on earth. The spiritual war is raging around us now and Satan wants to set up strongholds in our minds to keep us from embracing God’s liberating truth. Satan wants us to believe hid lies and paralyze us.

But, the beautiful news is because of what Jesus has done we will be victorious.

Satan tries to one up God Almighty. But he’s a defeated foe, he wants to steal our joy, peace, and destroy any belief in God we have.

There is a perfect analogy I listened to the other day that speaks volumes by John Hope Bryant that I want to share with you.

There are three types of people, like three types of birds. There are eagles; there are buzzards; and there are turkeys.

1. Eagles:

Eagles don’t fly in packs. You have never seen a flock of eagles.

Eagles are high altitude birds, but they are not arrogant or pumped up. They are not full of themselves. They don’t have to be. They are who they are.

In human terms, they are reasonably comfortable in their own sky. There is power in that alone.

Eagles raise their children differently.

An eagles nest is made of sharp little twigs. The message is if you get big enough, where you start bumping up against the inside of those twigs… it’s time for you to go out and get a job. You cannot be 45 years old, and living with your mother.

Eagle parents literally push and prod their little ones to get out of the nest, and to learn how to fly on their own. They recognize that they cannot protect them for the rest of their lives. They have got to grow up.

An eagle is not afraid to take the road less traveled.

An eagle lives with a certain level of intentionality. A what I’m for kind of bird.

2. Buzzards

Buzzards are a completely different sort of bird. Buzzards love packs. Buzzards are low altitude birds.

Buzzards are always stepping on your head, to elevate themselves.

Buzzards are always player-hating, and never player-congratulating. They always have something negative to say about somebody.

But John says he can find respect for people like buzzards, because at least they are consistent with who they think they are. They really believe that this is who they really are -Bottom feeders.

They are not playing a game with others and he can respect that, even if they are not his cup of tea.

But there is anether sort of bird, which is actually worse.

3. Turkeys

Turkeys are the worse kind of people. Because a turkey is actually trying to be something they are not.

A turkey has wings, and they can’t even fry. They fly in short bursts, rather than long distant travel.

If we’re going to be leaders we have to deal with these difficult consistencies, both positively and effectively. We must learn to step over the mess and not in it.

At the same time we need to give live, grace, and even forgiveness, even when getting absolutely nothing in return.

No one wakes up in the morning and just says, “I want to create a wonderful life or business. It requires that we become purposeful. And become rainbows, after storms.

We need to learn to successfully manage pain. Because in that pain is where we create ourselves.

We need to be able to say with absolute confidence and inner comfort. “I would rather someone respect me and learn from me, than to like me, and never respect me.”