Thinking Aloud

It never ceases to amaze me how the 'ol devil likes to sit on my shoulder every single Sunday morning, while I'm getting ready for church. You know how he brings up situations, people, trials...things you haven't thought of in years and had presumed that you'd moved on from. Such was the case this morning. 

I was thinking back to some friends of ours. These are friends who we have been through some really rough circumstances, from the death of a loved one, to a marriage that was on the verge of divorce. Through good and bad, my husband and I were there for them and considered them friends.

You can imagine my surprise when they just decided that they no longer wanted to speak to us. No word of warning, no indication, no response to phone calls, no acknowledgment to letters. To say that it didn't hurt would be an absolute lie. 

We know that Matthew tells us if we have ought with a brother, that we should go to that person and try to get it settled. The problem is, the problem is on their side, not ours. Funny how the Lord works. In writing this post, I was reminded of these verses: Matthew 5:23-24 23 Therefore if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee; 24 Leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift.

Before the Lord, I can honestly say I've done all I could do at the time to try to find out what the problem was....perhaps the Lord is putting it on my heart to try again. Isn't it just like God to give you an answer while trying to blog about the problem :)

The point was... before I ended up rambling to myself (thanks for bearing with me! lol) was that while the devil was sitting on my shoulder this morning, trying to distract me from preparing my heart to meet with the Lord, I began to pray. "Lord, show me how I can get my mind focused on YOU." And He did just that. The Lord showed me that I needed to PRAY for these people that the devil tries to use to hinder my relationship with the Lord. When Satan thinks he's distracting me from focusing on the Lord, I can CHOOSE to turn things around and ruin his plans. I can pray for those who have spoken evil against me, who have hurt me...after all, I am no better than my Savior and the pharisees spoke evil against Him. 

Matthew 5: 11 Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. 12 Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.

I SO desire my life to be pleasing to the Lord. I don't want anything - no person, no feeling, no heart attitude - to stand between me and my walk with the Lord. I would encourage you that if there is someone in your life that the devil uses to stir up feelings of anger or bitterness over, that you go out of your way to make things right. Even if you aren't the offending party - TRY to reconcile. I know it's hard. There are just some people who would rather be bitter and angry. I realized something about people like that, they are really miserable, self-loathing people on the inside who need pity and our prayers, not our condemnation. 

James 5:16b The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.

© Adorning Grace 2010