Daily Devotional
God has not left you to solve your plight alone
Text: Deuteronomy 31:8
“The LORD himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.”
Message
What brought us to the place we are in today and the way out is often because we will see and make our problem bigger than God instead of the other way round. No wonder many of us complain that we are lonely!
Married or single, young or old, rich or poor—we can not fix our loneliness. But we can put it to use.
The real question is, are we willing?
Willingness is possible only by replacing the lies we’ve believed with the truth. Elisabeth Elliot writes:
“When the surrender of ourselves seems too much to ask, it is first of all because our thoughts of God Himself are paltry. . . . In our blindness we approach Him with suspicious reserve. We ask how much of our fun He intends to spoil, how much He will demand from us, how high the price we must pay before He is placated. If we had the least notion of His lovingkindness and tender mercy, His fatherly care for His poor children, His generosity, His beautiful plans for us; if we knew how patiently He waits for our turning to Him, how gently He means to lead us to green pastures and still waters, how carefully He is preparing a place for us, how ceaselessly He is ordering and ordaining and engineering His Master Plan for our good—if we had any inkling of all this, could we be reluctant to let go of . . . whatever we clutch so fiercely in our sweaty little hands?”
Lies about loneliness are dislodged only by truth about God. He has not left us to solve our plight on our own. Nothing has slipped through the cracks. We are not stuck in Plan B, no matter what brought us to the place we’re in today.
If we are alone—if we are lonely—the ache of it is God calling us to deeper fellowship with him through his Son.
Peter began sinking in the wind and the waves because he took his eyes off Jesus. Once that happened, he could see no way out, no rescue. But rather than fight harder to save himself, he cried out, “Lord, save me.” And immediately—with no delay, no conditions—Jesus reached out and pulled Peter into the boat. Then he asked Peter a question: “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?” (Matt. 14:30–31).
God is calling you and I today to trust him without reservation.
I receive the grace right now in Jesus name and pray the same for you.
Shalom
Being mainly an article by David Kotter and is adapted from Confident Witness: Evangelism and Apologetics for the 21st Century, edited by David Dockery.