​

CURRENT RADIO SERIES Songs of Encouragement   CURRENT TV SERIES Songs of Encouragement

For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. —Romans 5:6 How many times have you heard someone cry out in frustration, “You just don’t understand me!”?  Perhaps you have said it yourself. Not being understood can be emotionally devastating because if we’re not understood, we run the risk of being rejected—and lonely. But while we need to be understood, we need also to understand. This is especially important where the love of God is concerned. You see, God fully understands us, individually. Yet, he accepts us as we are! People who feel lonely because they don’t feel accepted by God are themselves guilty of misunderstanding!  They think God loves the whole world—everybody but them. They don’t really know the love of Christ that fully accepts the yielded soul, regardless of what they have done. How do we know that he accepts us? Romans 5:8 tells us that “…while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” That means, no matter what he understands of you (and as Creator, he understands you fully!), he accepts you as you are. He loved you before the foundations of the world, and accepted you enough to die in your place. So while we crave to be understood by others, let’s not misunderstand the love and acceptance of God that trumps all others! Once we understand who we are in him, we can even extend grace to those who fail to see our best intentions. His love can transform your self esteem! GOD ACCEPTS YOU, WARTS AND ALL!

Unclaimed Blessings

by Dr. Paul Chappell

“And the LORD said unto Abram, after that Lot was separated from him, Lift up now thine eyes, and look from the place where thou art northward, and southward, and eastward, and westward: For all the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed for ever. And I will make thy seed as the dust of the earth: so that if a man can number the dust of the earth, then shall thy seed also be numbered. Arise, walk through the land in the length of it and in the breadth of it; for I will give it unto thee.”
Genesis 13:14–17

The size and area of the land that God promised to Abraham was vast. The promise seemed beyond the realm of what was possible. Yet Abraham believed it, even as a childless man nearing one hundred years of age. And in time, a great nation did come from his descendants, just as God had promised. Yet when God delivered Israel from slavery in Egypt, they refused to enter the Promised Land. It took forty years in the wilderness before they finally began to take possession of what God had promised. And even then, they did not do a thorough job. “Now Joshua was old and stricken in years; and the LORD said unto him, Thou art old and stricken in years, and there remaineth yet very much land to be possessed” (Joshua 13:1).
The reality is that even at its greatest extent under the reigns of David and Solomon, Israel never reached the boundaries of the land God promised to Abraham. This was not a failure on God’s part, but rather a failure of the Israelites to do what was needed to claim what God had offered them. They were greatly blessed and helped by God, but they could have had so much more. He was able to fully give them all He had promised, but they did not claim it.
 

Today’s Growth Principle: 

The lack of victory we experience comes from our failure to claim what God freely offers.