Hope For Today "Truth"

Our words and actions are often the direct result of what we think and feel. If we want to speak and act well, we first need to think well.

In the past, many of us have identified ourselves by the names people called us or by the labels they put on us.  God has good news for us today as we seek to live well and enjoy this day with Him and others. The foundation of who we truly are, and living well out of that secure place in our hearts is based on what God says about us.

Not only are all the things God says trustworthy and useful for making us wise but they refresh us.  And underneath all God’s words are His character.

If we treasure something, we usually take special care of it. We don’t neglect it or leave it where it could get damaged or stolen or forgotten about. As God awakens our hearts and our consciousness to new and wonderful truths – what many would call a spiritual awakening - we need to cherish what we have learned and let this truth nourish our hearts and strengthen us to act in new and God honouring ways.

"Nevertheless" - what kind of word is what? We don't hear it so often now but it meant something very significant to folks in our parents and grandparents generation and has something wonderful to remind us about today.

While it is important that we practice telling the truth at all times, the essential advice God is giving us in this picture is that we are to get to know and wrap ourselves around with truth, the truth that God has given us in the Bible.

What do we know?  Who can we trust? In what way can we be assured that something is what is claimed and someone will do for us what they promise in the moment? These are significant questions and we hear stories that challenge us in the area of trust almost every day on the news.  I suppose that’s why I find the words from the Bible we will look at today comforting, particularly since there are many people through the centuries who have found them to be true.

In our spiritual lives God invites us to name those things that are harming our relationship with Him and with others, and to make them available so they can be removed. This is what we speak about in Step 6 of The Twelve Steps. We were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

The exact nature of our wrongs is rooted in the lie that our problems are caused by what is around us rather than what is within us.  It’s time that we admitted that to God, to ourselves, and to another human being.

In a world where people believe many things – including some who believe there is no god – how do I know there is a power greater than myself?  How do I know that God has any interest in restoring me to sanity or even more important, has the ability to do so?  Our questions are valid and welcome.  We’re not the first to ask them and we won’t be the last.

As we move through Jesus’ list of the kind of attitudes we should have and act on we come to the one that says: Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. Matthew 5:6

God wants to lift us out of whatever sorrow and darkness has clouded our own souls with life’s challenges.  Our part is to realize that we are not seeing reality as clearly as we should.  God is with us, has been with us, providing us whatever we need for whatever we face.