WOTD, CHEERFUL: happy, successful, right, to be accepted. Sometimes its difficult to feel any of those things when youre in the midst of hardship....but its absolutely necessary. Here are a couple of proverbs to ponder. Prov 17:22 A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones. Prov 15:13 A happy heart makes the face cheerful, but heartache crushes the spirit. A CHEERFUL heart heals and restores, and even INFLATES our SPIRIT. Sadly though, you can smile and laugh without having a CHEERFUL or happy HEART. Its just a surface thing, it doesnt go deep, to the heart. We try to cheer our hearts, others try to cheer our hearts, but it just doesnt get down past our teeth. Prov 25:20 Like one who takes away a garment on a cold day, or like vinegar poured on a wound, is one who sings songs to a HEAVY heart. How do we get the medicine that gets clear down to our hearts? I think theres a clue in the explanation of the Hebrew word, CHEERFUL. It says it means: to be accepted. We need that deep comfort that comes from being accepted. Our friends are wonderful. They are day after day are at our side during hardship. They are working hard to bring a smile to our lips...and we deeply appreciate them. They are the gas in our car. Sadly though, gas burns off quickly. We also have to have OIL: We NEED to be delighted and CHEERED by the Holy Spirit. We are delighted by Him when He speaks poignantly from His Word. Dont you love it when He reveals a new aspect to a story youve read a thousand times? If we ask Him, Hell do that! We are also delighted when He gives us a desire of our heart....something that no one else could know or fulfill. Last week an old friend texted some pictures of fall trees in her neighborhood...in the town where I was born. Beautiful fall trees always make me smile. But these pictures made me cry....in a good way. These pictures took me to a place where I am accepted, where I am loved unconditionally, where no one expects ANYTHING from me. They reminded me of all the people in my life who love me NO MATTER WHAT. And they reminded me of my God who loves me so much that he saw the yearning in my heart to be in Illinois in the fall and had my dear friend send me some. They reminded me of my God who loves and ACCEPTS me with all my flaws and failures. And it CHEERED my HEART. Sometimes we just need to ask the Holy Spirit to delight us. We need to ask Him for some good old fashioned medicine. The kind that goes past our teeth and warms our soul. We need a quart of OIL.
Posted on: Sat, 25 Oct 2014 15:05:15 +0000
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