Save your Strength for your Purpose…

The day went quick, yet seemed so long.  There was nothing to show, nothing accomplished, nothing done and my heart looked as messy as my home.

My thoughts had been moving like Israelites circling the desert – around and around yet getting no where.  Finally as night fell, the light turned on and lit a candle in the dark alley my mind had been racing through, just bright enough for me to find the of way of escape.

Some verses emerged straight through the rocky, uneven places of my heart and reminded me: In the fear of the Lord there is strong confidence, and His children will have a place of refuge [Prov.14:2].

Ah..a refuge, somewhere to be hidden ~ yet known.

Somewhere to land and Someone to lean on…

That single Proverb steadied my feet with some solid ground to walk on – to walk on forward in confidence.  It’s true you know.  The right fear really does dispel all the wrong ones!

Because I don’t want to miss one more day, one more opportunity walking around a wilderness with worry knotted scared around my heart, where slowly, yet suddenly, seconds turn to minutes; turn to hours; turn to days and then these worried moments pile up into years.

And fear, it will do that, you know.  Fear of man will keep us bound and hold us back from moving forward.  It will prevent us from pursuing our purpose and reaching our potential.

Dear friend, however and wherever God calls us to, let’s not allow room for our thoughts wander to what others may whisper, say or think.  Because there will always be the noise of naysayers – there will always be some unreasonable responses.  

Our responsibility is simply to remain steadfast.

 
Because if we’re going be Nehemiah builders, we can’t allow the words and attitudes of others to effect our faithfulness to God.

We waste precious energy when worry what others will think.  Can we really afford to spend our strength trying to appease people all because we want to fit-in to circles, instead of being set-apart for His calling?

For whatever we give our strength to, we yield our heart to.  And the thing about compromise; is it always leads to loss.  

Loss of our strength.  

And I don’t want another Samson story in my life.

With each compromise, his sensual desire for sin grew, until Samson completely gave in and forfeited his God-given power and ability.  He was rendered use-less because He didn’t make good-use of His gift.  Physically Samson was endowed with extraordinary strength, likewise the Word provides us with extraordinary ‘soul strength’.  But we forfeit that strength when we spend it anxiously trying to appease the masses, instead of following Master.

Remember that one command? The one that goes something like. . .

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul,
with all your mind and with all your strength.” [Mark 12:30]

Think about that.

What does it mean to love God with all our STRENGTH?

It means *where and what* our efforts and energies are given to.  Instead of entertaining the thoughts that fear of man bring, which drain our energy and resources; let’s be wise, investing our strength in surrender.  Let’s spend it pursuing things that have purpose – God’s purpose.  Because that investment always brings forth increase; some thirty, some sixty and some a hundredfold.

When we start caring what God cares about, we’ll stop being consumed with caring what others think and we’ll begin walking where He’s calling us to – maybe a mission of a multitude; maybe just meeting with that one person.

Be encouraged from the Word and don’t let fear hold you back.  The fear of man brings a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord shall be safe. [Prov.29:25]

And the safest place to be is walking on the impossible toward the Master who is calling us to come break-free from fear in order to fulfill our purpose and reach our potential.