Universal Life Church

Promises
By Pastor Johan and Esther Lourens

Grace and peace to you from our Lord Jesus Christ.

Even when we are too weak to have any faith left, He [Christ] remains faithful to us and will help us, for He cannot disown us who are part of if, and He will always carry out his promises to us (2 Tim. 2:13).In his amazing words in 2 Corinthians 12:9-10, our word for today from the Word of God, Paul talks about how he moved from being beaten down by his storm to capturing his storm as a means of soaring where he had never gone before. His storm was what he called his "thorn in the flesh," an unidentified issue that, in his words, tormented him constantly; something painful and limiting that he had repeatedly begged God to remove. Instead of taking away the storm, God said to Paul, and He says to us, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness."

Then, like the eagle, Paul realizes the storm can be his chance to experience a new level of power and spiritual altitude. He says, "Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong." Again like the mighty eagle, Paul in a sense, says, "Come on, storm! You're not going to beat me! You're not going to defeat me! You are my chance to experience Christ's power as only those in the midst of a storm can!" Your storm strips you of your self-reliance, your ability to control things, your ability to contribute anything to a solution, and that's actually an exciting place to be. Because it means it's going to have to be totally God! Don't fight that. Open yourself up to the possibilities of letting God carry you to a new level of spiritual power, of knowing Him, of seeing things you've never seen before. It was only after his awful season of suffering and loss that Job could say to God: "My ears had heard of You, but now my eyes have seen you" (Job 42:15).

You can meet Jesus, touch Jesus, experience Jesus in a storm as nowhere else. And if you'll surrender to the mighty winds of God's great grace and empowerment, you will find yourself eventually able to look down on the storm that once held you down. You'll be looking at it from God's perspective. And you will be flying higher than you've ever flown before!

I am holding you by your right hand - I, the Lord your God - and I say to you, Don't be afraid; I am here to help you.

You shall be a new and sharp-toothed threshing instrument to tear all enemies apart, making chaff of mountains.

And the joy of the Lord shall fill you; you shall glory in the God of Israel (Is. 41:13-16).

My wish for you is, ""..let us run with endurance the race that God has set before us. We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, on whom our faith depends from start to finish."" (Heb. 12:1,2 NLT).

May the Lord bless you.

Called in His service.

Pastor Johan and Esther Lourens

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