All of a sudden, emails I was expecting weren’t arriving. What seemed like His provision was stalled and I refused to try to “make it happen.” I began to doubt myself and my ability to hear His voice and began to listen to the voices in my head.

But Lord, did I miss it? Were you not really leading in this direction?

As I studied on the first day of July, my eyes came across 1 Peter 5:10:

After you have suffered for a little while THE GOD OF ALL GRACE who has called you to His eternal glory in Christ, WILL HIMSELF restore you, secure you, strengthen you, and establish you.

Friends, He is the God of ALL GRACE, and that is exactly what we need in the suffering!

Leading up to the promise to restore, secure, strengthen and establish are verses 6-9. I knew He was going to show me something as I dug deeper on what preceded the promise.

Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, SO THAT (there it is again!) in due time He may exalt you. Cast all your anxiety on Him because He cares for you.

Be sober minded and alert. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. RESIST HIM, standing firm in your faith and in the knowledge that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kinds of suffering.

So I thought back to Paul and the disciples … for them it was prison and more physical suffering in the persecutions.

For us it is the war within our minds where we are assaulted with lies from the enemy that can debilitate us. The enemy is trying to get us to doubt Him and His goodness and His promises! And there are times when he gets away with way too much before I wake up and realize that I have not been alert and I definitely haven’t been resisting the evil one!

So, as I look back at my frantic week of listening to the voices in my head spewing lies rather than standing firm in what I knew was true, I see where this situation drove me to speak to my soul, like I wrote about last week. And speak to it OUT LOUD.

There were many times during the week where I’d put my hand over my heart and say aloud O MY SOUL, WHY THE UNEASE WITHIN ME? BLESS THE LORD, FOR HE HAS BEEN SO GOOD TO ME, HOPE IN HIM, FOR I WILL YET PRAISE HIM!

The unease was indeed real, but I chose to put my hope in God, for He has been good to me!

And remember those emails that set this whole struggle off? Yep, they came, but they came in His timing, after Psalm 27:11-14 spoke to me mid-week:

Wait patiently for the Lord and be strong and courageous. Wait patiently for the Lord!

That very same mid-week day my Streams in the Desert said in part:

“The Lord is my strength” to sit still. And how difficult is the attainment! Do we not often say to one another, in seasons when we are compelled to be quiet, “If only I could do something!”

Praise God I remembered to do the one thing that was helpful – speak to my soul to “Hope in God” and remember the promises of the God of all Grace.

So how have you been speaking to your soul this week? Is the God of all Grace meeting you in your suffering? I’d love to hear!

Thanks for hanging out with me today!
Athena