SCRIPTURE READING: Psalm 121:1-2 ‘I lift up my eyes to the mountains - where does my help come from? My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.’ 1. WE ALL NEED HELP • In some area or another we all need help. • Regardless if it was one of the great men and women of the Bible or the apostles of Jesus, or you and me today, we need God’s help. • We may think we can do it on our own, but sooner or later we will realize that we cannot do it on our own. • There is just something about help that lifts us from one dimension to another. • I remember years ago my grandfather decided to advance his four daughters R1000 of their inheritance. It was a considerable amount of money in those days. This help brought such joy and relief to my mother and to us as a family as a result. It was not earned or expected, but it just lifted the weight of life and brought relief. • When God steps in and helps us, it has the same effect. • Perhaps there is an area of your life today where you need divine intervention. • You just need God’s help in your situation. • Well, you can trust God for just this. 2. GOD'S HELP CAN COME FROM UNEXPECTED SOURCES • You just never know who God will use and what He will use to bring help and relief to your situation. • Isaiah 55:8 "For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways," declares the LORD. • My ways are not your ways, says the Lord. • We should not prescribe to God how and where that help should come from. • Sometimes when we are in a situation, we want to make our problem someone else’s problem. • My employer must solve this, or my husband must solve this, or my parents must solve this, or my children must solve this. • My ways are not your ways, says the Lord. • In my own experience I have seen how God will use an unexpected source to come through for my situation. 3. WHEN GOD HELPS US HE HAS GOT OUR HEARTS IN MIND • Sometimes we have pre-conceived ideas about how God should help and what God should do. • A pre-conceived idea, according to the dictionary, is an opinion formed beforehand without adequate evidence. • We think we know what’s best for us. • Often people do not want to change, but they want the problem/s to go away. • I am reminded about a time when the Doctor told me my cholesterol was a bit high. I asked him how we could correct this and he told me something I didn’t really want to hear. He told me that I needed to change. I needed to change my lifestyle and start eating healthy. I also needed to change my lifestyle and do more exercise. Now I have never been very partial to exercise, unless it involved watching it, and preferably from the couch! I also have always loved the wrong food. If I have a choice between a fresh jam doughnut or fresh fruit and vegetables, the choice is easy – THE DOUGHNUT! So I wanted the quick-fix, a pill that will take the problem away without me having to change. • I also remember a story of a father and son that arrived at our church and advised me that they had walked from another town, several hundred kilometers away, and had now settled in our city. They asked for food as they said they had none and hadn’t eaten for days. I got them seated in our reception area and served them coffee and I quickly went to the grocery store and purchased two boxes of provision. Then I called them back into the office and happily advised them that we would be able to help and presented them with the two boxes. The father did not seem very delighted and he stood up and looked at the boxes and then at me, saying: ‘Do you expect me to carry that?’ That was when I realized that they had a preconceived hope that I would give them money and in fact did not really want food. • Even if things don’t work out according to our thinking, He remains able to turn things out for our good. 4. WHERE ARE YOU LOOKING FOR YOUR HELP? • We must be determined that God is our help and we will not look to other things. • The psalmist writes and says: ‘MY help is from the Lord!’ It was a settled matter for him. • But yet, often when we face troubles we can turn to the strangest things. • We must not look in the wrong places for help. • Years ago I went to visit a lady in our church. She and her family had faithfully served the Lord for 40 years. She was a godly lady. But I was so surprised when I got to her house as she had hung crystals around her house and felt that they would have a positive effect. • Don’t turn to other things; don’t look to the weird and the questionable. • We can end up turning to the wrong thing and that’s when things usually end up worse. 5. YOUR HELP COMES FROM THE ONE WHO MADE HEAVEN AND EARTH • Remember your God is great! • Your God is the one who made heaven and earth. • He is great and why would you look to anything less than Him? • He is able to do more than we could ask or think. • Ephesians 3:20 ‘Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us.’ • Do you think if He created the universe, that your problem or situation is too great for Him? • Is anything too hard for God? • Jeremiah 32:27 ‘I am the LORD, the God of all mankind. Is anything too hard for Me?’ • The answer is NO; nothing is too difficult for Him. • So let’s look to Him with confidence, know that He is able to handle our concerns and challenges and He knows best and He can see things from the correct perspective. • Give it to Him today and let’s ask Him to intervene in your life and situation. • Declare it with me: ‘MY HELP COMES FROM THE LORD!’ By: Andrew W Roebert Comments are closed.
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