As I'm struggling God still speaks...
Psalm 56:8 "You have taken account of my wanderings; Put my tears in Your bottle. Are they not in Your book?"
He puts my tears in a bottle?? Wow, kinda makes me feel cared for...I know my tears speak a special language to the heart of God. Our tears are precious to Him. They stir the heart of God our Father and He responds to our tears. Maybe, since he can't reveal all his plans and "fixes" in life to me now, he keeps these tears to remind me at the victorious end of all the times he was watching and I was unaware, the times he wanted to reach down and physically wipe my tears and tell me it would be okay...then lovingly roll out the blueprints he's drawn up for my life. But he knows that wouldn't be for my ultimate good. So he is content with keeping my useless tears in a bottle. Just for him to remember, and for them to stir his heart. There are many cases of this in the Bible, I hope I can be one of them:
Isaiah 38:5 "Go, and say to Hezekiah, Thus saith the LORD, the God of David thy father, I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy tears: behold, I will add unto thy days fifteen years.”
2 Kings 20:5 "Turn again, and tell Hezekiah the captain of my people, Thus saith the LORD, the God of David thy father, I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy tears: behold, I will heal thee: on the third day thou shalt go up unto the house of the LORD.”
God saw Hezekiah’s tears and He responded to those tears and to his crying out in prayer.
Job 16:20 "My friends scorn me: but mine eye poureth out tears unto God.”
He has heard my cries. I am His child, He has heard my cries and He will respond.
“The righteous cry, and the LORD heareth, and delivereth them out of all their troubles. Many are the afflictions of the righteous: but the LORD delivereth him out of them all” Psalm 34:17, 19
I take this one as a promise, and I rejoice because I KNOW God keeps his promises, every one! I have to keep telling myself that he may not always answer my cries when and in the way that I think He should. He responds in a way and time that is for my ultimate good.
“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts” Isaiah 55:8,9
We have One to whom we may pour out all the deep hurts in our heart and we do not have to fear that our confidences will be betrayed.
“Trust in him at all times; ye people, pour out your heart before him: God is a refuge for us. Selah” Psalm 62:8.
God tells us that we may approach Him boldly so that we may receive His mercy and grace in our time of need.
“ Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need” Hebrews 4:16
So for now I will approach the throne of God boldly with my request and my tears in hand. And will claim his promises to me. Yet, for the sake of being honest, I am still human and my heart worries and still yearns...
“And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away” Revelation 21:4
Maybe, He will show me that bottle of tears that He has collected from me. “Do you see this bottle here? These are the tears you cried during this time. You see my child, you were never forgotten. I did care that your heart was broken. I was there comforting you.”
I heard this quote in Sunday School this morning and I took it as a message of encouragement and motivation from God as to what I am to do in my downtroddenness...
"Don't think about what might never be but, instead, be FULLY available for what's happening NOW."
~a U.S. Marine (when asked about if he thought about returning to his family)
I am praying that I make myself fully available and stop making plans for the future that my never come to pass. I know I'll need help sticking with this, as I am the WORST planner of all time! I love you Lord and I trust your timing and plan for my life.
