Enduring the Heat

It is getting hot in Houston! In reality, I think a lot of people are struggling with the heat in a different way. I was reading Psalms 119 this morning (yeah, the really long chapter!) and stumbled across v. 83. It says:

               Though I have become like a wineskin in the smoke, I do not forget your statutes

Now, quite honestly, I have never seen a wineskin in smoke, but as I considered what The Lord wanted to convey to me...the imagery was pretty beautiful. When that wineskin hit the smoke and the heat, it was enduring a process. The heat has to be enough to produce smoke, but not so much that it would scorch the wineskin. In order to dry the wineskin out, it was going to have to endure the heat and smoke slowly, over a period of time before it would be pulled out.

How many times have you felt like you are suffocating in the smoke produced by the heat, the trials in your life? Have you been caught in a time of pressure, not so much to destroy you, but enough to wear you down? Maybe the worst part of it all is that it feels like you have been in the smoke and heat forever with no end in sight. Every Christian I know (me included) has faced times like this. The temptation is to quit or take matters into your own hands. To give God an ultimatum...you have been holding out for as long as you can, and He hasn't pulled you out...so you take matters into your own hands. 

I know this temptation...failed that that test a few times.

                                   But we need to see things as they are, not as we feel. 

How? The Psalter says," I do not forget your statues!" Better yet, in verse 97 he puts it this way, " O how I love your law! It is my meditation all the day!" Or maybe you know verse 105 better, " You word is a lamp into my feet or a light to my path." I told Ashley I was in Psalms 119 this morning as I was walking out the door and she says, "have you gotten to verse 109 yet!" "My life is conintually in your hand, Yet I do not forget your law!"

The way that we endure, even find delight in our long trials, droughts, and tribulations is to be saturated by the Word of God. Being filled with his Word is like constantly filling a wineskin with moisture as it spends time in the heat. You won't become brittle...you won't scorch, you won't even dry out because the well spring of living water that is saturating your life. 

I can't tell you when a trail, especially a long one, will end. One thing I can be sure of is that when those trials are upon you...seek God in His word, and follow the light it puts out in your life...it may only be a lamp unto your feet or it could be a bigger light unto your path. Either way, it will always be enough!