Balancing Truths: Pt. 4 — A ‘Time With God’ Audio Devotion

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Transcript

Good morning. Each weekday morning at this time, we listen to God in His word, and we grow in our relationship with Him.

All this week we’re talking about balancing truths. There are so many things that we love in the Bible and we focus on, and we try to overlook the fact that the Bible also says some things that balance those truths, and to have a full picture of God and our relationship with Him, we have to accept everything in the Bible, God’s word to us as truth.

Well, today, here’s our balancing truth. Sometimes God allows you to be in circumstances where all hope seems lost. Have you been there in your life? I sure have.

Sometimes God allows you to be in circumstances where all hope seems lost, and in those very circumstances all hope is not actually lost if you keep trusting God.

Well, it’s a part of life, isn’t it? All hope seems lost so often in so many circumstances of our lives. Listen to the apostle Paul writing to the Corinthians in 2 Corinthians chapter 1, verse 8. He says,

We do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death.

But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. He delivered us from such a deadly peril. And He will deliver us. On Him we have set our hope that He will deliver us again, and you also must help us by prayer so that many will give thanks on our behalf for the blessing granted us through the prayers of many.

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What an amazing passage Paul sharing so personally, so deeply of coming to this place where all hope seemed lost. We were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. We felt we had received the sentence of death.

Are you in a place like that right now?

Maybe your marriage seems to be falling apart and all hope seems lost. You can’t see any light at the end of the tunnel. You’re groping around in the darkness. You can’t think of anything you could do to change your situation.

Maybe you are in a place financially and you’re in such a hole you feel like there’s no hope. Life is over. You’ve received the sentence of death. Maybe there’s some other issue in your life, a health issue, and you’re struggling to accept what the doctor has told you about the struggle you’re facing coming in your life.

I don’t know where you are, but when you find yourself in a circumstance where all hope seems lost in that very circumstance, all hope is not actually lost if you’ll keep trusting in God. Think of Jonah in the belly of the whale.

What could seem more hopeless than that. The digestive juices sitting there on his skin, the darkness, the stink. The thought what in the world could happen to deliver me from this? Think of Daniel in the lion’s den.

Think of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, having been thrown into the fiery furnace that was so hot it killed the people who threw them in. Think about David facing down Goliath.

Think about Jesus in the grave for three days. Story after story after story. God has given us people who God allowed to be in circumstances where all hope by any reasonable measure was lost.

But in those very circumstances hope was not actually lost as they continued trusting God.

Whatever circumstance you’re in today, don’t despair. God is with you. Call on Him. Ask for His help, and like Paul, ask the people in your life to please be praying for you as you go through this time.

I’m John North.

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