“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted” (Matthew 5:4)

I was reading a book by John MacArthur in which he was explaining the verse above. He said, “The context reveals that He [Jesus] is not speaking of the kind of mourning related to earthly bereavement; instead it’s grieving over one’s own guilt, the sorrow of repentance of sin.” As I read this, I began to think. I couldn’t remember the last time I actually felt true sorrow for my sins. I think I’ve become so accustomed to my God of grace and my usual routine of confessing sins, in a sense, to not feel sorry for them. Now I’ve always been taught that Christ paid the price for our sins, so we should not live our lives feeling guilty for them (Romans 8:1-2). While that is a true statement, it sounds like there might be a Godly sorrow that is necessary for believers to practice. So what does the Word say about it?

In 2 Corinthians, Paul talks about what Godly sorrow is. He is writing to the church at Corinth and mentions a previous letter he sent to them. “Even if I caused you sorrow by my letter, I do not regret it. Though I did regret it—I see that my letter hurt you, but only for a little while— yet now I am happy, not because you were made sorry, but because your sorrow led you to repentance. For you became sorrowful as God intended and so were not harmed in any way by us. Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death” (2 Cor 7:8-10). So we see that there are two types of sorrow, and Godly sorrow produces repentance.

As I was trying to better understand this concept of Godly sorrow, I read something by John Piper that I thought explained it very well. “At least two things govern what makes sorrow good. One is the cause, the other is the outcome. The cause of godly sorrow for our own sin is the spiritual perception of its moral ugliness, not just its negative consequences. We see it as morally repugnant. This repugnance is owing to our spiritual preference for the taste of the truth and beauty of God. Therefore our sorrow for sin is rooted in our savoring of God. Sin is a revolting flavor in the feast of godwardness. Therefore, sorrow over this is a signal that we delight in God. That is what makes the sorrow good. The outcome of good sorrow for sin is repentance and holiness. In fact, repentance includes sorrow for sin and extends it to a more durable experience of holy living. This holy living is the outward form of delighting in God above all sin. Therefore delight in God is what makes the sorrow and repentance good” (John Piper).

Piper explains that this type of sorrow is closely related to our delight in God. John MacArthur says, “Realizing you are spiritually bankrupt is a truth you grasp intellectually. Mourning over your sin is the natural response of the emotions.” This Godly sorrow leads to repentance. It does not lead to guilt, shame, despair, depression, self-pity, or hopelessness; that’s what worldly sorrow leads to, which as Paul says, ultimately leads to death. This righteous type of sorrow leads to repentance: repentance leading to salvation. Scripture is clear that repentance leads to and is required for salvation (Matt 3:2; 4:17, Mark 1:15, Luke 13:5, Acts 2:38; 3:19; 11:18, 2 Tim 2:25, 2 Peter 3:9, Isaiah 30:15). But we are also commanded to confess and repent of our sins even after we’re justified by initial repentance (John 13:10, 1 John 1:9). And since “Godly sorrow leads to repentance,” we could conclude that we can’t properly come to repentance without Godly sorrow. If apathy exists in confession of sins, it’s not real repentance. In a prayer of David, he says “I confess my iniquity; I am sorry for my sin” (Psalm 38:18). “‘Even now’, declares the LORD, ‘return to me with all your heart, with fasting and weeping and mourning’” (Joel 2:12).

It’s clear that God takes repentance very seriously, and He wants us to be sincere and completely broken so that He can make us whole. But this isn’t all depressing. It’s actually the opposite. We are to be sorrowful, but once it leads to repentance, the sorrow should stop. This is where we can apply the passage mentioned earlier, Romans 8:1-2, “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death,” and Ephesians 3:12, which tells us, “In him and through faith in him we may approach God with freedom and confidence.” There should be no guilt in our life; we should live free from that. And this should bring joy, and indeed will bring joy. So, true Godly sorrow will produce joy. We are commanded to be “sorrowful, yet always rejoicing” (2 Corinthians 6:10). Our joy is made complete when we follow God’s commands, in this case, following in proper repentance. Christ said, “If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete” (John 15:10-11).

So instead of just “confessing” my sins, I must “repent”, and that’s correctly practiced through Godly sorrow over the sins. I don’t believe we will ever begin to get victory over a sin, until we begin to practice true Godly sorrow in repentance of them. In the same passage where Paul explains godly sorrow, he says, “See what this godly sorrow has produced in you: what earnestness, what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what alarm, what longing, what concern, what readiness to see justice done. At every point you have proved yourselves to be innocent in this matter” (2 Corinthians 7:11). These are all signs of victory over sin, and they were all produced from genuine godly sorrow. All sin is an offense to God and should be viewed as serious to us in order to get victory over them. And in the victory, we will receive joy from Christ. So let’s delight in God. Let’s make His delight our delight also. And when we sin against Him, practice true sorrow for the sins: sorrow that will lead to repentance. God’s grace should not be taken advantage of (Romans 6:1-2). As God’s grace covers our sins, our undeserving hearts should be filled with thankfulness that leads to a change of heart. God is still teaching me this idea of true godly sorrow, and I pray that I might put into consistent practice what I’ve learned.

I cry for help in the night.
Drowned in unwanted pains
And unfulfilled desires.
Craving the undeserved.
I stand…..
Thunder-Death to silence;
Lightning cleansing darkness;
Fully drenched in the moonlight;
Rain kissing face.
Arms outstretched to feel Your embrace.
Contentment……contentment……
Treasures revealed as seconds;
Gone before spoken.
These priceless moments with You.
Weakened by Your Presence,
Humbled by Your Grace.
Forgive me for lack of gratitude.
I am not worthy of this precious trove.

Faces hold in time
Cast upon my mind
The audience captivated is me and only mine
And I see it flow
I don’t know
How so fast life can go so slow
But I’m sure I want you to keep me company
Is it strange to think eternally when we are still so young?
Do you see our lives that way–or is it only some?
Well I know for sure
What I’m living for
It doesn’t take much faith–only trust
And I’m so glad for you
That you’re here to help me through
It won’t be long till He comes back for us

(a child)
Love that holds me tight
Grace that pulls me through
When in dark, You’re light
Patience paints Your hue

We all who are Your nation
Believe Your word is true
Jesus Your advocation
Makes God, our sin, deaf to

Lord we love You
Lord we love You
Lord we love You

(A Young Adult)
Peace that makes things right
Power that makes things new
For our souls You fight
Our hearts You pursue

We all who are Your nation
Believe Your word is true
Jesus Your advocation
Makes God, our sin, deaf to

Lord we love You
Lord we love You
Lord we love You

We will sing a song of love!
Will You descend on us like a dove?
Cause Lord we love You
Lord we love You
Lord we love You

(A grandparent)
Love that holds me tight
Grace that pulls me through
Jesus, You’re the light
Take us home with You

What does it mean to have a hardened heart? There are many times in the Bible when someone’s heart has been hardened. During Sunday night’s message, I became distracted with this thought when Cliff mentioned that the apostles’ hearts were hardened to the people and their needs. I also recall God hardening Pharaoh’s heart so he did not listen to Moses and Aaron. I always wondered why God hardened people’s hearts if He wanted what was best for them, but I had a change of thought when reading this story about the apostles. I am sure God can harden our hearts for His purposes, like with Pharaoh, “Go to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the hearts of his officials so that I may perform these miraculous signs of mine among them.” However, I think we do a lot of this hardening ourselves. Just like the apostles, we can be blinded by our own desires, whether we are tired, hungry, fed up, frustrated, whatever it may be.

How often do you think you harden your own heart to the needs of the ones around you? Maybe we need to highlight those times in our lives when we are most likely to do so and focus on them. Lets try to pick up on those times and soften our hearts to those needs around us. I think if we do this God will bless us and those around us. I can’t imagine how many opportunities and adventures we miss that God intended for us because our hearts were hardened to His voice.

Gracefully, tears of joy fall gently to the floor,
And my heart melts when I hear the sweet, sweet name of Jesus, the One whom I adore.
Before I found You, I was empty, alone, and thirsty for light,
But You took me, blind and broken, and gave me pure sight.

Daily, my heart beats faster at the thought of Your face,
Yes, I’m alive, so alive, because Your glory and grace.
I will declare Your Holy name to every soul in the streets,
And bring You honor and praise and tell the world of Your peace.

Hallelujah! Let us sing to the God of all Creation,
The Great I Am, The Messiah, The Author of Salvation.
When I speak His name, there is rest within my soul,
And all my worries wither, for He has made me whole.

His humble heart always hears my softest cry,
He is my Jesus, my Deliverer, my precious Adonai.
Joy He provides and strength He sufficiently gives,
My spirit is alive and aflame for my Redeemer He lives.

Marvelous maker, Marvelous One,
You are The Trinity—Father, Spirit, Son.
You’re the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end,
For all of eternity, Lord, You are my father and friend.

Heavenly trumpets will sound as the angels sweetly sing,
“Glory, Glory, to God in the Highest, the King of Kings.”
He is, indeed, the hand of hope, He calms every ocean shore,
Take my heart, oh Jesus, I want to forever be called Yours.

And as I stand here on Earth, surrounded by His love, showered by His grace,
I marvel at the moment when I’ll meet my maker, face to face.
In that moment, when the final minute arrives, my heart loses rhythm, and eternal life begins,
My soul will glow bright as I reach my hand out to the Heavens and run to my Savior, my King.

God,
Thanks for Your mercy. Thanks for reminding me of Psalm 103.
You forgive all my sins.
You heal all my diseases.
You redeem me from death.
You crown me with love and tender mercies.
You fill my life with good things.
You give me righteousness and justice.
You are compassionate. Merciful. Slow to anger. Abounding in love.
You do not constantly accuse us.
You do not remain angry forever.
You do not punish us for all of our sins.
You have removed our sins as far as the east is from the west.
You are tender and compassionate.
You know how weak we are.
Your love remains forever.
Your salvation extends to our children’s children.

God, why do I doubt your goodness? Why do I get impatient or turn away from You when I am frustrated? Keep my heart whole before You. I feel so overwhelmed by life, by thoughts racing through my head, by expectations I have put onto myself and by expectations I feel that others have of me. I am exhausted. Renew me. Be the center of my life. Help me to trust you.

Do you ever wonder why your car runs out of gas at the most inopportune time? Or why it costs more to dry a load of laundry than is does to do the wash? I guess it boils down to the whole “why do we drive on parkways and park on driveways” nonsense. I could banter back and forth with someone for hours asking “why” questions, but where would that lead us?

However, “why” is a word I have found myself using a lot lately. “Why am I at my current job?” “Why did that have to happen to my family?” “Why didn’t that happen? The cards seems to line up perfectly.” And yet I realized that the underlying question to all of my questions was, “Why God?”. You see, I found myself questioning God.

Have you ever babysat for a little kid who loves to talk and ask questions? As a pediatric physical therapist, I have the opportunity to experience some pretty interesting conversations with kids of all ages. There are times I am constantly laughing, while other times I am frustrated or heartbroken. And then there are those amusing times when a child suddenly thinks he/she is in charge. They come marching back to the gym and start rattling off a list of activities or exercises that they are going to do that day. It is then that I proceed to tell them that I have a different plan and that they will have to wait and see what it is. The “why” questions then begin to fly out of their mouths. And I stand there with a smile on my face, explaining to them as simply as possible what the next immediate step or exercise is. Their little immature minds would not begin to understand that the exercise in question would help strengthen their quadriceps eccentrically in order to facilitate descent when negotiating the stairs.

In the same way, I think God stands there quietly, smiling at us as He reveals one step at a time in the plan he has for us. We can barrage Him with “why” questions like I have been doing, or we can simply follow the next step and “complete the exercise”. God knows our finite minds cannot handle the explanations to the “why” questions and needs us to just trust Him.

In my job, I have developed great relationships with the kids I treat. And they slowly begin to trust me. I hope that one day they realize that the silly little exercises they didn’t want to do helped them get to where they are today. And as for me? Let’s just say I’m learning to ask far fewer questions.

What is worship?

Is it singing? Or is it more? Is it doing things for God? Or is it more? Is it telling God how great He is, or is it more? We are commanded many times to worship our God in the Bible, so how important is it that we have a clear understanding of what it means? The dictionary defines worship as “reverent honor and homage paid to God.” This gives us a rough idea at the word, but what does the Bible say?

I think the best verse to describe worship that God wants, is found in Romans 12:1: “Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship.” Other translations say “-which is your reasonable service” (NKJV). Here, Paul is pleading with his Roman brothers in Christ to worship the way God wants us to. And the formula to do so: present our bodies as living sacrifices. We must give our bodies, all of us, every thought, every action, every motive, every intention, completely, entirely over to God. Instead of presenting a lamb to God like they did in the Old Testament, God wants us to present ourselves. But He wants us holy, set apart, pleasing and acceptable to Him. In the OT, only spotless lambs would be acceptable and pleasing to Him. So likewise, for true worship, He wants us to be holy and set apart from the world and sin. But here’s the even tougher part, since He wants a living sacrifice, we must continually present our bodies to God like this as long as we are still living. Every day, every minute, we are giving ourselves as an offering to Him. The worship God requires takes everything. The worship God is after is continual.

Paul explains what it means to present our bodies as a living sacrifice by contrasting it with the alternative. He says, “do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God” (Romans 6:13). “Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death, or of obedience resulting in righteousness?” (6:16). “For just as you presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness, resulting in further lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness, resulting in sanctification” (6:19). And this is all possible [and necessary], because we have been set free from sin (6:18,22).

I also found some other imperative things in Scripture about worship. Worship must be our immediate response to God (Matthew 28:17). Our worship should be continually offered (Hebrews 13:15). Our worship should be accompanied with a healthy dose of fear and reverence (Revelation 14:7), yet we must worship with gladness and joy (Psalm 100:2). We must not worship any other gods, because God, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God (Exodus 34:14). We need Christ’s help to worship God (Heb 13:15). And in John 4, we find out the way in which God desires his worshipers to worship Him. “Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth” (John 4:23-24).

Wait, so what exactly does that mean? “God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth”? To answer, I’ll quote a commentary I read: “To be acceptable to this infinite Spirit, the worship must be of a spiritual nature - must spring from the heart, through the influence of the Holy Ghost: and it must be in Truth, not only in sincerity, but performed according to that Divine revelation which he has given men of himself. A man worships God in spirit, when, under the influence of the Holy Ghost, he brings all his affections, appetites, and desires to the throne of God; and he worships him in truth, when every purpose and passion of his heart, and when every act of his religious worship, is guided and regulated by the word of God” (Adam Clarke’s Bible Commentary).

“Worship is recognizing God for who He is; it is ascribing worth to Him; it is God’s people telling Him about the worth they see in Him. In fact, worship could very well be thought of as ‘worth-ship’” (Don Weaver, Worship: The Heart’s Response to God). So if it’s a response to how worthy God is, let’s ask ourselves: How worthy is God? How much worth do we actually see in Him? Is He worthy enough to give everything to? Is He really worth that much to us? And how do we tell Him of His worth? Paul and John explain that the way God wants us to tell Him and show Him that worth is practically giving Him our everything. Who ever said that Christianity wasn’t demanding? The worship God demands, seems pretty demanding. Sounds like He demands everything. Everything, every second. But, as Paul said, “You have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body” (1 Corinthians 6:20). It’s our reasonable, logical service.

So let’s give God what He deserves. Think of how much He has given us, of which we don’t deserve any. Let’s seek God in worship and He will show us even more about Himself and how we should live for Him. C.S. Lewis said, “It is in the process of being worshiped that God communicates His presence to men.” I think there is a lot of truth to this, like He promises in His word, “Draw near to God and He will draw near to you” (James 4:8). And let’s remember Hosea 6:6 - God is really after a heart of worship more than the actual worship itself. I hope this glance at worship helps us get a bigger picture of worship for an even bigger God.

Have you ever heard God’s call in a certain area of your life and then found when you went to follow Him that it was much more difficult than you expected? Sometimes the pain involved doesn’t end after you’ve moved closer to where you know God wants you. Sometimes it continues on and leaves you wondering whether to continue down this path or go back while you still can… if that’s even an option.

This is something I’ve been learning over the past few months. I’ve felt for a while that God is preparing me for something. I still can’t tell you exactly what it will be, but in my heart I’m fairly sure it will involve moving away. So, I’ve been working to follow God in this area and begin to move myself into a position where I could go or do whatever He directed.

Since I was a little girl, I dreamed of owning a horse. Just before I was thirteen, I bought one – a beautiful, sweet (and sassy) Arabian mare. I’ve already written a blog about her before, so I won’t retell the whole story, but let it be enough to say that for me, she was a dream come true. I loved her so much and choosing to give her up was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.

But, in that step, God was faithful. He provided an amazing home for her – a place where she’ll never want for attention or love or companionship. I can visit her whenever I want to and even ride. Seeing her so happy and content often reassures me that I did the right thing.

And yet, to be honest, I really miss her. More than I realized. I miss hearing her whinny when I’d walk out to the barn to put her away at night. I miss perching on the edge of her stall and venting to her about my day while she ate her dinner. I miss the way she used to rub her head on my back when it was itchy. I miss her, and it aches.

This past Saturday marked the fact that she’d been gone for two months and one day. I walked out to the barn for the first time since the day she left, and I spent the afternoon rolling up the wire that made up her pen. Until that time, I realized I had never come to terms with the fact that she really wasn’t ever coming home. But remembering her so happy and content at her new home and then winding up the wire foot by foot confirmed to me that this chapter had really and truly closed for good. It hurts, but it also brings a sense of closure. That chapter has ended, and even as it aches still, I’m excited to see what the next chapter will bring.

There really wasn’t a point to this blog when I started writing. I just wanted to share a bit of my current story and maybe let it encourage you as well. If you’re in a place where you’ve taken steps to follow God in a direction He called you and things are still difficult or painful, don’t give up. We hear it often, but God truly does have amazing plans for us, far better than we could imagine. Difficult as it is sometimes, He asks us to continue to follow Him down the paths He has for each of us and to trust Him.

“For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope. In those days when you pray I will listen. If you look for me wholeheartedly, you fill find me.” - Jeremiah 29:11-13