By Sheila Schuller Coleman
Times have been tough for all of us. I don't know anyone who hasn't been affected by tough times in the past year. In fact, when people ask me to pray for them, it is often for one of the following reasons: a dire financial need, for healing (many of them from cancer), or for a ruptured relationship.
Where can we find the strength to not only endure these times, but also find delight in the midst of them? We find the strength (even delight) when we praise God for ALL things.
Praise God for cancer? Praise God for losing a job or a pension in the midst of retirement? Praise God for a ruptured relationship? Yes. Yes. Yes.
Now, I'm not meaning to be cold-hearted when I say that; I'm simply sharing with you wisdom found in God's word. As we praise God, adore him, love him - even in the midst of a horrific trial - we discover his POWer-full love for us. We feel his strong, loving hands picking us UP, giving us the strength to soar above the storm clouds.
When we are dropped by life's trials, and we praise God anyway, God's love lifts us UP! Job teaches us to trust God no matter how tough life gets (his trials and tribulations still hold the record for being most severe) when he says, "Though he [God] slay me, yet will I trust him" (Job 13:15).
Trusting God with our very lives, praising him for even our challenges, living and loving him - no matter what - that's the secret to finding God's UPlifting POWer-full love!
My prayer for you, dear friends, is that you will not miss the blessings hiding in the trial - the blessings that come when you experience the POWer-full love of God that lifts you UP! I invite you to join me, dad, and our guests on Sunday mornings in January for UP messages, UP interviews, and UP music that will fill your heart and heal your soul.
Even if you don't believe it right now, say this prayer aloud with me: "Thank you, God, for (insert your trial here). Thank you, Lord, for letting me see your POWer-full love up close…from my front row seat. Thank you, Lord, for your love that lifts me UP! Amen."
