Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates. – Deuteronomy 6:4-9
Promises, promises.
We all make them. Often flippantly. If we understood how God feels about vows that are broken, how far we stray from his image when we take lightly that which we have said we will do or not do, we would make fewer promises and we would hold to them more relentlessly.
God never breaks his promises. You can be sure that his word is true. So many of his words have already been fulfilled, and a few are left undone, waiting until that perfect time when it will be so.
Tomorrow morning my husband and I will stand before our brothers and sisters with our newborn daughter and make a promise – the same promise we made when her sister and brother were born. We’ll make this promise to the Lord: that we will raise this child to know him. We will give our all to seeing that the Word is planted in her heart as a seed, and we will water and nourish and spend ourselves for that little soul, and when all is said and done we will pray with fervency for her growth into a child of God, and a follower of Christ. We will talk about him when we sit and home and when we walk along the road, when we lie down and when we get up.
If I were counting upon myself or my husband to get all of this done for Talia, I wouldn’t be able to stand up and make this promise with him. I’m so thankful to God that he honors our promises made with trepidation, that he fills us with his spirit and enables us to do what we had no idea how to do in the first place. I’ve seen him working in our family, helping us teach our children who God is and what Jesus has done for them. I’ve seen them begin to respond to his love. I’ve seen my husband and I grow as parents, seeing a greater vision of God’s best for us with each passing year.
So I can happily stand and present this little girl to God, and promise to do with her what is most glorifying to the Lord. I can promise it because I love her, because I love him, and because I know that even when I am at the end of myself and my ability to accomplish anything of value, he’ll do it in me through a power I’ve only begun to understand and recognize.
What promises do you think God might be asking of you today?
Promises, promises.
We all make them. Often flippantly. If we understood how God feels about vows that are broken, how far we stray from his image when we take lightly that which we have said we will do or not do, we would make fewer promises and we would hold to them more relentlessly.
God never breaks his promises. You can be sure that his word is true. So many of his words have already been fulfilled, and a few are left undone, waiting until that perfect time when it will be so.
Tomorrow morning my husband and I will stand before our brothers and sisters with our newborn daughter and make a promise – the same promise we made when her sister and brother were born. We’ll make this promise to the Lord: that we will raise this child to know him. We will give our all to seeing that the Word is planted in her heart as a seed, and we will water and nourish and spend ourselves for that little soul, and when all is said and done we will pray with fervency for her growth into a child of God, and a follower of Christ. We will talk about him when we sit and home and when we walk along the road, when we lie down and when we get up.
If I were counting upon myself or my husband to get all of this done for Talia, I wouldn’t be able to stand up and make this promise with him. I’m so thankful to God that he honors our promises made with trepidation, that he fills us with his spirit and enables us to do what we had no idea how to do in the first place. I’ve seen him working in our family, helping us teach our children who God is and what Jesus has done for them. I’ve seen them begin to respond to his love. I’ve seen my husband and I grow as parents, seeing a greater vision of God’s best for us with each passing year.
So I can happily stand and present this little girl to God, and promise to do with her what is most glorifying to the Lord. I can promise it because I love her, because I love him, and because I know that even when I am at the end of myself and my ability to accomplish anything of value, he’ll do it in me through a power I’ve only begun to understand and recognize.
What promises do you think God might be asking of you today?
No comments:
Post a Comment