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Please Be Patient With Yourself, God Isn't Finished With You Yet


I thank my God every time I remember you.  In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy  because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now,  being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. (Philippians 1:3-6)

       Are there days when you are sure you lie every time you claim to believe in God and that you've given your heart to Him? Are there times when you're convinced that you've deluded yourself and that your life is one big, fat, ugly joke - but you're not sure whether it's on the world or on you and you haven't a clue what the punch line is? What about all those things you think you should have done and should be doing that don't begin to fit into your life? What about those good works that are supposed to shine like a candle and glorify Your Father in heaven? These are thoughts that haunt me more often than I care to admit.
       When we read today's passage, we might be tempted to think that the Philippian church to which Paul wrote had it all together. Paul thanked God for them. He prayed for them with joy. They had partnered with him in the gospel from day one. If there was a church that deserved an A+ on their report card, surely it was the Philippian church. Then Paul says that he is confident that God will carry on the work begun there to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. Is your thought, "see, God was at work in them! Not in me, I'm a lost cause"? I've been there; said that.
       If God was still at work in the Philippians, then they weren't the flawless masterpieces we sometimes think. Paul wrote of his struggles in Romans 7, then followed it with Romans 8. There was only One who ever achieved the goal that we sometimes set for ourselves. It isn't that the goal is a bad goal, but that it is only by God's grace that we reach it. His grace makes up the difference. His work in us isn't finished, but it finishes for us.
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Birthday of
Elizabeth Palmer Peabody

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