Hope Without Limits

Funny thing about help.  The first step to receive it, is you have to realize it is not a bad thing to need it.

Some posts come to me as one big download.  Not this one.  Without my even realizing it my Heavenly Father has been working on this one for over a month.  He used it all to lead me to studying the Hebrew for Psalm 55:22 this past week.  Talk about “super-sized” portion!  I am very thankful He is so patient.  Piece by piece He revealed my own heart to me which put me in a position to receive His supply of hope.  Now that is LOVE.

Piece 1 –

On one of my morning walks I was thinking about the power of the Word of God and speaking it over myself rather than declaring “I don’t see how this will happen”.  I repented of where I had made those types of negative statements and yet my  heart still felt it wanted to cry.  I heard the Holy Spirit tell me “give your heart a voice”.   So I put my hands on my heart and immediately my heart cried out “it’s just too much; this is just too hard and I can’t do it”.  I don’t remember exactly what You said Father, but I remember what You did.  I saw You and Jeshua.  You both picked up little me and each of You were carrying me on Your shoulders.  I was in between the 2 of you.  Little me started to smile and to laugh and to giggle as You tossed her around and played with her and let her ride on Your shoulders.

Oh, I remember now what happened before the vision.  I came into agreement with my heart (little me) that this actually is too hard.  It really is.  I can’t do this in my own strength. What does that agreement look like? It means I made the choice to stop beating up my heart with my intellect that I should know better (i.e., grown up me, beating up little me) and allowed my heart to be real with God.

It was as I made that choice, that’s when I saw the vision. I have a big brother and a Dad that can help me.   Heavenly Father that is when You came, when I gave my heart permission to be real and to connect with Your heart.  You reminded me that You give me what I need in the moment (manna Exodus 16:4).  I don’t have to live any more than the moment (Matt 6:34).  I have what I need in the moment and I get to be carried by my big brother and my Dad always.  I know what that feels like in the natural.  And now, I’ve got … I’ve got it.  Thank You Father.   Seal it up Holy Spirit.

Till your old age I will be the same —
I will carry you until your hair is white.
I have made you, and I will bear you;
yes, I will carry and save you.
To whom will you liken me and equate me?
With whom will you compare me, as if we were similar?
(Isaiah 46:4-5)

Piece 2 –  

A couple of weeks later, I was driving to work, feeling pretty stressed out and what flashed into my thoughts was “cast all your cares upon Him for He will care for you”.  Don’t know about you, but “cares” is not really an expression I use.  But the light bulb went on – “my cares” are the stresses I am feeling.  So what my Heavenly Father was really telling me is “cast all your stress upon me and I will care for you”.  I knew I had to look up the verse and study it.

Piece 3 – the study:

Psalm 55:22 – NIV
Cast your cares on the Lord
and He will sustain you;
He will never let
the righteous be shaken.

In my study I discovered King David had just been betrayed by close friends when he wrote the verse above.  As I studied the Hebrew in Strong’s Concordance – this was God’s answer to King David:

Ok. WOW!

But that’s not all (hard to take in, right?) because this passage is also talking about you and me.  Seriously.  Our Heavenly Father justified and vindicated us through the blood of His Son (Rom 3:24) –  so this is the promise of the One that knows the number of hairs on Your head (Matt 10:30) to ME and to YOU.

We look at the moment – God looks at eternity.  In the moment we may feel our world is tottering/shaking/falling apart – but we can hope.  Why?  Because however the adversary is accusing or shaking us – Jeshua is our defender for eternity.  We have Jeshua’s provision to sustain and nourish us for eternity.  You were never meant to carry Your cares/circumstances in the power of your own soul.  It feels like too much for you because it is too much for you.  God knows that, He wants you to know that.  His instruction manual is found in Psalm 55:22.

He is saying “no, no, no – come to me.  Give me that stress, give me that worry, give me that responsibility and let me show you how I see it.  Let me fill it with myself as I tent/rest upon you.  Let it be a connecting point for us.  (2 Cor 12:8-9)  Then I can supply Your need according to my riches in glory (Phil 4:19) and  lead you beside still waters – take you out of this whirl that is your thoughts and current reality and cause you to rest (Psalm 23:2-3)”.

Sometimes we literally need to step away and rest.  But sometimes in the middle of the day it is hard to get away physically.  Yet that doesn’t mean that our spirits and our souls (will, intellect and emotions) cannot be refreshed by His presence; cannot find renewing strength … actually exchange our strength for His strength.  Exchange (rather than renew) is the actual Hebrew word used in Isaiah 40:31.  Eagles don’t rise up by their strength.  They rise up by the strength of the thermal air currents rushing up beneath them.   Hmmm … could that be a metaphor for the Holy Spirit? 🙂

Sounds like a pretty good plan to me.  I think I am going to take Him up on His Word starting by agreeing that my needing His help is a very good thing.  I am so very thankful that He is so much bigger than the stresses in my life, than the cares in my life and that I get to cast them, no matter their size, upon Him and He will care for me now and always.

He would like to do the same for you.  What is your choice?