O merciful God, be Thou unto me
A strong Tower of defense,
I humbly entreat Thee.
Give me grace to await thy leisure,
And patiently to bear
What Thou doest unto me;
Nothing doubting or mistrusting
Thy goodness towards me;
For Thou knowest what is good for me
Better than I do.
Therefore do with me in all things
What Thou wilt;
Only arm me, I beseech Thee,
With Thine armor,
That I may stand fast;
Above all things taking to me
The shield of faith;
Praying always that I may
Refer myself wholly to Thy will,
Abiding Thy pleasure, and comforting myself
In those troubles which it shall please Thee
To send me, seeing such troubles are
Profitable for me; and I am
Assuredly persuaded that all Thou doest
Cannot but be well; and unto Thee
Be all honor and glory. Amen.

This prayer was prayed by seventeen-year-old Lady Jane Grey in her prison cell in the Tower of London in 1554. She was then led to the chopping block where she read Psalm 51, then knelt down. Her final words were, “Lord, into thy hands I commend my spirit.”

O worship the King, all glorious above,
O gratefully sing His pow’r and His love;
Our Shield and Defender, the Ancient of Days,
Pavilioned in splendor and girded with praise.

O tell of His might, O sing of His grace,
Whose robe is the light, whose canopy space,
His chariots of wrath the deep thunder clouds form,
And dark is His path on the wings of the storm.

Thy bountiful care what tongue can recite?
It breathes in the air, it shines in the light;
It streams from the hills, it descends to the plain,
And sweetly distills in the dew and the rain.

Frail children of dust, and feeble as frail,
In Thee do we trust, nor find Thee to fail;
Thy mercies how tender! how firm to the end!
Our Maker, Defender, Redeemer and Friend. Amen.

Twenty years or so ago I stood in my tiny kitchen in New York City preparing dinner for my husband and two sons. I had the radio on, listening to an interview with Francis Schaeffer. He made a statement that burned into my head and heart:

“If I’m not content, it’s because I am not letting God be God or I have ceased to be thankful.”

Those words came to me during a period of great discontent. We had had significant and long-term issues to deal with concerning the health of our children. I hated living in the city without so much as a blade of grass for them to play in, even at the park. Life just seemed utterly difficult in every way. I could not make sense of it, nor come to terms with what God was doing—or not doing.

Dr. Schaeffer’s statement played in my mind like an endlessly cycling tape. It was obvious that I was not content. As for letting God be God, I knew that I wanted him to do things he wasn’t doing. I had accused him of inactivity in our lives. He seemed rather inattentive when it came to good things. Plenty of bad stuff happened, but we were very lacking in what I would have considered his “blessing.” As for thankfulness, I had a very short list.

Hearing Dr. Schaeffer make that statement on the radio as I chopped vegetables in my tiny kitchen was no haphazard incident. It was definitely God at work in my life, very faithfully, as he had been all along. He was about the business of changing me, not my circumstances—which happened to be the exact opposite of what I had in mind, hence my discontent. That moment marked a huge step forward in my thinking and my mind being changed regarding God’s purpose and my/our circumstances.

Since that time I have had plenty of opportunity (thousands of times, I’m sure) to revisit that statement. Discontentment seems to live just barely beneath my skin, ready to erupt at a microsecond’s notice. When it does, I have to deal with the fact that I am not letting God be God, or I have ceased to be thankful. Probably both, since I’ve found that I can’t really do one without the other. Recognizing discontentment immediately and renewing my mind with what God has revealed about himself in Scripture and who I am in light of that has the spontaneous effect of thankfulness. When I understand who God is, I am happy to turn all over to him with a thankful, grateful heart.

An overall attitude of contentment affects every aspect of life, great and small. I don’t think it is so much a matter of ‘looking’ for things for which to be thankful. That seems artificial to me, and when I’ve tried that, it peters out pretty quickly. Genuine contentment is spontaneous, an outcome of loving God’s sovereignty. If meditating on God’s character is the starting point in dealing with my discontent it has a true foundation rather than making out a ‘thankful list’, helpful though that may be.

1 Timothy 6:6-7 says, “Now there is great gain in godliness with contentment, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content.” The godliness comes first. It is–and I know this a scorned word these days—foundational. Without godliness, all we’re left with is trying to manage our own happiness. That can work for a while, but it will not endure when the going gets tough.

If you check out my favorite books list on my blog profile, you’ll see that I read Spurgeon’s “Morning and Evening” every day. In light of the physical issues I mentioned in yesterday’s blog, today’s Evening reading of Spurgeon is exactly what I need.

Writing of the limits God puts on illness, Mr. Spurgeon says that “The God of providence has limited the time, manner, intensity, repetition, and effects of all our sickness; each throb is decreed….Affliction is not haphazard….He who made no mistakes in balancing the clouds and stretching out the heavens commits no errors in measuring out the ingredients that compose the medicine of souls. We cannot suffer too much nor be relieved too late. (Italics mine.)

This encourages me, not only for my present circumstance but for every time I suffer in any way. Every one of us suffers in various ways and various degrees. We’re eager–no, we’re frantic–to get it over with. “Oh Lord, how long?” has been the cry of my heart many times, wanting him to relieve my pain. Too frequently I have been prone to thinking I have suffered too much and have been relieved too late. Or even years later, not yet.

Spurgeon closes with this pithy word: “When we consider how hardmouthed we are, it is a wonder that we are not driven with a sharper bit. The thought is full of comfort that He who has established the boundary lines of our lives has also determined the boundaries of our tribulation.”

Knowing how hardmouthed I am in the sight of God is necessary before I can understand and receive the grace he extends to me even in every moment of suffering. Only then can I be full of comfort with the thought that God has determined the boundaries of my suffering. I am in a place of complete safety, regardless of where circumstances may lead! Quietness and rest!

All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.

For the last several weeks I have been under doctor’s orders to rest, to be off my feet, and to do no lifting while awaiting some necessary surgery. In other words, to be a complete slacker! It is the antithesis of what my life has been for the last several years, and it came at a most inappropriate, senseless time, in my opinion. I work with my husband in ministry, and my being taken ‘off-line’ made us very short-staffed. What was God, in his sovereignty, doing?

It is during times like this that my natural commonsense approach to life wants to be satisfied with knowing the immediate purpose of the circumstance. I can tolerate it if it makes some kind of sense to me. Trouble is, sometimes it just doesn’t happen, especially in the thick of the thing. Then what?

“For thus said the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel, In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength” Isaiah 30:15.

This verse comes within a long passage in which God is telling Israel what a rebellious people they are, insisting on their own way. Trying to be the potter rather than the pot. There were many warnings, then in the middle of this he says: return, rest, and you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength.

That has become my modus operandi for these weeks. I do not want to waste them. Quietness and trust. Having a still heart, trusting in God’s sovereign work for our good and for his glory. For my dear husband who bears a heavier load in ministry and also at home. For all the ministry issues that are still unsettled. For the weeks of recovery ahead. Though things don’t make sense to me, I am still commanded to return, to stake everything on the eternal sovereign God, to rest in him, then to be quiet and trust.

There have already been personal benefits. I am thankful for copious amounts of time for reading and thinking and praying. I’m thankful for much-needed sleep and physical rest.
I’ve discovered a wealth of wonderful sermons and other resources online that I heretofore had little time to read. Many thanks to John Piper, http://desiringGod.org/, and other great websites for making so many resources available!

The greatest benefit is more deeply learning to be quiet and to trust God. In Henry Scougal’s book, “The Works of Henry Scougal,” he writes,” Indeed, a modest and unaffected silence is a good way to express our submission to the hand of God under afflictions,” and “There is nothing more acceptable unto God, no object more lovely and amiable in His eyes, than a soul thus prostrated before Him, thus entirely resigned unto His holy will, thus quietly submitting to His most severe dispensations.” I underlined those sentences when I read the book two years ago, and they mean even more now.

So I will wait and trust and…blog. If all this circumstance serves to make me “lovely and amiable in His eyes,” I am happy indeed.

O for a thousand tongues to sing
My great Redeemer’s praise,
The glories of my God and King,
The triumphs of His grace!

My gracious Master and my God,
Assist me to proclaim,
To spread through all the earth abroad
The honors of Thy name.

Jesus! the name that charms our fears,
That bids our sorrows cease,
‘Tis music in the sinner’s ears,
‘Tis life and health and peace.

He breaks the power of cancelled sins,
He sets the prisoner free,
His blood can make the foulest clean,
His blood availed for me.

Hear Him, ye deaf; His praise, ye dumb,
Your loosened tongues employ;
Ye blind, behold your Saviour come;
And leap, ye lame, for joy!
—Charles Wesley

“Blessed is the man who, having nothing to say, abstains from giving in words evidence of the fact.” —George Eliot

“We need winds and tempests to exercise our faith, to tear off the rotten branches of self-reliance, and to root us more firmly in Christ.”

–Charles Spurgeon , from April 29th “Morning and Evening” devotional

If you’re not familiar with this devotional book, I highly recommend it. You can read it here every day or you can also order it from the same site if you’d like to have your own copy.

God stir the soil,
Run the ploughshare deep,
Cut the furrows round and round,
Overturn the hard, dry ground,
Spare no strength nor toil
Even though I weep.
In the loose, fresh-mangled earth
Sow new seed.
Free of withered vine and weed
Bring fair flowers to birth.

–Anonymous

Jesus, I am resting, resting,
In the joy of what Thou art,
I am finding out the greatness
Of Thy loving heart.
Thou hast bid me gaze upon Thee,
And Thy beauty fills my soul,
For by Thy transforming power
Thou hast made me whole.

Simply trusting Thee, Lord Jesus
I behold Thee as Thou art,
And Thy love, so pure, so changeless,
Satisfies my heart.
Satisfies its deepest longings,
Meets, supplies its every need,
And surrounds me with its blessings;
Thine is love indeed!

Ever lift Thy face upon me
As I work and wait for Thee;
Resting ‘neath Thy smile, Lord Jesus,
Earth’s dark shadows flee.
Brightness of my Father’s glory,
Sunshine of my Father’s face,
Keep me ever trusting, resting,
Fill me with Thy grace.