The Pastor's Wife in Persevering

In honor of my wife loving me, and celebrating over eighteen years of marriage, I wanted to repost this article from a while back.

Musings About Persevering Alongside My Wife

In all the struggles I have had to deal with in ministry, no one person this side of Heaven has helped me more than my wife. Now God will send along people from time to time who are given for the moments need. However, no one can surpass God’s plan for perseverance in the ministry that the pastor’s wife as a paraclete.

That being said, the marriage of a pastor ought to be of utmost importance. It should follow the joy of the quiet time. Now I am not a perfect husband, but what follows are a few items that have solidified our marriage and added to perseverance in the hardest of times.

• Daily have time to talk uninterrupted at levels of planning, rejoicing, learning, and intimacy.

Planning means we go over schedules and calendars, concrete things as well as tentative plans.

Rejoicing gives each of us an opportunity to share what wishes for the day and experiences we have had that were significant to us.

Learning gives each of us an opportunity to discover something new as well as teach form our perspective. This is often sharing of scripture and updating one another on the kids.

Intimacy deals with the emotional levels and struggles of life. It also is a time to share wishes and desires.

• Pray with your wife. Make it real prayer too. This leads to inspiration and meditation. It lets God bring solutions as Truth that sets us free.
• Get her perspective. Wives often have what I call “Radar”. They can pick up on things and perspectives of people and situations that we men can not fathom. They are usually right.
• Often let your wife set the pace. I am headstrong and rust to fix everything. Often my wife will give caution to not react till morning. Heeding this advice has saved me from many sorrows.
• Scripture. If my wife gives me a scripture there is usually good reason. I may not need it in that moment, but I will certainly need it before the week is over.
• Keep her #2. Nothing will bring perseverance in your ministry like perseverance in your marriage. Without the home following God, we are unfit for ministry. Honor God by honoring the wife of your youth and you will find unhindered access to God.
• A Character of Love. If you truly love your wife, your actions will form habits, those form character, and thusly you will have a heart of true love. Much has been written about love languages and such. These have great insights, but give your wife love as Christ loved the church, and your ministry will persevere.

Persecuted

Here are two more links from blogs we need to read.

The media and an Iranian pastor

Iranian Pastor may be executed

Notes for Sunday

Saints,

Here are my rough notes for the sermon of July 31st. I hope these will help you go back throughout the week and garner the specifics God has for your life.

Where is your faith?

Luke 8:22-25

This is not a trite nor complete answer to your storms. But it is the first and general step in gaining the right path to abiding in Him for living.

Please note: we can not walk by faith if we are too busy, not giving God the priority of our lives.

Those that walk by faith do not trifle with God.

Describe the situation at sea.

Describe similarities to life.

Show parallel in John 11 with the death of Lazarus “Lord, If you had been here”

Faith is now a running theme in Luke

• Centurion had great faith as Jesus had not seen in Israel.
• John Baptist faith was weak and Jesus said to look to evidence he had given by example.
  
• Woman weeping at His feet was forgiven.
• In Ch 9, He will send out apostles by faith.

We often amble in life. I do- this is what happens when we are not pursuing God by faith but at a minimum by religion.

Faith requires that we address God as He is.

3 Steps to Faith Building

But notice lately 3 components of the Christian life keep coming up

Word-Prayer-Worship

1. Read the word and look at the world. (Word aspect) See God in all of it.

Your past, in nature, and in hope.

2. Apply the promises of God to your life. (Prayer aspect)

Get specific from the time in the word to apply truths to your needs.

Pray the scripture you have found.

Exercise Trust

· In God’s holiness

· In God’s provision

· In God’s fighting your battles

· In God’s right judgment upon your enemies.

· In God’s providence.

3. And thank Him for what He has done. (Worship aspect)

• Take notice when promises are fulfilled
• Take notice of battles fought.
• Take notice of bad things working out for good.
• Take notice of the forgiveness of your sins and of ann the second chances the day has provided.

Quotes Part 5

Persevering Quotes from the Christian World at Large part V
Affliction

Please note that these are a compilation from various internet sources

I need to thank the following sites
http://www.thegracetabernacle.org/quotes/gracequotes.html
http://www.spurgeongems.org/iquotes.htm

AFFLICTION

Affliction is one of God's medicines! By it He often teaches lessons which would be learned in no other way. By it He often draws souls away from sin and the world, which would otherwise have perished everlastingly. Health is a great blessing but sanctified disease is a greater. Prosperity and worldly comfort, are what all naturally desire, but losses and crosses are far better for us if they lead us to Christ. Let us beware of murmuring in the time of trouble. Let us settle it firmly in our minds, that there is a meaning, a 'needs be', and a message from God in every sorrow that falls upon us. There are no lessons so useful as those learned in the school of affliction. There is no commentary that opens up the Bible so much as sickness and sorrow. The resurrection morning will prove, that many of the losses of God's people were in reality, eternal gains. Thousands at the last day will testify with David, "It is good for me that I have been afflicted" (Psalm. 119:71)! J.C. Ryle The Gospel of John.

No words can express how much the world owes to sorrow. Most of the Psalms were born in the wilderness. Most of the Epistles were written in a prison. The greatest thoughts of the greatest thinkers have all passed through fire. The greatest poets have “learned in suffering what they taught in song.” In bonds Bunyan lived the allegory that he afterwards wrote, and we may thank Bedford Jail for the Pilgrim’s Progress. Take comfort, afflicted Christian! When God is about to make pre-eminent use of a person, He put them in the fire. George MacDonald

Your afflictions may only prove that you are more immediately under the Father's hand. There is no time that the patient is such an object of tender interest to the surgeon, as when he is bleeding beneath his knife. So you may be sure if you are suffering from the hand of a reconciled God, that His eye is all the more bent on you. Robert Murray McCheyne

(Affliction) brings out graces that cannot be seen in a time of health. It is the treading of the grapes that brings out the sweet juices of the vine; so it is affliction that draws forth submission, weanedness from the world, and complete rest in God. Use afflictions while you have them. Robert Murray McCheyne Comfort in Sorrow, Christian Focus, 2002, p. 25, Used by Permission.

(Affliction is sometimes) sent for the conversion of the soul. Sometimes in health the Word does not touch the heart. The world is all. Its gaieties, its pleasures, its admiration, captivate your mind. God sometimes draws you aside into a sickbed, and shows you the sin of your heart, the vanity of worldly pleasures and drives the soul to seek a sure resting-place for eternity in Christ. O happy sickness that draws the soul to Jesus (Job 33, Psm. 107). Robert Murray McCheyne Comfort in Sorrow, Christian Focus, 2002, p. 6, Used by Permission.

God's children should not doubt His love when He afflicts. Christ loved Lazarus peculiarly, and yet He afflicted Him very sore. A surgeon never bends his eye so tenderly upon his patient, as when he is putting in the lancet, or probing the wound to the very bottom. And so with Christ – He bends His eye most tenderly over His own at the time He is afflicting them… A goldsmith when he casts gold into the furnace looks after it. Robert Murray McCheyne Comfort in Sorrow, Christian Focus, 2002, p. 11, Used by Permission.

(Affliction) shows the power of Christ's blood, when it gives peace in an hour of trouble, when it can make happy in sickness, poverty, persecution and death. Do not be surprised if you suffer, but glorify God. Robert Murray McCheyne Comfort in Sorrow, Christian Focus, 2002, p. 24-25, Used by Permission.

I find afflictions to be good for me. I have always found them so. Afflictions are happy means in the hands of the Holy Spirit to subdue my corruptions, my pride, my evil passions, my inordinate love to the creature. Afflictions soften my hard heart, bring me to my knees, increase faith, increase love, increase humility, increase self-denial. Afflictions make me poor in spirit, and nothing in my own eyes. Joseph Williams

Those who dive in the sea of affliction bring up rare pearls. C.H. Spurgeon

The Lord gets his best soldiers out of the highlands of affliction. C.H. Surgeon

The furnace of affliction is a good place for you, Christian; it benefits you; it helps you to become more like Christ, and it is fitting you for heaven. C.H. Spurgeon

As sure as God puts His children in the furnace of affliction, He will be with them in it. C.H. Spurgeon

Most of the grand truths of God have to be learned by trouble; they must be burned into us with the hot iron of affliction, otherwise we shall not truly receive them. C.H. Spurgeon

I would go to the deeps a hundred times to cheer a downcast spirit. It is good for me to have been afflicted, that I might know how to speak a word in season to one that is weary. C.H. Spurgeon

There is no attribute of God more comforting to His children than the doctrine of Divine Sovereignty. Under the most adverse circumstances, in the most severe troubles, they believe that Sovereignty hath ordained their afflictions, that Sovereignty overrules them, and that Sovereignty will sanctify them all. C.H. Spurgeon Divine Sovereignty, 1856.

The more afflictions you have been under, the more assistance you have had for this life of holiness. John Flavel The Fountain of Life, 1671.

Extraordinary afflictions are not always the punishment of extraordinary sins, but sometimes the trial of extraordinary graces. Sanctified afflictions are spiritual promotions. Matthew Henry

When I am in the cellar of affliction, I look for the Lord’s choicest wines. Samuel Rutherford

Poverty and affliction take away the fuel that feeds pride. Richard Sibbes

There are some things good but not pleasant, as sorrow and affliction. Sin is pleasant, but unprofitable; and sorrow is profitable, but unpleasant. As waters are purest when they are in motion, so saints are generally holiest when in affliction. William Secker

Persevering Quotes Part IV

Persevering Quotes from the Christian World at Large part IV
Affliction

Please note that these are a compilation from various internet sources

I need to thank the following sites
http://www.thegracetabernacle.org/quotes/gracequotes.html
http://www.spurgeongems.org/iquotes.htm

To know that nothing hurts the godly, is a matter of comfort; but to be assured that all things which fall out shall co-operate for their good, that their crosses shall be turned into blessings, that showers of affliction water the withering root of their grace and make it flourish more; this may fill their hearts with joy till they run over. Thomas Watson

God takes away the world, that the heart may cleave more to Him in sincerity. Thomas Watson

God sweetens outward pain with inward peace. Thomas Watson

Not to be afflicted is a sign of weakness; for, therefore God imposeth no more on me, because he sees I can bear no more. Joseph Hall

When we grow careless of keeping our souls, then God recovers our taste of good things again by sharp crosses. Richard Sibbes

The winter prepares the earth for the spring, so do afflictions sanctified prepare the soul for glory. Richard Sibbes

Do not even such things as are most bitter to the flesh, tend to awaken Christians to faith and prayer, to a sight of the emptiness of this world, and the fadingness of the best it yield? Doth not God by these things (ofttimes) call our sins to remembrance, and provoke us to amendment of life? How then can we be offended at things by which we reap so much good?.... Therefore if mine enemy hunger, let me feed him; if he thirst, let me give him drink. Now in order to do this, (1) We must see good in that, in which other men can see none. (2) We must pass by those injuries that other men would revenge. (2) We must show we have grace, and that we are made to bear what other men are not acquainted with. (4) Many of our graces are kept alive, by those very things that are the death of other men's souls.... The devil, (they say) is good when he is pleased; but Christ and His saints, when displeased. —John Bunyan

As the wicked are hurt by the best things, so the godly are bettered by the worst. —William Jenkyn

Poverty and affliction take away the fuel that feeds pride. —Richard Sibbes

Labour to grow better under all your afflictions, lest your afflictions grow worse, lest God mingle them with more darkness, bitterness and terror. —John Owen
The secret formula of the saints: When I am in the cellar of affliction, I look for the Lord's choicest wines. —Samuel Rutherford

The way to be eased is not struggling with it, but meekly to bear it.
There is a fable, but it has its moral for this purpose. A certain ass, laded with salt, fell into a river, and after he had risen, found his burden lighter, for the moisture had made it melt away; whereupon he would ever after lie down in the water as he traveled with his burden, and so ease himself. His owner perceiving this craft , after laded him with Wool. The ass purposing to ease himself, as before, laid himself down in the water, and thinking to have ease, rising again to feel his weight, found it heavier. —Richard Stock

Look how fears have presented themselves, so have supports and encouragements; yea, when I have started, even as it were at nothing else but my shadow, yet God, as being very tender of me, hath not suffered me to be molested, but would with one Scripture or another, strengthen me against all; insomuch that I have often said, Were it lawful, I could pray for greater trouble, for the greater comfort's sake. —John Bunyan

He that rides to be crowned, will not think much of a rainy day. —John Trapp
God takes a safe course with His children, that they may not be condemned with the world, He permits the world to condemn them, that they may not love the world, the world hates them.... —Richard Sibbes

Afflictions are light when compared with what we really deserve. They are light when compared with the sufferings of the Lord Jesus. But perhaps their real lightness is best seen by comparing them with the weight of glory which is awaiting us. —Arthur W. Pink

No wise man can expect that...God should diet us with a continual feast. It would neither suit with our health, nor the condition of this pilgrimage. Live, therefore, on your peace of conscience as your ordinary diet; when this is wanting, know that God appointeth you a fast for your health; and when you have a feast of high joys, feed on it and be thankful! But when they are taken from you, gape not after them as the disciples did after Christ at His ascension; but return thankfully to your ordinary diet of peace. —Richard Baxter

The highest honor that God can confer upon his children is the blood-red crown of martyrdom. The jewels of a Christian are his afflictions. The regalia of the kings that God has made, are their troubles, their sorrows, and their griefs. Griefs exalt us, and troubles lift us. —Charles Spurgeon

It is the great support and solace of the saints in all the distresses that befall them here, that there is a wise Spirit sitting in all the wheels of motion, and governing the most eccentric creatures and their most pernicious designs to blessed and happy issues. —John Flavel

Persevering Quotes from the Christian World at Large, Part III

Persevering Quotes from The Christian World at Large Part 2
Please note that these are a compilation from various internet sources

I need to thank the following sites
http://www.thegracetabernacle.org/quotes/gracequotes.html
http://www.spurgeongems.org/iquotes.htm

We are able to persevere only because God works within us, within our free wills. And because God is at work in us, we are certain to persevere. The decrees of God concerning election are immutable. They do not change, because He does not change. All whom He justifies He glorifies. None of the elect has ever been lost. R.C. Sproul Chosen by God, Tyndale, 1986, p. 177.


It is true that God will never forsake His own children. But the proof that we are His children is that He works in us the vigilance not to forsake Him. God's not forsaking us is the work He does in us to keep us from forsaking Him (Philippians 2:12-13). John Piper When Is It Dangerous to Look at Jesus? June 15, 2005, Fresh Words, Used by Permission, www.DesiringGod.org.

Those who fall away have never been thoroughly imbued with the knowledge of Christ but only had a slight and passing taste of it. John Calvin

The Greeks had a race in their Olympic games that was unique. The winner was not the runner who finished first. It was the runner who finished with his torch still lit. I want to run all the way with the flame of my torch still lit for Him. Joseph Stowell Fan The Flame, Moody, 1986, p. 32.

Our motto must continue to be perseverance. And ultimately I trust the Almighty will crown our efforts with success. William Wilberforce

One day George Mueller began praying for five of his friends. After many months, one of them came to the Lord. Ten years later, two others were converted. It took 25 years before the fourth man was saved. Mueller persevered in prayer until his death for the fifth friend, and throughout those 52 years he never gave up hoping that he would accept Christ! His faith was rewarded, for soon after Mueller’s funeral the last one was saved.


Sunday, A.M., May 5
Preached in St. Anne’s. Was asked not to come back anymore.
Sunday, P.M., May 5
Preached in St. John’s. Deacons said “Get out and stay out.”
Sunday, A.M., May 12
Preached in St. Jude’s. Can’t go back there, either.
Sunday, A.M., May 19
Preached in St. Somebody Else’s. Deacons called special meeting and said I couldn’t return.
Sunday, P.M., May 19
Preached on street. Kicked off street.
Sunday, A.M., May 26
Preached in meadow. Chased out of meadow as bull was turned loose during service.
Sunday, A.M., June 2
Preached out at the edge of town. Kicked off the highway.
Sunday, P.M., June 2
Afternoon, preached in a pasture. Ten thousand people came out to hear me.
John Wesley From his Personal Diary.


By perseverance the snail reached the ark. C.H. Spurgeon

While women weep, as they do now, I’ll fight; while little children go hungry, I’ll fight; while men go to prison, in and out, in and out, as they do now, I’ll fight; while there is a drunkard left, while there is a poor lost girl upon the streets, where there remains one dark soul without the light of God – I’ll fight! I’ll fight to the very end! William Booth The end of his very last speech.

Christ ceaseth not to work by His intercession with God for us, and by His Spirit in us for God, whereby He upholds His saints, their graces, their comforts in life, without which they would run to ruin. —William Gurnall

Your life is short, your duties many, your assistance great, and your reward sure; therefore faint not, hold on and hold up, in ways of well-doing, and heaven shall make amends for all —Thomas Brooks

If Christ has once possessed the affections, there is no dispossessing of him again. A fire in the heart overcomes all fires without. —Richard Sibbes

When we are foiled, let us believe we shall overcome; when we have fallen, let us believe we shall rise again. Jacob, after he received a blow which made him lame, yet would not give over wrestling (Gen. 32:25) till he had obtained the blessing. So let us never give up, but, in our thoughts knit the beginning, progress and end together, and then we shall see ourselves in heaven out of the reach of all enemies. —Richard Sibbes

Priorities in 09

SO far it is the 14th day of 2009. I have been busy relaxing. That is right, relaxing to the Glory of God. As part of seeking God I have found that to persevere I need to have adequate rest. The way I have afforded such a luxury into my schedule is as follows...

First I assessed what is of value according to God.

Second I realize out of 1 Corinthians 10:13 that God gives us nothing we can't handle without Him, and He has a light yoke. So If I have the too busy syndrome, I must be adding to my schedule what should not be there.

Thus, I have changed my schedule to be priority prioritized rather than goal driven. Some things will just have to wait till I have had time with God. Some days I find I need time with God in the morning, again after running around, and before bed.

Then again, some things are just going to have to be let go altogether. The world has so many distractions that I can't do it all. My time is going to be spent laying up treasures in Heaven and abstaining from futile endeavors. Mind you I will still pause for a good movie with the family, and may play one or two rounds of golf. But the striving to make my house magazine perfect on a dinner napkin budget will just have to go. All in all I am finding the balance of work and relaxation, with ample time for others, all this makes me readily more able to persevere.

Simply put. I am finding much more time for all that is required of me, and the joy that goes with it, when I simply take each day to the presence and glory of God.