Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Standing With You


“Our strength to stand comes by those who stand with us.”
Loren Thornburg
As I stood as a bridesmaid in a wedding of a good friend I was reminded of the importance of those who stand with us.  I love that picture of people standing on both sides of the couple and the implied commitment to stand with them.  It is said that this tradition originated from Roman Law which required witnesses at a wedding to outsmart evil spirits.  Those attending dressed in identical clothing to the bride and groom so that evil spirits would not know who was getting married.  Although we don’t exercise this same practice or belief that we need to outsmart evil spirits there is still a great protection in those who stand with us.  We need people in our lives who are willing to stand with us through the big events and small challenges of our lives.  People can support us when we need it, point us straight when we’re off, encourage us when we feel hopeless, and pick us up when we can’t get up ourselves.  We all need people willing to stand with us and we all need to be people willing to stand with others.  Let’s stand.   
“A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer.”
Ecc 4:12 NLT
We are most vulnerable when we stand alone.  God knew that and He knows that.  He created us to be in relationship with Him and with people.  He created us to stand with others and to allow others to stand with us as well.  It’s in our design.  We weren’t meant to stand alone.  We were meant to stand “back-to-back and conquer.”  God created you to stand with others and to have others stand with you so that we can point one another to Him.  It has always been first about leaning on Him, looking to Him, and relying on Him.  Yet it is also often people that He uses to help us do that.  He uses those around us to represent Him, to be His hand of provision, and to point us back to Him.  We need people standing with us pointing us to Him.  Lets be those people standing, pointing to Jesus.   

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