Revert to Invert

“When you revert to old ways revert to new truths”

Loren Thornburg

Ever feel like you’re back where you started, like you’ve reverted? Revert is to return to a previous state, condition or practice. You worked so hard to become a better you, only to find you are back in the same struggle, with the same feelings, and now the disappointment too of being back there again when you thought you were moving forward. However, although the feeling may be the same you are not the same. All that you learned and all the ways that you grew that helped you move out of the old place are still there. So you are not in fact right back where you started, even when it looks and feels the same. Instead when you revert you can revert to all you have learned and all that you know is true so that you can invert which is to put in the opposite position. You can turn backwards into forwards as you go back to what is true.

“Now I am deeply discouraged but I will remember your kindness…”
Psalm 42:5 NLT

Discouragement is something we are all familiar with. It comes in all shapes and sizes and the enemy does not hesitate to use it and play off of it. One way he does that is in getting you to feel like all the work that you have done was for nothing and even less than nothing but you wasted your time because now you are back where you started. The enemy would love for you to think that, to become discouraged in feeling like you will never get through it, and to stay in that place even longer. Instead when you feel that you’ve gone back, go back to the Lord, go back to who He is, and go back to the truths He has shown you. For when we go back there we find the hope we need for our discouragement to be inverted into encouragement. Remember the kindness of our Lord!! You are not back where you started!

Expect without Expecting

“Don’t miss your what looking at your how”

Loren Thornburg

An expectation is a strong belief that something will happen. We expect things big and small. Expectations can be good for they include the hopes and dreams of what we believe one day will be. Yet sometimes we miss “what” we hope will be when it comes in ways different than “how” we expected it to. Often our dreams come through the trials of disappointment, our hopes through the pain of loss, and things promised to us beyond the burden of conflict. In the midst of the disappointment, the loss, and the conflict it can be easy to give up on that which we expected or to miss it completely because we expected to come a different way, at a different time, with an easier process. But don’t miss it, even when it gets hard. Keep expecting...Expect dreams to be seen, expect promises to be kept, expect good things to come. Just do it without expecting... don’t expect it to come when you thought, don’t expect it in the way you hoped, and don’t expect it exactly as you envisioned it would be. If you do you might miss it.

“Or were you expecting to see a man dressed in expensive clothes? Those who dress like that live in palaces, not in the wilderness.”

Matthew 11:8 NLT

Jesus is speaking here to the crowds about John the Baptist. He is affirming that John is indeed the one the scriptures referred to as the one who would come before Jesus to prepare the way for Him. But as was true with Jesus they expected him to look differently. They had heard many great promises of a great kingdom to come with a mighty king, savior and defender and they believed that all of these promises would in fact come to pass. However, many people missed it because it looked different than they thought; He looked different than they thought. They were expecting a man dressed in expensive clothes and residing in a palace. I can’t say that I blame them since this is what they knew of a king and so this is what they expected. The same thing is true for us in the promises that God gives us. We expect them to come as they did before or as they did for someone else or as we think would be best. I don’t want us to miss Him or His promises. So keep expecting but in different things...for God to be faithful, to be sovereign and to be good!!

Knowing When

“There is a time to fight and a time to stand still; A time to speak and a time to remain silent; A time to and a time not to...The key is knowing when.”

Loren Thornburg

In watching the Super Bowl I was wishing life had an option for a video review to go back and see what really happened. A chance to change the call that had been made and potentially change the entire outcome of the game. It often seems that sometimes people are getting a different story of what “really” happened. Unfortunately life and most of football doesn’t work like that. Even in football you only get a few opportunities to use the video review option. The key is knowing when to use it. For there is a time to fight the call, but more than not is the time to accept the call and move on. Often times the call is not what actually happened as often times in life we get called things that didn’t actually happen. Yet as in football the key is knowing when to fight it and advocate and when to keep silent. When to move on from the “bad call” knowing that in the game of life we don’t have to fight every time things are misunderstood. Instead we can get up and keep playing knowing that it’s not time to fight, but time to play.

“If anyone attacks you, don’t for a moment suppose that I sent them, and if any should attack nothing will come of it. I create the blacksmith who fires up his forge and makes a weapon designed to kill. I also create the destroyer--but no weapon that can hurt you has ever been forged. Any accuser who takes you to court will be dismissed as a liar. This is what God’s servants can expect. I’ll see to it that everything works out for the best.” God’s Decree.

Isiah 54: 15-17 MSG

He does! God sees that everything works out for the best! Yet if you’re like me you face things that makes this hard to see, hard to believe and hard to trust. And so we try to take matters into our own hands, relying on ourselves to set things straight, not trusting that God will be our justifier. We forget that God really does care for us, He really is shepherding us, even through this time that we face. Reputation and all...He cares for you! Even when life gives us “bad calls” we have the ultimate referee. He always sees it right, always protects, always advocates, always justifies. It may not be as you would do it but it will be for the best!