THIS BROKEN WORLD

by Tammy Phillips
June 20, 2022

Recently, I have been challenged, and asked some hard questions that I could not answer about the promises of God.  Of course, when you ask the Lord, He promises to answer.

“Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.” (Jeremiah 33:3 NKJV)

“He shall call upon Me, and I will answer him; I [will be] with him in trouble; I will deliver him and honor him.” (Psalm 91:15 NKJV)

The Lord does not promise that we will like the answer.  I received a reply to my questions to the Lord from one pastor.  “The world is broken and we want God to be sovereign in a broken world.”    I didn’t ask the question anymore but unsolicited from a second pastor  and a devotion I read , I heard the same, “the world is broken.”

Things break in a broken world. (It’s not a comforting word, but it is the truth.)  The Lord God had a plan to send Jesus into the brokenness and darkness to save us.  He accomplished His plan through Jesus and that is our eternal hope. He saved us. He is saving us, and He will save us.  It is a progressive plan towards eternity.  It is why we have to keep walking by faith. 

Satan hates God.  He hates us, as children of God.  He has other ideas. He wants to dismay us.  He wants to steal from us.  He wants to kill us. He wants to destroy us.  It is his schemes! He wants to throw seemingly insurmountable obstacles in our path.  He wants us to be dismayed and turn our eyes from God.  God has the better design, life eternal with Him.   We cannot lose focus on God nor His eternal perspective.  We have to keep walking by faith.  Sometimes, it’s all we can do.  

There are many things that happen this side of heaven that we will never understand.  I don’t know If we will understand when we are in the very face of Jesus. (Will it even matter then?)  It is at this point where we must choose to step in faith.  We must choose to trust the word of God and turn off the lies of the devil.

Isaiah 41:10 is one of my favorite promises from the word of God, “Fear not, for I am with you; Be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, Yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.”

Pictured above is a coaster from artist, David Arms with Is. 41:10 printed on it.  I thought it was the sweetest little art piece until I dropped in on the floor and broke it to pieces.  I thought it was destroyed.  However,  I loved it so that I picked up the fragments and glued it back together.  This is what God does with our lives.  The little square will never be the same, but it is saved and beautiful in its brokenness.  

He knows we live in this broken world.  However, He gives us hope in His word and tells us:

1. Do not fear.
2. I am with you even though you may not see nor feel Me.
3. Do not be dismayed or look away from Me.
4. Do not be amazed by the destruction of the enemy.
5. He is God.
6. He will give you the strength to breathe and step each day because His mercies are new every morning.
7. He will help you.
8. He will hold you up when it is hard to stand on your own two feet.

I enCOURAGE you to stay and stand in faith.  Do not turn away from Jesus and gaze on the brokenness.  Stay focused on Him.   I heard the Lord clearly say, “CELEBRATE LIFE!  Do not glorify the broken works of the enemy.  Do not be amazed by the evil in this world.  Do not be amazed by the works of our enemy like theft, destruction, sickness, cancer, nor death.  Jesus has overcome these things and as His children we have eternal hope and life in Him.   Celebrate every breath of life.

PS…Big thanks to Pastor Scott Sheppard who answered my call to the Lord  without hesitation.   Pastor Freddy  T. Wyatt and Lysa TerKeurst  spoke  the same words into my life as confirmation and they didn’t even  know it.