Why Do We Doubt God?

Why Do We Doubt God?  

                                       

                                                                                         Return to Main Menu

                                                           To follow A Daily Thought click>>>

Jeremiah 29:11

11For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

<< Jeremiah 29:10Jeremiah 29:11Jeremiah 29:12 >>

Read Jeremiah 29:11 in contextRead Jeremiah 29View in parallelCom

It is not amazing that people have doubts about God. Perhaps in doubting God, very likly we are doubting ourselves.  How can we doubt the very God who is so intelligent that He created this universe and did so in a way that demonstrates that from what science can tell us, the universe is very likey created only for us on this rock we call Earth.  

As humans, we are very adept, very good, and do a very excellent job at setting ourselves up for self-inflicted disappointment in our Creator God.  I do not claim to present here the final word on why we doubt God.  But, here are some thoughts on why we doubt God, these thoughts are simply that, thoughts for your consideration:

A-  If we pray, we pray too much expecting our wants to be supplied and disappointed when they never come.  We have to realize that God is not and never has been in the business of supplying our wants.  If He did, He would be busy 24x7x365 just trying to keep up with our us and our wants.  If God supplied our wants, they would be never ending.  Rather, God is in the business of supplying our needs and supplying those needs when He thinks we need them.  In this, we have to learn to be patient.  And that is so very good for us.

B-  But, again, we set ourselves up for disappointment in our praying just for our needs.  When praying for our real needs we are far too impatient in waiting on our needs to be met.  God provides for us, our needs, in His time.  We must remember that His time, His schedule is not on our time table.   We have to keep this in mind and this is important because if he gave in to us upon our demanding our needs on our time table we would begin to feel entitled to what we need and very likely want more.  God is not in the business of supplying our wants but He does provide for our needs and in faith we have to accept our real needs will come at just the right time.  In patiently waiting on God to fill our true needs, we demonstrate our Trust in God, Trust in our Salvation, and our Trust the Guidance of the Holy Spirit.  Most assuredly, our Love, and in our love, our Trust is God's great desire from us.  It is the same relationship good parents have with their children.  Again, all this is good for us and does not harmus.

C-  Another disappointment we set for ourselves leading to disappointment in God is thinking we have to know everything.   We rightly think that God is in control, but we then often insist on knowing why bad things happen to good people while good things happen to bad people.   God shows He is in control by allowing people to have a lot of control in their circumstances.  That is God's Circumstantial will.  Rarely does God step in and change our circumstances, even when bad people do bad things to us or especially when we behave stupidly.  He wants us to live in faith, not in the fear of His judgment; He wants us to live in the Guidance of the Holy Spirit and not in expectation of His control saving us from our behaving not only badly but also stupidly.  God Loves us, Jesus Saved us, and the Holy Spirit leads us in our daily living.  But, we have to properly respond in love and trusting God.  We fail God, we sin, by creating undesirable circumstances when we fail to Love God, fail in accepting Salvation, fail in Trusting Him with our lives or deny the leading of the Holy Spirit.  But, in all of this, God is still in control.  We can deny Him, we can even say that he does not exits.  It is stupid behavior on our part, but God is God, His genius created this universe, and He is in Control.  With God in control, why do we fail to Trust Him with the very live He created, our own.

D-  In our human condition, our most basic problem is not fully trusting the Creator God of the universe.

Maybe the mistrust comes from a prayer that seems never to be answered.  Maybe we prayed hard for a friend to live that was involved in a terrible accident, and died.  There are many bad circumstances that come to us, we pray, and our answers often do not come as we prayed.  We have to understand, that in Faith, God rarely changes our circumstances just to satisfy our prayers; but leads us through our prayers and through our Trust of Him to survive our circumstances.  But again, the reality, is that if we mistakenly think God fails us then it is because of our misplaced selfish expectations in our circumstances.

----------- Comment---------

We have misplaced expectations because we fail to understand His plan for us.  We fail to understand His plan for us because we fail to properly seek His plan for us.  And then, if we seek His plan for us, we often do not like it because it is so in conflict with our own idea of what we think His plan for us should be!  

Because if we think His plan for us is not good or unreliable it is because we do not trust Him.  We just come to the mistaken conclusion that God is unreliable.

Because we think God is unreliable we doubt Him.

We doubt and we do not Trust God primarily because of just one element in our lives- our sin - and especially the sin of  our selfishness.

We all have to get past our selfishness, seemingly for many of us, everyday.  Pray, often everyday for the Holy Spirit to lead you from selfishness and to Trusting God.  In being born with a will to survive, it helps keeps us alive, but out of that will to survive we develop selfishness.  And that selfishness also kills us and can destroy our relationship with God.  Pray daily for the Holy Spirit to continually lead you, lead you in all you think, say, and do; lead you to Trusting God, and Trusting His plan for you.

Do not bargain with God, it is an attitude of arrogance.  Trusting God begins in our daily Prayers, humble prayer, prayer without specific expectations, prayer in seeking what God wants for us to do with our lives, prayers for the Guidance of the Holy Spirit, above all, prayers in humbleness. 

Humble prayers, they will change your life.

"To have the Holy Spirit in your heart you must pray.... and pray...... and pray........everyday... often........ often everyday.

Seek and feel the Guidance of the Holy Spirit by praying.  Pray for the Holy Spirit to Guide you in everything you think, say and do.  This my friend, will change your life.

Thanks be to God.

TB2G

© lonnie coggins

Please Join 'A Daily Thought Group' on Facebook.  
It is designed to be an uncluttered library of only ‘A Daily Thought’ postings.  

 Thanks and God Bless.

Click Here to go to  "A DAILY THOUGHT GROUP"

   Return to Main Menu

==============================

Sharing these messages

You are welcome to share these messages.  You can send the links to your friends,  copy and insert the link on FB or you can print the message and share it with your friends.

You can print the message including this sharing message only for your friends and for non-profit.  You will have to copy and paste the message to a word processing document.   After you copy and paste add the following at the end of the message:

© Lonnie Coggins
ldcoggins@gmail.com

If you desire to use any of these messages in a For-Profit manner you must contact me (email) for permission.  Typically, I will most likely give permission.

Please email me if you find any broken links in this message.

lonnie

Publication  0202

intro
God has a plan for us, we must seek it, embrace it, and Trust Him as He unfolds it before us.  Click the link so read why it is so hard to do so.   You can share the message on your Fb page as you like, and if you like, click the FB 'Follow' button to have notifications of these publications.
http://lonnieadailythought.blogspot.com/2014/01/why-do-we-doubt-god.html

Forgiving Others

Forgiving Others

                                       

                                                                             Return to Main Menu

Sin is a part of our lives from the very beginning.  We may think we are pretty good.  The fact is, we maybe pretty, but 'good', only God is good. 

I once struggled with what we are taught in Psalm 51:5, see below.  Since God made us, how is it we are made sinful?  But, I do believe this is the inspired word of God, just as all of the Bible.  So, I have to seek to understand or at least think about its purpose.

There are other ways to look at the source of our sin, but one helpful way is to understand a purpose of our sinfulness we are born with.  It certainly seems we are born with a survival instinct and programmed with the desire, perhaps a selfish desire for self preservation, and according to Psalm 51:5, this begins at the time of conception.  Certainly, when we come into this world, we are crying, demanding, and maybe screaming with great desire for our needs to be met.  You might not want to consider this sin, but at some point very soon in our lives, our crying and demanding become selfish sinfulness if we are not taught differently.  The net result is the same- we are selfish sinful people, and we have to accept it, get over it, and seek to become the patient people God intends us to be.

From that moment of crying, we begin an education of leaning to be patient and forgiving if our whims, needs, and wants are not met in accordance with our time table or desire.  The problem is some people do not get a very good education and their cries, demands, and screams become not for just their needs but more so for their wants.  We all have to learn to fight the temptation to impatiently demand our wants and be patient in receiving our needs.  Herein lies much of our sin against others and God.  Self-centered demand of our wants inhibits our ability to form and maintain relationships;  in that, it affects our happiness and joy in life.

Learning to forgive others is perhaps, one of the hardest behaviors we do.  For most people, loving God is far easier than loving others, but, it is the command of Jesus that we do both- forgive and love.  But, best of all, Jesus is right and He showed us the way.  In His death on the cross He showed us love, in His life He demonstrated love, and in His resurrection, God verified the Truth of Jesus' love and His words.

Jesus' command to love others survives the "acid test" of living life.  In the western world, we live in a throw away society that goes by one acid test: 
               'IF something works, we keep it and use it; 
                if it does not work, we simply throw it away."

Loving others works for us and is truly good for us!

Loving others begins by forgiving them of their sins against us.  What others do against God is not so much our business,  
      our business is dealing with what others do against us.

In your everyday life, you would not pick up a 25 pound bag (say 10 kilos) of sand and carry it around on your back because it felt good and heavy, and then add to it.  Well, not forgiving others is worse.

Oh, sometimes we like to harbor our dislike for what others have done to us.  We even cultivate it by throwing it in their face from time to time dumping on them,  "Remember when you ..."  every time we can.  It supposedly makes us feel better to make them feel bad.

Very often, we are the most harmed by this behavior and become our own worst enemy.  This behavior of unforgiveness is like that bag of sand.  In many ways, it gets heavier and heavier and we eventually collapse under its weight.  And, then we do not understand why we feel depressed.  

The irony of that baggage is that many people might not remember events the way we think we remember them.  They just put the conflict behind them, or maybe they apologized and we were just too unforgiving to remember or accept the apology.  In these instances, the other person has put the whole incident behind them, and rightly or wrongly no longer considers the issue.  So, in our unforgiveness, we are the only ones who suffer, and can suffer greatly in our own self-inflicted depression.

Forgiving the sins of others-

     it works.  

Forgiving others works in that 

     it lightens the baggage of our burdens, 

     it removes our barriers to friendships and 
  best of all,

     it builds our relationship with God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit.

Jesus tells us to love and forgive others.

He really did know what was and is good for us and our eternity.

But, there is one more thing to consider:

     We have to learn to forgive ourselves and 
      that can be the hardest lesson of all.  

Ask God, He will forgive you,
      so move on from your sin by forgiving yourself.

Life is much more full of Joy 
       when there are no barriers 
           between you and your relationship with God.

Mark 11:25 NIV

• "And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive him, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins. "
  Read Mark 11 | View in parallel | Compare Translations
  
  

  John 20:23 NIV

  "If you forgive anyone his sins, they are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven."

  Read John 20 | View in parallel | Compare Translations

Thanks Be to God

© lonnie 

Follow

                                                   Return to Main Menu

==============================

Sharing these messages:

You are welcome to share these messages.  You can send the links to your friends,  copy and insert the link on Facebook or Christian.com or you can print the message and share it with your friends.

You can print the message including this sharing message only with your friends and for non-profit.  You will have to copy and paste the message to a word processing document.   After you copy and paste add the following at the end of the message:

© Lonnie Coggins
ldcoggins@gmail.com

If you desire to use any of these messages in a For-Profit manner you must contact me (email) for permission.  Typically, I will most likely give permission.

lonnie coggins

author, editor

"A Daily Thought"

Psalm 51

1Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassionblot out my transgressions.2Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.3For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me.4Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge.5Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.6Surely you desire truth in the inner parts; you teach me wisdom in the inmost place.7Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.8Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice.9Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity.10Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.11Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me.12Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.13Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will turn back to you.14Save me from bloodguilt, O God, the God who saves me, and my tongue will sing of your righteousness.15O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise.16You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.17The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.18In your good pleasure make Zion prosper; build up the walls of Jerusalem.19Then there will be righteous sacrifices, whole burnt offerings to delight you; then bulls will be offered on your altar.

<< Psalms 50Psalm 51Psalms 52 >>

View in parallelCompare Translations


Publication 167

A Random Thought on Self-Control

A Random Thought on Selfish Self-Control
                                       

                                                                                         Return to Main Menu

We are not created to selfishly control and direct every event and activity influencing our lives. 

God gives us the ability to affect much of our lives.  But, there is so much influence, both good and bad, from other people and nature that we have absolutely no ability to change, affect, or control that influence and its effect on what we think, do, and feel.

Far too often, events acting on our lives for which we have no control can lead us into worry.  One of Jesus' commands was to not worry.  What He said was good for the people who heard it,  is still good and righteous for us today, and will positivly guide our future!

Matthew 6:31-34

31 So do not worry, saying,         'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?'32 For the pagans run after all these things, and         your heavenly Father knows that you need them.33  But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and        all these things will be given to you as well.34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow,              for tomorrow will worry about itself.         Each day has enough trouble of its own.
Jesus tells us not to worry.  The Truth of that comes in the fact that everything He said, did, taught, and thought was verified by His Resurrection!  
We MUST Trust His Truth and His Commands to us.
Therefore, worry becomes sinful because it puts a barrier between us and Trusting God.  We can be concerned, but excessive concern that is worry over things we cannot control is sinful.  It is as selfishly telling God, "I will not Trust you to help me through this worry!"
Jesus had another command for us:John 14:1Jesus Comforts His Disciples
1"Do not let your hearts be troubled.          Trust in God; trust also in me."
It is hard to Worship God to your fullest when you are worried. Seek to be concerned about the things you can change, pray for wisdom to make the change, and lift the rest to Him in Trust.

Thanks be to God

lonnie

For more on worry click:

        Eliminating Worry from Your Life

   Return to Main Menu

==============================

Sharing these messages

You are welcome to share these messages.  You can send the links to your friends,  copy and insert the link on FB or Christian.com or you can print the message and share it with your friends.

You can print the message including this sharing message only for your friends and for non-profit.  You will have to copy and paste the message to a word processing document.   After you copy and paste add the following at the end of the message:

© Lonnie Coggins
ldcoggins@gmail.

If you desire to use any of these messages in a For-Profit manner you must contact me (email) for permission.  Typically, I will most likely give permission.

lonnie 

Thoughts on the Danger of What "I" Can Do

Thoughts on the Danger 
   of What "I" Can Do
                                                                                                                    Return to Main Menu  

Follow

For a long time in my life I thought I was a pretty smart guy.  
While in the Air Force "I" did some really neat stuff,  "I" was successful in business and teaching careers.  

"I", at age 24, developed for a Vietnam combat required emergency the navigation techniques to air-drop a 2000 lb bundle from 10,000 feet and consistently hit the leading edge of a soccer field.  

"I", as a young first lieutenant took that airdrop project to Vietnam, trained about 20 other crews how to do it and helped save the lives of 300 soldiers surrounded by 40,000 bad guys.  One of the best job activities I have ever been a part of.

"I" 'saved' my crew one monsoon rainy, stormy night, when almost out of gas and no visibility outside the cockpit of our C-130 plane, and ground control could not 'paint' our airplane because of the storm, "I" used "my" navigation skills, "my" talent, and "my" abilities to talk the pilot to the runway.  The pilot never saw the runway until I told him to flare (pull up) the nose and settle the plane for landing.

"I" started and had a successful business.

"I" was a good middle school teacher.

"I" did a lot of unusual stuff very successfully in my life.

BUT,

     my first night in Vietnam I was so scared of dying that I knew that on the next day I would not be able to function.  It was staggering great responsibilities I felt for what I had ahead of me the next day.  For some reason, that night I prayed, something I had not done in years.  In that prayer God relieved my burden and the next day "I" started implementing the air drop procedures and process described above.

In those next days, "I" also forgot about what God did for me.  It took me 37 years to come full circle to realize and came to understand that "I" had done nothing.  I had also prayed about how to do the process of dropping those bundles on the soccer field and God had shown me the way.  God truly showed me how to do that airdrop procedure, God relieved me of my burdens and then, .. I forgot about Him! Stupid, Stupid, Stupid.

If I have learned anything in this life, 

whatever it is that we do, 

we do more if we allow God to direct our lives.  

In my lowest moments in those days now 41 years ago, 

God, 

when requested through prayer, 

lead me to the solutions,
calmed my heart
and helped me save many people.

It often comes to mind that I could have done so much more in those 37 intervening years if I had prayed daily as earnestly as I prayed in those days of the Spring of 1972.  Prayers came to me from time to time, mostly in times of crises and I prayed often when teaching my SS class, praying for Guidance of my words.  But, only on the rare occasion of a crises in my life did I pray.  I do not remember praying about business decisions, family decisions, even if I should teach middle school.

On our own, we may do some good things with our life.  But, I thank God He showed me His power in those prayers in those hard days of 1972 and what He can do through me when I allow Him to guide me.  Again, I regret it took 37 years for me to realize that "I" is dangerous.

It is my testimony that the biggest problem of achieving our greatest accomplishment is one little word, "I".  God gives us our brain and its capabilities, he give us life and the breath to sustain live, He gives us the desire and will to do our best, and everything else we have.  We owe to Him everything we accomplish, for without Him we truly are not much more than dust, at best we are dirt, and maybe not even good dirt.  In giving everything we do to His Glory, He will give us more opportunities to serve Him.

A most simple direct example-- I do not consider myself much of a writer, but, when I allow Him to guide my words, some good words are on this page.  Maybe I am "wordy", maybe I mispell a word, drop a comma, maybe a hanging participle lingers around, maybe sometimes I do not even make a bit of sense, but I try my best, seek His guidance, and it seems to work.  All this, from a me, a guy that required three semesters to complete freshman college English Composition.

I appreciate you, my readers, for your encouragement. I write what I feel moved to write and a good many of you seem to like it, take the time to read, feel moved by it, and then feel encouraged to do more.

My testimony, "Seek ye first His Kingdom...", letting God guide you to where He wants you to be, and you and those around you will be the better for it.  (Matthew 6:33)

Above all, do not let "I", your inborn self-centered selfishness, get in your way of what you should be doing and being what God has planned for you.  Pray and pray and pray for the guidance of the Holy Spirit, and God will build your faith as the Holy Spirit guides your life into far greater accomplishment than what only "I" can do.

"I" is perhaps the most dangerous word we use to cloud our lives, hinder our vision, and hold us back in our doubts.  "Seek first the Kingdom", it is, after all, a command of Jesus!  

We truly are strongest and at our greatest potential,
when we humble ourselves to God 

asking for His guidance in all we accomplish for Him.

Thanks be to God,
lonnie

Follow

Return to Main Menu

Wants and Needs Control our Lives

Wants and Needs Control our Lives  

                                                                            Return to Main Menu                          

   Fighting for what you want
         is a sure path 
            to unhappiness. 

Living in God's grace depending on Him to supply your needs brings abundant joy to the heart that only God can so graciously provide.  Learning to discern your needs from your wants is a life long journey with the Holy Spirit guiding your path.  WANTS are circumstancial in the everyday environment we find ourselves;  they change with the wind, grow with being met, and ultimately lead to self-distruction when you live life depending on your selfish self-confidence.   Persistent pursuit of our wants only leads to a life in chaos, but God's joy in our hearts brings peace to our lives.  

Pray for your needs to be met, it's ok to be specific, but end your prayers as Jesus did, "Not my will, but yours be done."

To have the Holy Spirit in your heart,
 "pray and pray and pray.... everyday".....
                                                especially for others.

Matthew 16:25 NIV [Jesus Speaking]

For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it.

Thanks be to God

lonnie

                                      Return to Main Menu

Publication 136