The Life Giver

A compilation

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Lord, what a change within us one short hour
Spent in Thy presence will prevail to make—
What heavy burdens from our bosoms take,
What parched grounds refresh, as with a shower!
We kneel, and all around us seems to lower;
We rise, and all, the distant and the near,
Stand forth in sunny outline, brave and clear;
We kneel how weak, we rise how full of power!
Why, therefore, should we do ourselves this wrong,
Or others—that we are not always strong;
That we are ever overborne with care;
That we should ever weak or heartless be,
Anxious or troubled, when with us is prayer,
And joy, and strength, and courage, are with Thee?—R. C. Trench

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As he approached the town gate, a dead person was being carried out—the only son of his mother, and she was a widow … When the Lord saw her, his heart went out to her and he said, “Don’t cry.” Then he went up and touched the coffin, and those carrying it stood still. He said, “Young man, I say to you, get up!” The dead man sat up and began to talk, and Jesus gave him back to his mother.—Luke 7:12–151

This widow’s son. Lazarus. The son of the Shunammite.

All of them looked dead. Were dead.

But then in one instant, everything changed.

Life was reintroduced.

Hope was rekindled.

Vitality was restored.

It reminds me of how sometimes in [American] football, the officials will come out after a play or a call has left a team dead in the water. Everything appears hopeless. Thegame or the opportunity looks over. But then after they have looked at the tape, the officials will say, “Upon further review,” and overturn the play or the call. And in one instant, everything changes.

Every dead area of your life is available for further review from God’s life-giving power.

Maybe a relationship in your life just fell apart.

Maybe you lost your job last year.

Maybe you’ve made some terrible mistakes that have cost you a lot of time and opportunity.

It looks like a dead situation.

But it’s not over as long as Jesus is on the scene.

Upon further review, He can restore your relationships.

Upon further review, He can supply all your needs.

Upon further review, He can forgive you and make you whole.

Most of us give up on God too easily.

Don’t lose hope.

With God, nothing in your life is ever beyond its resuscitation point.—Pastor Steven Furtick

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Maybe sometimes the Lord just lets us have a problem so that He can give us the answer. He likes to have us pray and find out we can't always solve all our problems and that we need His help. After all, if we could figure it all out and solve all our problems, we wouldn't need Him. So the Lord lets us have a little problem now and then to show us we need Him and we have to pray. He likes to give us answers to remind us that we're dependent on Him and we need Him. He likes us to appreciate His help and to love Him for it—like a father!—David Brandt Berg2

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People are rushing around out in the wings, like they're busy in the service of the King; but the people here under the central dome just stand there quietly and look up, bathed in that beautiful, beautiful golden glow from above, taking big deep breaths of that heavenly air. … You just cannot go on if you only hurry around all the time in the wings and you never step into the rotunda and look up through the dome, spending quiet time, seeing heavenly visions and breathing heavenly air and hearing heavenly music and voices! It just totally renews you and completely refreshes you and gives you new vision and fresh inspiration, new strength, rest and peace and joy!—David Brandt Berg3

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If you’re always hurrying and rushing around, fretting and impatient, you’ll never be able to focus your full attention—your eyes, your ears, your mind, your heart—on the Lord for the solutions to the problems, the answers to the questions, the best decisions for the situations!

Unless you get quiet and try to seek the Lord, how are you ever going to get anything from the Lord? He says, “Be still, and know that I am God. In quietness and confidence shall your strength be.”4 You’re going to have to get quiet by yourself—somewhere, somehow, sometime—if you’re going to hear from the Lord.

Every great man of God, from Moses to Jesus, had to retreat alone to his mountain for a while in order to have time to meditate, pray, and commune with God. My Lord, if Jesus Himself had to do it, how much more we need to do it! Jesus had to get up at the break of day before His disciples got up and walk out across the hills or up in the mountain to get alone with God and get His orders for the day from His Father.5

If you neglect your fellowship with the King of kings because you’re so busy with the affairs of the kingdom, it can be disastrous to your spiritual life and communion with the Lord! You cannot do the Master’s work without the Master’s power and guidance. And to get it, you must spend time with the Master!

Asking the Lord for the solutions to problems is the easiest way in the world to get them. If you’d spend a little more time praying, you’d probably spend a hell of a lot less time working and trying to get things done!

We all need more quiet time with the Lord in rest and refilling, drinking of the living water of His Word and fellowshipping with Him in the communion of prayer and the sweet lovemaking of the Spirit. It just totally renews you and completely refreshes you and gives you new vision and fresh inspiration, new strength, rest and peace and joy. For “they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; they shall walk, and not faint.”6

“In all thy ways acknowledge Him.”7

The Lord is always right there with you. He says, “I’ll never leave thee nor forsake thee,”8 He’s always there. So it’s never God who’s not there; it’s we who are sometimes not always there, when we run off someplace else and leave Him behind when we forget to pray.

So you need to remember that you cannot possibly solve the multitude of problems that you will encounter in your own wisdom, your own strength, your own mind, your own understanding, your own trying to put two and two together. Jesus said, “Without Me, ye can do nothing.”9

The most important thing in our lives is Jesus and to stay close to Him, to let Him lead and guide us. He’s the one who has got to lead us, because only He can! Without Him we don’t know where we are going or how to get there or anything. But He knows exactly where and how, and all we have to do is just sit in the back seat and let Him drive. He knows where to go and the best way to get there.

He’s promised that if you acknowledge Him, He will direct your paths. He said, “You shall hear a voice behind you saying, This is the way, walk ye in it.”10 So ask the Lord about everything before you do it. Make sure it’s what He wants you to do. Seek Him about everything—every problem, every decision—and He will never fail you or let you down!—David Brandt Berg11

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We dull our understandings with trifles, fill the heavenly spaces with phantoms, waste the heavenly time with hurry. To those who possess their souls in patience come the heavenly visions.—George MacDonald

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Good things as well as bad, you know, are caught by a kind of infection. If you want to be wet you must get into the water. If you want joy, power, peace, eternal life, you must get close to or even into the thing that has them. They are not a sort of prize which God could, if He chose, just hand out to anyone. They are a great fountain of energy and beauty spurting up at the very centre of reality. If you are close to it, the spray will wet you; if you are not, you will remain dry. Once a man is united to God, how could he not live forever? Once a man is separated from God, what can he do but wither and die?—C. S. Lewis12

Published on Anchor July 2012. Read by David Salas.
Music by Michael Dooley.