FEELING FORSAKEN?

While reading last evening I came across 2 Chronicles 32:31 where it is recorded that "God left him (King Hezekiah), to try him, that He might know all that was in his heart." Being "left" by God is not a comfortable experience to someone that knows Him as our only true source of life and wellbeing.



Immediately I thought of the passage in Hebrews where it is also recorded that Jesus said "I will never leave you nor forsake you..." (13:5).



I thought God was the same? yesterday, today, and forever. How can He leave Hezekiah and promise to not leave me? The enemy of our souls can have a field day with us if we allow. The answer to this puzzle is in the definition of the Greek and Hebrew words "left" and "try" and the word "leave" which Christ used in the New Testament.



God left King Hezkiah...the word means to loosen, to permit, to relinquish; to try him, which means God endured with patience with Hezkiah to see how he would act in a certain circumstance. Jesus promised to never leave us nor forsake us. The word leave here means to abandon, to desert us or to cut us loose. He will never do this.



There are seasons in our lives when we go through the furnace of trial; some small everyday decisions and other great trials that can influence our lives forever. How can we know, and most of all God know, if we are making progress along the way unless He leaves us alone, seems to abandon us for a season? Although we may feel this way in a physical or mental sense; He is always with us in the process.



Malachi 3:3 says that God shall sit as a Refiner and purifier of silver; and He shall purify the sons of Levi, (those who are His servants) and He will purge them as godld and silver, that they may offer unto the LORD an offering in righteousness. He scoops off the dross, the impurities, the shortcomings in our life as dross as we go through this refining process. He sits at the heat control and He is the Master Refiner of the Universe.



His Word is purified seven times. Why should we be different if we are His children? Know, and be confident of this eternal fact; He will not lose one that He has chosen. Christ prayed to the Father that He has not lost one; except the son of perdition. He will not lose us!



Malachi 3:16 gives great encouragement that "Then they that feared the LORD spake often one to another: and the LORD hearkened, and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before Him for them that feared the LORD, and that thought upon His Name. And they shall be mine, saith the LORD of Hosts, in that day when I make up My jewels; and I will spare them, as a man spareth his own son that serveth Him."


ALL THINGS work together for the good to those who love God!