Bruised Reeds and Smoking Flax
by Pam Worsey
Has
Father taken you down to the Potter’s House lately?
He often takes me there. Have
you been broken on the wheel of life until you wonder just what is happening to
you? Then maybe, just maybe, the
Holy Spirit will have a word of strength and comfort to whisper to your soul as
you read on. There will be nothing
new in what you read, no deep theological teaching; I’m incapable of anything
remotely like that, but sometimes, the way God has led, supported and comforted
another, can be just the strengthening word we need as we face life’s
struggles. So may I just tell of a
few things He has taught me through the wilderness experiences we must all go
through for Christ to be formed in us, and share some of the comfort He desires
to bring to some for whom this article is written.
Are
you thinking that you must be especially sinful for God to have to treat you so
apparently harshly, and that maybe He isn’t able to love you as much as that
sweet Christian you so admire, because there is so much wrong with
you? God’s answer is
that when we were all still dead in our sins, Christ died for us, (Rom.5:8).
Do you remember how it was the Holy Spirit led Jesus, full
of the Holy Spirit, into the
wilderness, so empowering Him through the experience that He came out full of
the power of the Spirit, (Luke
4:1&14) ?
The same Holy Spirit says to us through the words of Hosea in (Ch.2:14-15)
that it is God who allures us into our wildernesses, so that there, in those
very desert experiences, He can ‘speak tenderly’ to us, in ways which would
never be possible without. Do you
hear the loving invitation of the Father through those words, spoken - just to
you? He it is who invites us
down to the Potter’s House or into the wilderness, where He can minister to us
in our brokenness in ways we never dreamed possible.
We can choose not to be broken if we so wish, but we do so at our peril,
for it is these very breaking experiences, when God moulds and reshapes us, that
He uses to keep us soft and pliable in His gentle, loving Hands.
To refuse to be broken leaves us hard, unbending and possibly therefore
unusable. Jesus invites us to take
up our Cross and follow Him.
Do
you remember Job’s words? “When
He has tried/tested me, I shall come forth as gold”!! (Job 23:10) and “Though He slay me, YET will I trust/hope in
Him”! (Job 13:15) This is so true.
There are many crucibles in life that God chooses and uses to burn off
our dross. Maybe you, or
someone very dear to you is seriously ill at the moment and knowing Jesus heals,
you cannot understand why you still suffer.
God’s timing and purposes are different from ours, but as He gently and
lovingly moulds us more to His ways, glimmers
of understanding begin to come; and how quickly He responds to the cry of His
feeble children as we pray for grace to persevere while praising, and to love
while learning. Maybe yours
is the crushing experience of bereavement or divorce, when tenderly and gently
the Holy Spirit would come alongside to strengthen, whispering those wonderful
words “A bruised reed He will not break, and a smouldering flax He will not
snuff out” (Is.42:3) Sometimes God uses the misunderstandings of others
to gently break and remake us, and these can be particularly devastating,
especially when they come, as they so very often do, through other Christians.
Again He comes alongside to reassure of His unfailing love and that
everything He allows to happen, has had to pass through the sifting of that
love, so will therefore be part of His plan to perfect us.
How can we learn to react with love, grace, forgiveness and humility
unless we pass through these fires. Grapes
have to be crushed for the juice to be extracted in readiness for a delicious
wine. Doesn’t this remind us of our Blessed Saviour, who suffered so terribly
and whose Precious Blood flowed for us, even as His Body was broken.
We follow a Saviour with
scars Who so understands our woundedness.
Jesus was wounded for us let us remember.
For
some, financial disasters or loss of employment might be the wilderness through
which you are now being led, as Father teaches the lesson of total dependence on
Him, even as He led the children of Israel through a desert, where their food
and water had to be supernaturally supplied.
We serve the same Lord today.
He hasn’t changed, and He is longing for us to develop a simple
child-like trust in His loving care and provision. After all, Jesus did tell us to seek first His Kingdom
and all these things would be added.
He knows our physical needs as He created us, and we have yet to move in
true faith as a Church, totally trusting the Lord.
Lord we believe, help our unbelief we pray.
One
of the most difficult wildernesses through which the Lord takes us is that of
apparently unanswered prayer. Surely
all prayer is answered, even if it has to be with a ‘no’, but Father knows
best, and sometimes, when He seems to be withdrawing His blessings, turning a
deaf ear and appears to our limited
finite minds, to be displeased with us, we may actually be passing through a
time of greatest blessing. How can we grow strong in Him, strong in faith and
character, unless that character is tested to what may seem to us beyond our
limits? It isn’t, because Divine love is taking us through the test and
‘you’ll never walk alone’ as the song says, or better still, in the words
of Jesus, “Lo, I am with you always” (Matt.28:20b).
We are also told in (Heb.13:5b)
that God has said, “Never will I leave you, never will I forsake you”.
What promises! Maybe someone
reading this today, just needs to hear those words afresh in the difficult
circumstances in which you find yourself.
It
could be, that having read the above, and not having experienced many of
life’s blows, an element of fear might try and creep in as you wonder what
awful thing you have yet to go through.
Fear is not of God, except the healthy
fear which protects us from danger.
If Father knows we have need of refining in a certain way for the work He
desires to do through us and for Christ to be more
fully formed in us, He can be trusted to do it in the right way and at the right
time in our lives.
So,
as we gather these thoughts together, let us remind ourselves that we gain
strength for the times ahead through being broken and breaking is NOT evidence
that God hates us, but of His love for us!
“Those whom He loves He chastens” (Heb.12:6) He cares so much that He longs to refine, purify and
perfect us so that He can use us for His Glory! Jesus, is the pure and perfect Son of God as we all
know, yet we are told, “Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from what
He suffered” (Heb.5:8) Can
we expect less? In the psalms
we read, “Before I was afflicted, I went astray, but now I obey Your Word. You are GOOD and what You do is GOOD” (Ps.119:67-68)
Lord,
take us down to the Potter’s House, or into the wilderness with You. Help us
to be pliable in Your Hands and obedient to Your will without reservation,
knowing Your way is always best. Everything You do is love, even when we do not
understand You.