Morning Devotional

November 24, 2004
"The Promise of Strength"

by Don Emmitte

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I can never stop thanking God for all the generous gifts he has given you, now that you belong to Christ Jesus. He has enriched your church with the gifts of eloquence and every kind of knowledge. This shows that what I told you about Christ is true. Now you have every spiritual gift you need as you eagerly wait for the return of our Lord Jesus Christ. He will keep you strong right up to the end, and he will keep you free from all blame on the great day when our Lord Jesus Christ returns. God will surely do this for you, for he always does just what he says, and he is the one who invited you into this wonderful friendship with his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. (1 Corinthians 1:4-9 NLT).

The next promise of God is strength. God will keep you strong! Now that’s good news, isn’t it? You may not feel strong today. Perhaps I caught you on one of your “weaker” days. Perhaps you feel as if the proverbial “rug” has been pulled out from under you. Perhaps you feel as though all your strength is gone. I’m quite convinced that some of you are feeling that way today. If not today, some day you will. How do I know? First, I’m an observer of life, so I’ve seen it time and time again. Second, it’s happened to me more times than I can remember. Sure, today I feel pretty strong, but tomorrow another storm may develop that makes me feel like I can’t take another step. But, God promises to “keep you strong”. First, this verse is about position. Positionally, if you are a Christian, then you are “seated with Christ in the Heavenly realms” (cf. Ephesians 2:6). You are a stranger here on earth, because your citizenship is in Heaven (cf. Philippians 3:20). You are a new creation (cf. 2 Corinthians 5:17). You are stronger when you are at your weakest (cf. 2 Corinthians 12:10). You are positionally strong in the Lord. He is living His strength through you.

Second, this verse is about perspective. God told Joshua, when he was about to lead thousands of people into the Promise Land, to “be strong and courageous” (cf. Joshua 1:9). Paul tells us to “be strong” and to “stand firm” in the Lord. Paul indicates what God told Joshua, we must keep the proper perspective on strength. Your help comes from the Lord, the Maker of Heaven and Earth. I don’t know how you see it, but a God who can make the stars and set them in place, form mountains and oceans, create thousands of species of plants and animals, and breathe life into a man has to be pretty powerful! This is the same God who wants to give you strength.

So, you can remain strong, because you already are positionally, if you will keep the proper perspective. A recent television documentary pointed out that the cheetah survives on the African plains by running down its prey. The big cat can sprint seventy miles per hour. But the cheetah cannot sustain that pace for long. Within its long, sleek body is a disproportionately small heart, which causes the cheetah to tire quickly. Unless the cheetah catches its prey in the first flurry, it must abandon the chase. Sometimes Christians seem to have the cheetah’s approach to ministry. We speed into projects with great energy. But lacking the heart for sustained effort, we fizzle before we finish. We vow to start faster and run harder, when what we need may be not more speed but more staying power—stamina that comes only from a bigger heart. Motion and busyness, no matter how great, yield nothing unless we allow God to give us the heart.