Locked-up faith!
Verse for Today: Tuesday, December 17, 2013
Acts 5:19 – But during the night an angel of the Lord opened the doors of the jail and brought them out.
The world often creates prison-like situations and locks up God’s children to frustrate them and make them ineffective. The world and its master Satan think that the message of God and its heralds can be locked up to shut them up. These prisons are often places of persecution, suffering, poverty, sickness, misunderstandings, gossip and brutal criticism. Once a person is in one or more of these prison cells, it is very difficult to come out. The enemy does everything possible to weaken us by taking us out of circulation and making it difficult for us to get out. Our prisons give us experiences which are dark and cloudy where we become lonely and friendless. There may not be any one to sympathize with us in these prison cells. Some of our dear friends and associates will even dare to say that these prison cells are God’s punishment in our lives. They add insult to our injuries. When we are thus deeply wounded, Satan will come to whisper that our prison cells are because God doesn’t love us anymore. Perhaps God has His purposes in permitting prison experiences in our lives as in the case of Joseph, Paul and Silas. God uses it to strengthen our faith. But God also opens the doors of prisons to release His children through divine intervention. God can change our prisons into places of victory. He will send His angels to open the strong iron doors of hindrances in our situations. The key to open these strong doors is faith and trust in the Lord. To the shame of the enemy, the Lord gives us peace, patience and praise as He prepares for our release from the prison experiences.
Dear friend, perhaps you are going through prison experiences in your life today. Are you imprisoned by your dark circumstances of poor health, debt, business failure, job loss, false allegations, gossip, and family concerns? For sure, these prison experiences are hard, bitter and painful. The lonely days and nights in the prison cells of situations would caste dark clouds around us, no matter how strong we are. But we can trust in the Lord who knows our situation which He has permitted in our lives for our good and His glory. He will rule and overrule our situations and give us release from our prisons at His time. He will send help at the right time to strengthen us and take us out of our situations. Sometimes it is physical release, but at other times He gives us the release of our spirits from our situations. God’s Word will often be our guide in our prisons until He accomplishes His purposes in our lives through prisons. He gives us hope against hope for a timely divine release and until then, He will fill our hearts with hope and great expectation for an imminent release. God who released Joseph, Peter and the disciples from the prisons will release us also, because He still has missions for us to accomplish outside our prisons. His Spirit will fill our hearts with His Word to give us hope and to fortify our hearts from falling into discouragement. So dear friend, be encouraged. Your help is on the way. Keep hoping for the Lord’s time and His means to come to your help. In the meanwhile pray for faith and patience to wait for Him. Let us use the key of faith to open the prison cells of circumstances and enjoy His peace in spite of the prisons of life.
Psalms 107:14 – He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death and broke their bands apart.
Thought for Today
The school of faith sometimes holds classes in prison cells to teach us great lessons of trust in the Lord.
Prayer for Today
Dear Lord Jesus: Help me to see Your glory shining in my heart and in the prison cells of life that You have permitted in my life. Amen!
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