Welcome to Testify to Grace! I’m so glad you’ve joined me this week. Last week we talked about the importance of sharing our testimonies about the goodness of the Lord. This week I want to talk about the testimony of deliverance and protection. Remember our stories don’t end with our salvation. God is constantly at work in us, transforming us into His image. So there will always be a new story for us to share.
Psalm 91:14 says “Because he has set his love upon Me, therefore I will deliver him; I will set him on high, because he has known My name.” This verse doesn’t mean that your effort to love God is what’s causing the Lord to protect you. Our precious Lord doesn’t work under coercion. What it means is that when we have a relationship with Jesus, when we have chosen Him as our Lord and Savior, we can’t help but love Him. Our love overflows as a response to His love for us. And because of His unmerited favor—which means grace, lovingkindness, and mercy that we can’t earn or deserve—He will deliver us. Even if it’s from a mess of our own making. Doesn’t that give you comfort? Knowing that we can’t do anything to earn or deserve God’s love and favor blows my mind. I don’t think I can tell you how many times the Lord has rescued me. But I have stories about those times! Any time we share a testimony, it must bring honor and glory to God and needs to answer the question, “What has God done?” Has He delivered you or provided protection for you in the midst of danger? God is constantly at work to protect us from evil and therefore danger in our daily lives and in our journeys. Today I’d like to share a testimony with you from a fellow believer who has experienced this deliverance. But first, I’m going to share her testimony of salvation. This is from Marilyn in Georgia. “I gave my heart to Jesus really young. I’m talking like by the time I was 4. It was very, very young. It came about this way: Mother would let me and my sisters come into the church service with her, but in order to keep us quiet and interested, she had a handkerchief she kept in her purse. I had a small child’s ring with a red rose that I loved and wore. If I got restless during the service she gave me the handkerchief and I put it on my left pinky with the ring around it and moved it around. I came up with stories about the handkerchief dancing and swirling. Sometimes it was an angel. That was how she kept me quiet and because I was quiet it meant I was listening. I don’t remember the sermons, but I remember that every time the pastor came to the invitation I cried. Every time. Mother asked me, “Why do you always cry at the end?” I told her, “Because I did that to Jesus.” Later in life when I was reflecting on my salvation, the Lord said to me, “When you came to me you were so young that you don’t remember. You belonged to me and you knew it.” Wow! I was humbled. Greatly humbled and grateful. I knew when He said that I was chosen. And I felt chosen. And the beauty of feeling chosen and knowing you are chosen is knowing exactly how much you are loved. You read you were chosen in the bible, but you don’t get it always. It’s not a concept we really understand but to be told before He made me He knew who I was… is wow. Very overwhelmingly humbling, you know? I’ll never believe that it had anything to do with me or my merits, because I am who I am because that’s how he created me. It gives you a peace with who you are. Being that young I didn’t know how to express it. When I turned 11 my parents sent my older sister Mickey to my bedroom to talk to me. She presented the gospel to me before I got out of bed. I sobbed and sobbed. She said she never knew anyone to cry and asked me why I was crying. I sobbed, I didn’t know I needed to be baptized! I am so sorry Lord.” It sealed it for me that I believed in Jesus as my Savior and Lord. This precious lady knows that the Lord loves her. I mentioned that God is constantly at work to protect us from evil and therefore danger in our daily lives and in our journeys. One of my favorite hymns is “O the Deep, Deep Love of Jesus.” In the second verse it says, “He who loves us, ever loves us, changes never, nevermore; He, who died to save His loved ones, intercedes for them above; He who called them His own people, watches over them in love.” This verse is based on Hebrews chapter 7-8 which says, “For it was fitting for us to have such a high priest, holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners and exalted above the heavens; who does not need daily, like those high priests (meaning the ones in the Old Testament), to offer up sacrifices first for His own sins and then for the sins of the people, because this He did once for all when He offered up Himself. Jesus is our High Priest and He intercedes for us constantly. To intercede is to stand in the gap, to make a defense. Picture a court room where Jesus is standing as our defense attorney and the accuser is trying to make a case against us. When the accuser tells the heavenly Father what evil we’ve done and how unworthy we are, Jesus speaks for us and reminds the Father that we are forgiven because we believe in Jesus and He sacrificed Himself for us. Jesus also takes care of his own. As our High Priest and loving shepherd, He carries us on His shoulders. Psalm 91:11 says, “For He will order His angels to protect you wherever you go. They will hold you up with their hands so you won’t even hurt your foot on a stone.” Listen to how the Lord delivered Marilyn from a dire situation. “I was either 5 or 6 and we not living at the beach, but had taken a trip to the beach. Daddy had both my sister, Mickey, and me and we weren’t too far out in the water. It wouldn’t have been over Mickey’s head to begin with, so not too deep. We were jumping waves. Daddy turned his head and he saw a wave forming the way it’s pictured in movies… like a Hawaiian tidal wave where the water rushes backwards and comes at you. So he got a firm grip on us and started heading us back toward the beach. Mickey later told me it appeared to be twice as tall as Daddy, at least 12 feet. When the first wave hit I was pulled away from him. The force of it pulled me away. He was trying to reach me, but he also had to hang on to Mickey and keep his own balance. I remember I was completely underwater. Then the second wave hit and when it hit it came in hard like a big push. That’s when I heard the Lord’s voice. He said one word to me: “Run!” I started running and I ran and I ran. I was completely immersed in water and my legs were running through the water, not on sand at all. I kept running and running until I ran out on the shore and I ran all the way up to the walkway on the beach. When I finally turned back, they were still in the water and didn’t know I had made it out. Daddy asked “How in the world did you get out? The wave had you.” I told him I was told to run and so I ran. Daddy looked at me and said, “I didn’t tell you that.” Psalm 89:9 says, “You rule the oceans. You subdue their storm-tossed waves.” Praise the Lord! I can only imagine how frightening that must have been for Marilyn, her father, and her sister. But at the same time, what an awesome rescue! Give the Lord praise. Photo by Laura Barry on Unsplash
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Holly DaeMinister, musician, and teacher. Archives
October 2023
Categories |