Gary Gleans

There are times when it seems that God has turned His back on us for no reason whatsoever.  It is important for us to realize that this is only the way that things seem.  The reality is that God has not truly abandoned us and that we truly have sinned against Him so that even if He did turn His back on us, He would be totally justified.  Our perspective of life is always skewed by our sin and our ability to understand God and His ways is always limited because of our fallen state of humanity.  We must strive to gain God’s perspective and we must learn to trust in Him even when we do not understand His ways.  It is not our place to question and doubt the ways of the Lord in our lives.  It is our job to honor and praise Him in all of the circumstances we face. WE MUST PRAISE GOD WHEN WE REMEMBER HIS FAITHFULNESS: There is no lack of evidence for the faithfulness of God to Israel or to any of us for that matter.  God had set the nation free from slav...

For the rest of this week I will be without internet access so my next post will be on Monday.  May the Lord richly bless and keep you.

We live in an oppressive world, surrounded by oppressive people, in territory that has been dominated by and oppressive devil; even our own hearts have been oppressed through the sinful nature we possess.  There are times when we will feel completely overwhelmed by the oppression that comes from any one or all of these sources.  Then, to make matters worse, during those times of oppression we often get the feeling that God is rejecting us.  This feeling is not a correct feeling and does not reflect reality, but that does not make it feel any less real.  When these feelings begin to overwhelm us we must cry out to the Lord as the psalmist does in this passage and then set our hearts on these two commands. WE MUST BE LED BY THE TRUTH OF GOD’S WORD: Satan is the father of lies and he will constantly try to oppress with by convincing us to believe things that are not true.  If we listen to his lies we will quickly become paranoid and think that everyone is out ...

Depression is an all too common reality in today’s world.  There are many causes of depression ranging from physical illness and personal loss to pride and our own sinfulness.  No matter what started the original descent down the road of depression the result of it is an intense feeling that God is small and that people are large.  This backwards way of thinking only complicates our lives even more and the spiral down to the depths of despair goes even further.  Fortunately, God knows all about our hearts and He can not only see our problems, both spiritual and physical; but He can also provide the solutions that we so desperately need.  Through the power of God’s Spirit and the instruction of His Word we do not need to be overcome by depression.  God can give us victory as we obey Him no matter how we feel. WE MUST RECOGNIZE THAT WE ARE DEPRESSED: As children we all learned to use our imaginations.  We would cover our eyes and pretend that others...

Sickness is both frightening and frustrating.  When we are sick it is easy for us to become fearful because we tend to project our present circumstance onto the future so we fear that an illness may just get worse and worse until we die.  Nobody plans on getting sick.  We all plan our lives assuming that we will have good enough health to be able to perform the tasks that we have planned.  When illness prevents us from doing what we have planned to do we tend to get frustrated by our lack of productivity.  The thing that we want the most when we are sick, besides healing, is compassion.  We long for someone who will help to encourage us, comfort us so that we are not overcome by fear or overwhelmed with frustration.  God is compassionate and He is honored when His children imitate His character by showing compassion to others.  Unfortunately, not everyone is like that and there are many people who are inconsiderate and only make things worse for ...

God is our Rescuer.  We are in a desperate situation because of our sin but God’s grace is greater than our sin and He rescues all those who trust Him.  We are often reluctant to recognize our own plight and have a hard time admitting that we are in need of rescue.  Our tendency is to deny our sin, rationalize our sin or think that there is some way that we deliver ourselves from sin.  This is foolishness.  God is our only hope but He insists that we trust Him to rescue us instead of thrashing about in our futile efforts to save ourselves on our own merit.  Like a lifeguard who waits for the object of his rescue to be rendered unconscious before he attempts to help; God waits for us to surrender our efforts that He might lift us up in His time.  This Psalm is quoted in Hebrews as referring to Christ awaiting resurrection.  Our rescue was bought through the death and resurrection of Christ.  However, when we read this Psalm from a Messianic p...

Perspective is vital to being able to live in a way that pleases the Lord.  We all view life from our own perspective, but what many of us fail to realize is that our perspective is skewed.  Things are really not as they seem to us.  If we want to please God with our lives we must strive to gain His perspective on our lives, the circumstances we face and the reality of our sin.  We must understand who we are in light of who He is.  We all have a tendency to be self-absorbed and egotistical but we must fight that perspective and set our hearts upon the Lord.  One of our most common prayers should be for the Lord to grant us the ability to live our lives in light of His perspective.  This is not easy nor is it natural so we must depend on Him and cry out to His so that we might be enlightened by Him. WE MUST PERCEIVE THE FUTILITY OF MAN: We may have the best of intentions and the greatest determination but our reality is that we are very week. ...

There are grave and serious consequences for sin.  Satan would have us believe that sin is only pleasurable and that we will enjoy sin greatly.  The truth is that the pleasures of sin are only passing but the consequences of sin are not only torturous but also very long lasting.  Fortunately, there is a means of being released from the consequences of sin which is through repentance and confession of sin to God and faith in the work of Christ on the cross.  No matter how great our sin or heavy the consequences we face may seem, God stands ready to forgive us and deliver us from our sin.  However, we must constantly consider the consequences of sin so that we might be motivated to do all that we can to avoid them. SIN BRINGS THE WRATH OF OUR FATHER: The greatest consequence that we face because of sin is that it places us under the wrath of our Father in heaven.  He hates sin and His wrath towards sin burns long and hot.  He turns away from sinners...

Sorry that I missed last week, I was traveling and did not have internet service so just decided to take the week off. We continue working through Psalms this week.  God bless.

There are many different kinds of people on the earth but for the most part they can be divided into two groups: those that fear the Lord and those that do not.  It is difficult for us to think of these two groups coexisting but that is the way that God has planned it.  Conflict between these two contrasting groups is inevitable but that should not be our main concern.  We must recognize that God has all of this under control and He will make sure that all is well in the end.  The structure of this Psalm is very creative.  It is and acrostic with every new phrase beginning with a new letter of the Hebrew alphabet.  The poem is organized by its content in an inverse order or as a chiasmus with the first verse matching the last verse in content, the second verse matches the second to the last verse in content etc…  The message of this Psalm should be a great comfort to all who fear the Lord. DON’T FRET HAVE FAITH: In the face of adversity we all hav...

We live in a world that is cursed by sin and inhabited by sinful men; however, while we live in this world we are under the care of the all mighty God who is loving and gracious towards us.  These two contrasting realities should give us cause for sober mindedness as well as bring us great comfort.  It is important that we remember both of these truths in order to maintain a proper balance in our lives. If we focus only on God’s love we will be easy prey for the evil men around us and we will be far more likely to fall into their traps or be overcome by temptation for which we are unprepared.  If we focus only on man’s sin we will become overwhelmed with anxiety and fear.  We must learn to live in this world as it is and not according to our wishful thinking.  One day we will be free from all evil and sin but that day is not yet upon us.  Until them we must strive to keep a proper balance in our minds. THE REALITY OF EVIL MEN SHOULD WARN US: There are ...

God rescues His children from the worst possible circumstances and disappointment.  We live in a world that is under the curse of sin.  Sin surrounds us on every side as it infects the hearts of men all around us.  Were it not for the grace and power of God we would drown in the sea of sin the surrounds us; but God is a rescuer.  He sees our plight and is filled with mercy and compassion and He delivers of from evil.  We should always feel free to plead with the Lord for rescue.  It is foolish and prideful to think and acts as if we are capable of handling things on our own.  God is pleased and honored when we cry out to Him because it demonstrates our dependence upon Him.  We may be attacked from a wide variety of different sources for many different reasons, but the one thing that is always consistent is the grace of God and His ability to rescue us from their traps when we call out to Him.  However, when He does rescue us, we must be fait...

Our experiences with God should have two effects on our lives.  First of all, it should increase our faith as we experience the blessings that God grants us even though we do not deserve them.  We should praise the Lord, have great confidence in Him and be motivated to obey Him.  He has proven Himself faithful to us; we must demonstrate faithfulness to Him.  The second effect it should have is that we should be eager to tell others about what He has done.  Good news is always to be shared with the people around us.  God blesses us that we might in turn be a blessing to others as we help them see the grace of trusting God.  We will experience even greater blessings as we share about God’s goodness and grace to others. WE ARE TO PRAISE GOD’S DELIVERANCE: David wrote this Psalm at a very critical moment in his life.  He was being chase by Saul so he took refuge in the land of Israel’s enemies.  David had fought this very nation on many occa...

The power and love of God are clearly demonstrated all around us.  We see it in the world that He has made and we see it in his care on a daily basis.  God has revealed Himself to us through the world he created as well as His Word.  Our hearts should respond to His revelation with praise, thanksgiving, obedience, fear, hope, joy and trust.  What we know and learn about God should cause a reaction in our hearts.  We must not ignore what God has revealed or allow our knowledge of Him to only inform our minds without transforming our hearts.  What we know and observe about God should fill our mouths with songs of praise, fill our hearts with joyful faith and fill every member of our bodies with grateful obedience. WE WORSHIP THE LORD BECAUSE HE CREATED THE EARTH: All that we see around us was created by God.  The more our knowledge of the universe grows, the more astounding God’s creation becomes in our minds.  As we observe the minute details ...

The greatest gift that any person can receive is the gift of forgiveness.  Since all of us have sinned, forgiveness is a gift that all of us desperately need.  Unfortunately, many times our pride convinces us that we do not need forgiveness and we do not seek for forgiveness or even admit that we need it.  We cannot earn forgiveness and can really do nothing to deserve forgiveness, but forgiveness in not unconditional.  God does not simply forgive all of the sins of all of humanity.  His forgiveness is conditional upon our willingness to recognize our sin, our faith in Christ to cover our sin and our repentance of our sin.  There are terrible consequences for sin and apart from forgiveness those consequences remain over every person on the face of the earth. CONCEALED SIN CAUSES PAIN: Our first reaction when we sin is to pretend that it never happened or try to rationalize our sin in such a way that we convince ourselves that it was nor really sin in t...