Proverbs 13:12 (Message) – “Unrelenting disappointment leaves you heartsick, but a sudden good break can turn a life around.”

We’ve all heard the expression “It’s better to have loved and lost than never have loved at all”, right? But is it true?

Each of us has desires, secret or publicly spoken of that drive us. Some of them we can hold on to for years if not a lifetime. At the same time, most, if not all of us have had dreams and desires crushed by life, too.

Love is certainly one of them. With slightly less than 40% of marriages ending in divorce, there is certainly evidence that where love once existed, there is now something less. But I believe most marriages begin with a desire for unconditional love that lasts.

I’m sure that you, like me have met plenty of people who loved, lost and lament having loved at all. For a moment, think of those in your life who were divorced at some point. When the tell the story, do they focus on the good times or only the bad ones?

Business and work are places where many dreams and desires reside. Whether it’s hoping for a great, fulfilling career or a business that will one day make you financially free or even one that leaves its mark on society – lots of desires live there.

When it doesn’t work as hoped, many are crushed. Some never recover. No matter what, lessons were learned, skills were improved and relationships were established. Which then should we base our story on?

Many years ago I learned that what ever I chose to focus on was expanding. If I focused on my problems, it was a virtual certainty that I’d get more of them. But if I chose to focus on the good things I got more good things as a result.

And I think that’s what Solomon was trying to tell us in his Proverb above. He was reminding us that problems come and problems go. To FOCUS on them (a conscious choice) would make us sick.

To choose instead to focus on the lessons learned, the relationships formed and the opportunities not yet explored leaves us in a position to get a “good break”. And that break could be the one to turn our lives around.

Jeremiah 29:11 – “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”

Let’s start today with a simple premise, but one that is foundational to what I’d like to share with you. God cannot (and will not) lie. His nature is pure and for that reason, he’ll never lie to us about any aspect of our lives.

It’s a tough one to swallow because most of us interact with other humans who seem to be hardwired much differently. Friends and family members lie to us all the time. Our government lies to us constantly. TV news is now often regarded to be “fake”. People in business dealings don’t tell us what to really expect, then lie and blame others when cornered with the facts.

You’ve experienced all of this in your life, right?

It’s a challenging situation because for as long as we’ve been believers, we’ve been told that “man is made in God’s image.” If this is so, why then do people lie so often when God never does?

Well, there is this little matter of the “fall” of mankind from God’s grace. Our first ancestors, with one bite of an apple, created this mess but also opened the door to God’s grace.

But if you read the Bible as our love letter from God, you can see that even in his anger, God still loves us. His Prophet, Jeremiah is telling the Israelites that what they were experiencing presently was temporary. God had a plan and in time they’d see it happening.

And the promise is a good one too. It’s one I grab on to whenever things get rocky in my world. I just remember that he’s got a plan and it’s to prosper me – not to harm me. It’s to give me hope for a better tomorrow.

So if your today is a bit overwhelming. If you have more stress than you’d like or the news is unsettling, remember these things. God has a plan for your life. It’s a good plan. And most, importantly, he’d never lie to you about it. Praise him in the storm and when the clouds break you’ll see it too.

Psalm 37:4 – “Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.”

Many religious people have been told and often believe that all of the desires of their heart are evil. They come only from our flesh and therefore must be destroyed in order to be holy. I do not agree with this concept at all.

I often feel desires that I cannot explain and when I reflect on and take delight in God’s word, I find those desires come from him.

One such desire is to love Jesus Christ and to seek to pursue those things he’s called me to do. To that end, I read scripture regularly and pray often. I also make time to worship God regularly.

But what about the desires we have? Are they given to us by God or are they evil? I suppose they could be either – but many of those things we simply wish for our lives were given to us by the one who created us.

So when religious people insist that our desires are evil, I’m convinced that I’m not a religious person.

Here’s an example. In my day-to-day life, I do marketing for a group of business leaders. But I rarely am aggressively seeking new clients to sell to. Seems a contradiction doesn’t it? I mean, doesn’t marketing and sales require you to chase people and convince them to part with their money?

Instead, I share ideas in places where my audience is known to be found anyway. I pray over those messages and ask God to send me ONLY those people he wants me to serve. When they contact me, I work to help them, as I would help any of my brothers and sisters in Christ.

This is the way Jesus commanded us to be. I simply seek to obey. Operating his way is counter-intuitive to the way I was trained and therefore I’m convinced that the desire to act this way is from God.

Do I still have to do battle with the flesh? Yes, of course. And I’m not telling you that those desires also come from God. But there are a whole series of other desires that you did get from God, along with the gifting it will take to accomplish them.

If you make time to walk with God regularly, he will share with you those things he desires for you. It’s amazing to me how closely those desires square with the ones I have anyway. It also helps me to be better at discerning when I desire something that is not from God but from my enemy, the devil.

So today, see if you can quiet yourself and hear God speaking to you in your inmost being – and you, like me will very likely discover those things he desires for you today.

Ephesians 2:8-9 – “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith — and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God not by works, so that no one can boast.”

I remember standing on the banks of the Ohio River one day marveling at the power of the river some 50 feet below me. The water levels were low but you could see and feel the strength of the river as it moved on to its destination.

As I looked at the very steep banks of this river and how low the water was in comparison, I asked someone who lived in the area if the water ever rose toward the top of these banks. The man told me that 2 times in his lifetime, the flood came and the river exceeded its banks by some 10 feet.

It was difficult to form a picture of such a thing happening. Nor could I fathom the destruction it would cause to have that much water, moving with such urgency, outside of this river’s banks. Anyone would know that such a thing would crush everything in its path.

Many believers have similar difficulty describing the power of God’s grace in their lives. When you consider the immensity of God’s love for us and his desire for us to love him in return – the thought is often too big to imagine.

We live in a time of temporary love. Like a henna tattoo, most love, sometime after it’s seen is simply washed off leaving no indication that it ever existed.

By contrast, Christ offered us unconditional love. Love that is everlasting. He offered it freely to people who were sinners. In the Gospel of Mark, Jesus told us: “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

I tell you this because I’ve witnessed his grace flowing over my life like the mighty river I described earlier. It’s washed away every foul thing in its path. What fascinates me is that regardless of the changes I’ve seen in my own life, I’m told that I’ve seen nothing yet. More change is going to occur.

When I ponder all that I’m empowered to do by remaining close to God and acting as his hands and feet I’m reminded that soon, all of the things Jesus was doing, I would have the power to also do.

An earthly flood is scary and destructive. You’ve seen enough pictures to know it’s true. However, the flood of God’s grace in our lives is redemptive and awesomely powerful. Give thanks for him. Praise be to God!

Psalm 55:22 – “Cast your cares on the Lord and he will sustain you; he will never let the righteous fall.”

Most of us are open to receive a bit of advice from someone we consider wiser, stronger or better than we are. Would you agree?

I know that throughout my life, I’ve looked for and made contact with people who could mentor me through my difficult challenges.

On those days though, when fear and worry were companions, I needed to go beyond human wisdom to seek out help that I knew wanted what was best for me. That I could trust.

I’ve had some days like that recently and am feeling some of those feelings now as I write this. My “job” has been challenging of late and some days I’m tired and unsure that I’m accomplishing what I set out to do.

I live in a results oriented world and some of my decisions that were intended to improve things only made them worse. It leaves me a bit fearful. I’ve worried about this more than I should.

So as I pondered all of this today, the Lord reminded me of this Psalm. He made it plain that it was time for me to cast my cares on him. That he would sustain me. He told me he would not let me fall.

I guess I’ve struggled with this scripture from time to time because I’m challenged to identify with the word ‘righteous’. I feel like I’m many things but righteous isn’t one of them. If I’m not really righteous, does God still love me anyway?

If I needed further evidence that God is alive and quite aware of my concerns he pointed me to another Psalm – just 1/2 page further in. In Psalm 56 it says “In God, whose word I praise, in the Lord, whose word I praise – in God I trust; I will not be afraid. What can man do to me?”

Almost instantly I started feeling better. My message to you in this is that there is a solution to your worry and your fear. It’s God – and his Son Jesus Christ. Cast your cares upon them and with the freedom you receive in exchange, just keep moving knowing that no man can hurt that part of you that lives eternally. God’s love will see to it.