{"id":6823,"date":"2020-10-22T14:29:58","date_gmt":"2020-10-22T04:29:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/?p=6823"},"modified":"2020-10-22T14:30:00","modified_gmt":"2020-10-22T04:30:00","slug":"every-effort","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/every-effort\/","title":{"rendered":"Every Effort"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n

Every Effort<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Michael<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Originally seen on\nBecoming Fully Alive blog site, 6 March 2014<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

So the other day I\nwas reading Hebrews 4 and came across this verse;<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLet us, therefore,\nmake every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will perish by following\ntheir example of disobedience.\u201d<\/em>
\nHebrews 4:11<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I didn\u2019t think much\nof it at first but then the Holy Spirit spoke loudly to me and has had me\nthinking deeply about it since.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As you know every\nword in the Bible is inspired by the Holy Spirit \u2013 nothing\u2019s just there\nhaphazardly. But I couldn\u2019t help but feel like those words \u201cevery effort\u201d were\na little daunting. Every time I read this verse, this is exactly what I\npictured;<\/p>\n\n\n\n

St. Paul did says\n\u201cevery effort to enter that rest,\u201d right?! So surely this is the \u201cevery effort\u201d\nhe\u2019s referring to\u2026 I have to push the huge boulder that is the world to enter\nGod\u2019s rest\u2026 I have to overcome temptation, pride, anger and all the sins that\nentangle me to enter that rest, and realistically that\u2019s just never going to\nhappen\u2026 I have to toil and labour and I should just accept the fact that this\nspiritual journey is going to be difficult and tiresome\u2026 I\u2019m probably going to\ngive up soon and get completely crushed by this boulder which means I\u2019ll never\nenter His rest. I allowed a chain reaction of these negative thoughts to\ncontinue to infest my mind for a while but the Holy Spirit quickly came to my\nrescue (as He always does!) and lifted me higher so I can view the situation\nfrom a bird\u2019s-eye view.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fast forward to\nverse 15 in the exact same chapter and it says \u201cFor we do not have a\nhigh priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who\nhas been tempted in every way, just as we are \u2014 yet he did not sin.\u201d Hebrews\n4:15<\/strong>. Wow. Isn\u2019t Jesus just amazing? Our high priest, the King of kings, my\nCreator the Almighty God empathizes with my weakness. He understands! He gets\nthe struggle I have with sin. Because He himself suffered when He was tempted,\nHe is able to help those who are being tempted (Hebrews 2:18). He\u2019s not asking\nme to do something that He\u2019s never had to go through \u2013 He was tempted too\nexcept He completely overcame sin. I\u2019m in awe at the level of humility my\nCreator must have in order to allow Himself to be tempted by Satan. And not\nonly can He 100% relate to my struggle. Verse 12 says \u201cFor the word of\nGod is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates\neven to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow\u2026\u201d Hebrews 4:12<\/strong>. He\ntells me that His word can penetrate absolutely anything, even the filthiest\ninnermost parts of my soul that I\u2019ve successfully hidden from everyone else \u2013\nyes even those parts! His word is active and has power to terminate once and\nfor all the sin I\u2019ve so willingly allowed to grow in my soul.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I went to liturgy\ntoday and the Gospel reading was about our Lord Jesus feeding the four\nthousand. You know that overwhelming, warm, peaceful feeling that you get when\nyou\u2019re in the presence of the Lord and He whispers sweet words to your soul\u2026\nyep I got that wonderful feeling through the following verse; \u201cJesus\ncalled his disciples to him and said, \u2018I have compassion for these people; they\nhave already been with me three days and have nothing to eat. I do not want to\nsend them away hungry, or they may collapse on the way.’\u201d Matthew 15:32<\/strong>. I\ninstantly heard the Holy Spirit whisper in my ear \u201cremember Hebrews 4:11? do\nyou still think that asking you to make every effort to enter My rest is\ndaunting?\u201d. When Jesus saw these people following him for three days straight,\nHe had compassion on them. Our God is a God who feels. He didn\u2019t want to send\nthem away hungry so they don\u2019t collapse on the way home \u2013 how loving!! He\nreally, really cared for the well-being of these people. He knew their needs\nand out of His sweetness provided them with food that they hadn\u2019t even asked\nfor! \u2026.Then it clicked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yes, God does ask\nme to make every effort to enter His rest\u2026 but every effort through Him! Of\ncourse the image in my mind was me really struggling to push this giant\nboulder\u2026I completely took God out of the equation \u2013 I removed Jesus from\nHebrews 4:11. I thought that I was going to have to struggle on my own so I can\nreach His rest and forgot that Jesus, my God who loves me abundantly, is\nwalking right beside me through every spiritual struggle. My loving Jesus will\nlook at my effort to walk with Him and straight-away provide me with the\nnourishment I need so I don\u2019t collapse. I know that He\u2019ll do that because He,\nbeing perfect, allowed Himself to be tempted by Satan \u2013 He empathizes with my\nweakness and knows that I need His support. I\u2019m not on my own, I simply need to\nrun into the arms of Love. And in those arms, I discover His word that is alive\nand active, able to penetrate my soul and rid me of my sin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m not making\nevery effort by myself. I\u2019m making every effort through my God\u2019s power.
\nNow there\u2019s a new image engraved in my mind;<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Lord will\nfulfil his purpose for me; your love, Lord, endures forever.\u201d<\/strong>
\nPsalm 138:8<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Original\nblog available at- https:\/\/becomingfullyalive.com\/every-effort\/<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Every Effort By Michael Originally seen on Becoming Fully Alive blog site, 6 March 2014 So the other day I was reading Hebrews 4 and came across this verse; \u201cLet us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will perish by following their example of disobedience.\u201d Hebrews 4:11 I didn\u2019t … Continue reading “Every Effort”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6824,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[457],"class_list":["post-6823","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorised","tag-effort"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6823","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6823"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6823\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6825,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6823\/revisions\/6825"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6824"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6823"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6823"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6823"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}