June 4, 2023: 2 Timothy 1:10 - God's Purpose and Grace was Revealed by Jesus Christ

“…but has now been revealed by the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ, who has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel…” - 2 Timothy 1:10

The Bible is an amazing book. It has completely changed my life; I will never be the same. Long before I decided to read it, I was wandering through this world, trying to understand why certain things had happened to me that affected my view of society. Growing up with my parents and younger brother, life was pretty good, but all that changed in 1976 when my parents moved from California to a dry and parched land out in the country about 40 miles east of Albuquerque, New Mexico. When my parents lived in Goleta, California, not far from Santa Barbara, they had a thriving antique business and my dad was also an auctioneer. They were self-employed, as were my grandparents, who had already moved to New Mexico. After the move, my parents’ antique business went from thriving to starving as the type of antiques they sold out west were not sought after in Albuquerque. Not long after we moved, they quit their antique business and decided to try their hands at real estate. That didn’t work out either, and at some point they declared bankruptcy. I don’t remember all of the details, but I just remember that life was a struggle. About 3-4 years later, my parents divorced, and I felt like my life had ended. Though my life prior to their divorce had been hard, it was the only life I knew. Now, I watched as my mom struggled to make ends meet, all the while her heart was broken over the divorce. It was during that time that my own heart began to harden. I started listening to the women’s liberation movement and singing songs like “I Am Woman” by Helen Reddy and “I Will Survive” by Gloria Gaynor. I also started putting up walls around my heart to guard it from any future heartbreak. When something hurtful happened to me, I would just put another row of bricks around the wall of my heart, making it a little higher each time.

About two years later, I got married at a young age and then experienced all the difficulties of a marriage that was created with no solid foundation on which to make it work. I was existing, but I wasn’t truly living because there was an emptiness, a longing, inside of me that, over the years, I realized nothing could fill it, even with our beautiful children and no matter how much success I achieved in my job, no matter how many nice things I was able to buy because of my and my husband's jobs, and no matter how much I worked at becoming physically fit; the emptiness was still there. What would it take to fill it? Not only was there an emptiness inside of me, but there was also a feeling of fear. Looking back, it was this feeling of fear, the feeling of “what if this were to happen” or “what if that happened” that left me an emotional wreck, though I might have seemed to “have it all together” on the outside. After 9/11 happened, I was even more fearful, especially over the future of our two young children and what it held for them. But the emptiness inside of me was even more powerful than the fear inside of me, and it drove me to do something I had done a few times before but had always failed at doing: to read the entire Bible for myself.

I started on this journey of reading the Bible with an open mind, thinking there probably is a God but not knowing much more than that. I remember reading in Genesis and struggling with the genealogies, not realizing then the importance of them, as they recorded the family lines that would eventually be traced to Jesus Christ. I remember reading some things that were difficult, such as when God eventually dealt with sin after giving people much time to turn from it and to turn to Him.

I remember reading the book of Job and really having a hard time reading all the excruciating things that Job went through, losing all he had, seeing all of his children die, having his friends point at him as the reason it was all happening because he must have committed some horrible sin and he was being punished by God for it. Even Job’s wife’s words must have been like a knife to the heart when she told her husband, “Do you still hold fast to your integrity? Curse God and die!” (Job 2:9) What was Job’s response to her? Did he say that he agreed with her and curse God? “But he said to her, ‘You speak as one of the foolish women speaks. Shall we indeed accept good from God, and shall we not accept adversity?’ In all this Job did not sin with his lips.” (Job 2:10)

Job did not know that before all this happened, God had been talking to Satan about Job, saying, “Have you considered My servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, one who fears God and shuns evil?” (Job 1:8) Satan then told God that the only reason Job was like that was because God had put a hedge of protection around him, his family, and all that he had and had blessed Job abundantly and if it were all to be removed, then Job would “surely curse You to Your face!” (Job 1:11). God then told Satan, “Behold, all that he has is in your power; only do not lay a hand on his person.” (Job 1:12). Job went through all that Satan had put him through, and which God had allowed. Job felt all alone in the world, asking God why all this was happening to him. Job regretted the day he was born, for he was in so much sorrow and pain. How many of us have felt that way, like we are all alone, with no one to help us? I can tell you that I have felt that way many times in my life, and many times I blamed God for my situation, for my pain, for my feeling of being trapped, with nowhere to go.

But Job never cursed God. He continued to pray to God, pouring out his heart to Him, including in this prayer:

“My spirit is broken, my days are extinguished, the grave is ready for me. Are not mockers with me? And does not my eye dwell on their provocation? (Job 17:1-2)

Through the tears, through the pain, Job cried out to God, never once saying that he was done with God and would trust in Him no more. Oh, no, the opposite is true; Job continued to trust in God even though he did not understand why all of these horrible things had happened to him and why God was allowing it to happen. I love what he said in the verses below:

“Oh, that my words were written! Oh, that they were inscribed in a book! That they were engraved on a rock with an iron pen and lead, forever! “ (Job 19:23-24)

Praise God that we DO have Job’s words written in a book that will stand forever! We have Job’s example that it’s okay if we ask God why He is allowing these things to happen to us, that as Job did, we should call out to God and pray to Him when we are fearful, when we are hurting, when we feel that we are all alone in our sorrow and pain and that perhaps God has forgotten us. God doesn’t expect us to be perfect, and He wants to hear from us, just as He heard from Job.

Job had many conversations with God, with God revealing to Job that His ways are not our ways. He is holy, and we are not. He is all powerful, all knowing, and all present, and we are not. He created everything there is, and we did not. How can we understand all that God does when we are not Him? The answer is we simply cannot understand but we must trust in God in all seasons in our life, in the good times and the bad times. Contrary to what many churches teach, God did not put us on this earth to provide us with all the comforts that life has to offer us and to keep us from going through tragedies and sorrows in this world. That is a false, prosperity god that is being taught. No, God put us on this world to see that we need Him in our lives to help us through the difficult times, to walk with Him through those times and cry out to Him, and most importantly to see that we need His only begotten Son Jesus Christ to redeem us of all our sins, because we absolutely cannot save ourselves, only Jesus can. At the end of the book of Job, Job again acknowledged who God is, not just hearing Him but seeing Him truly as He is - Almighty God - and he repented of his sins:

“Then Job answered the LORD and said: ‘I know that You can do everything, and that no purpose of Yours can be withheld from You. You asked, “Who is this who hides counsel without knowledge?” Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know. Listen, please, and let me speak; You said, “I will question you, and you shall answer Me.” I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees You. Therefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes.’” (Job 42:1-6)

After Job repented, God told Job’s three friends to go and take a burnt offering to His servant Job and Job would pray for them, “because you have not spoken of Me what is right, as My servant Job has.” (Job 42:8) Job did pray for his three friends and the Bible tells us that “God restored Job’s losses.” (Job 42:10) God blessed Job with ten more children and restored all that he had, even more so, and all his family and acquaintances comforted him.

I have to admit that I had to read the book of Job three times before I understood its meaning. I believe that God was working on my own heart between the times that I read it. I think the most difficult thing for me to do in my walk with God over the years has been to trust in Him, no matter what. That is what the book of Job has taught me, and it was only when I walked with God, cried out to Him, and even questioned why He was allowing the sorrows and pain in my own life to happen, that it was during that time that I saw that there was a purpose in my suffering, and that purpose pointed to Jesus Christ, my Redeemer. I myself needed to repent - which means to turn from my sin and turn to Jesus Christ, trusting in Him for my salvation, and I did. And now, I echo the words beautifully spoken by Job in his time of sorrow but a time when he trusted in the Lord when everyone else had abandoned him:

“For I know that my Redeemer lives, and He shall stand at last on the earth; and after my skin is destroyed, this I know, that in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another. How my heart yearns with me!” (Job 19:25-27)

Job knew that His God is a living God and that one day He will stand on the earth. Job also knew that one day he himself would be resurrected from the dead and would receive his glorified, new body and would see God with his own eyes, and Job longed for that day. The same is true for us, and those who have been saved by the precious blood of Jesus Christ, the Redeemer of all our sins, and we will be resurrected and receive our glorified bodies and will live in eternity with Him. But for all who have not accepted Jesus’ free gift of salvation, they will spend their eternity separated from Him in a place called hell, a real place that Jesus spoke of many times when He walked the earth, that is a place of torment and eternal sorrow and pain.

Before I finish today’s devotional, I ask you: If you have not received the grace of God through the free gift of salvation by trusting in Jesus Christ, will you put your faith and trust in Him today, before it’s too late and you take your last breath as you exit through the door of your temporary life and enter the door of your eternity? Jesus told us He is the way, the truth, and the life and that no one comes to the Father except through Him. Is He knocking on the door of your heart? Will you let Him in? Jesus wants you to turn to Him, for He loves you more than you could ever know.

“Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me.” (Jesus Christ; Revelation 3:20)

Reading the Bible truly changed my life. It pointed me to Jesus and my need for Him. And now, that emptiness inside of me that could not be filled with anything on this earth, has been filled with Him, and I know that my Redeemer lives. ✝️