"Yes--But!"

After proclaiming faith the devil attacked hard this past week to the point of doubting whether I should REALLY be even contemplating going to the interview for the 5 children. I felt like it is all just TOO much. I vented to my sister-in-law about how life was going and then wrote a brief email to one of my dearest friends. I knew they would both pray. God answered their prayer with this devotional that I read the next morning.

"YES--BUT!"

“Lord, I will follow Thee; but…” Luke 9:61

Supposing God tells you to do something which is an enormous test to your common sense, what are you going to do? Hang back? If you get into the habit of doing a thing in the physical domain, you will do it every time until you break the habit determinedly; and the same is true spiritually. Again and again you will get up to what Jesus Christ wants, and every time you turn back when it comes to the point, until you abandon resolutely. “Yes, but—supposing I do obey God in this matter, what about…?” Yes I will obey God if He will let me use my common sense, but don’t ask me to take a step in the dark.”

Jesus Christ demands of the man who trusts in Him the same reckless sporting spirit that the natural man exhibits. If a man is going to do anything worthwhile, there are times when he has to risk everything on his leap, and in the spiritual domain Jesus Christ demands that you risk everything you hold by common sense and leap into what He says, and immediately you do, you find that what He says fits on as solidly as common sense.

At the bar of common sense Jesus Christ’s statements may seem mad; but bring them to the bar of faith, and you begin to find with awestruck spirit that they are the words of God. Trust entirely in God, and when He brings you to the venture, see that you take it. We act like pagans in a crisis, only one out of a crowd is daring enough to bank his faith in the character of God.

Oswald Chambers