Lamentations 3:39-40 “Why should a living man complain, a man, about the punishment of his sins? Let us test and examine our ways, and return to the LORD!”

I have a murmuring heart. Well, at least according to the Bible I do. I tend to find a reason to complain about nearly anything. My toolbox is too small, I don't have enough tools, my toolbox is too big, I have too many tools, my apartment is too small, I have too much stuff, I have too large an apartment for what I need, I don't have all the stuff I should have, etc. I can find reasons to complain when it rains, I can complain when it is sunny and clear out. I can complain when my computer is working, I can complain about my car, my tea, my books, my co-workers. I am a master murmurer.

The problem with complaining is that we are told not to. Philippians 2:14 is fairly blunt about this. “Do all things without grumbling or questioning,” which means that in my pursuit of Christ-likeness that I need to stop. Instead of grumbling or complaining then, what are we supposed to do? Well according to Psalms 105:2-3 we are to “Sing to him, sing praises to him; tell of all his wondrous works! Glory in his holy name; let the hearts of those who seek the LORD rejoice!” And then to drive yet another nail into the coffin of my murmuring heart, 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 directs us to “Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”

I complain too much, but it isn't just me that has a problem of complaining. Have you ever been to a church service where someone you spoke with did not complain? Neither have I. Have you had a conversation with good friends where you did not complain about something (directly or obliquely)? Neither have I. Complaining surrounds us to the point that we do not notice it anymore. Oh sure, we notice the sensuality on television and in the media just like we notice the foul language that surrounds us whenever we step out our front door, but we never notice the complaining. To me that is scary because its easy to ignore complaining and to pass it off as something that everyone does – because everyone does complain! Maybe we need to start looking at what we complain about and how often we complain. Maybe we are missing out on some of God's blessings because we are complaining and whining when we should be praising, rejoicing, and giving thanks.

This next week, why don't we make a special emphasis to curb our complaining and to increase our prayerful thanks. When we start to grumble about something let us make an effort to somehow turn it into something we can be thankful about. Instead of murmuring, let us find a reason to rejoice – my Savior has redeemed me and allowed me yet another day to praise Him. Let us test and examine our ways so that we may draw nearer to our belovéd God!

Father, whate’er of earthly bliss
Thy sovereign will denies,
Accepted at Thy throne, let this
My humble prayer, arise:

Give me a calm and thankful heart,
From every murmur free;
The blessing of Thy grace impart,
And make me live to Thee.

Let the sweet hope that Thou art mine
My life and death attend,
Thy presence through my journey shine,
And crown my journey’s end.

Philippians 4:6 “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.”

I recently learned yet another lesson about being anxious and on trusting God. These sorts of lesson tend happen fairly often to us as people, or at least to me. I don't know about all of you, but I still have this tendency to worry about things because that is all I can really do. What happened to me was this: my apartment lease was coming up. Not a really serious issue to most folks, but for me it was a fairly big deal. If you will understand that my job situation is not secure, then the idea of taking out another year (or more) lease is a fairly big thing. The rent was also going to go up. Now I know that everyone complains about rent but complaining is equivalent to not trusting God, but thats another topic. I complained about my rent being too much for what I was getting, and now the rent was going higher and they wouldn't let me go on a month to month rate at the “low” rate I was paying already. Two months ahead of when my lease was up, I started getting nervous. What would I do? What could I do? I began hunting for another apartment. I prayed about my situation, and the answer that I got back was “just wait.” Again, I don't know about you but I have trouble with waiting. I continued to look for a new place or for options. Still, the answer from God was “just wait” while I continued to cry out “I can't, I need to have everything lined up soon! I don't have much time!”

With a month left of my lease I was really desperate since all my apartment searching had turned up nothing. I was badgering God in my prayers, “Lord, help me know what to do, where do I go!” His response continued to be “just wait!” With just a week left until my deadline, I got home after work and prayed again, “Lord, you are going to have to provide because I have tried everything and if nothing comes up I will take out a new lease and trust that you will provide the rent.

At church that night, a lady came up to me and told me that God had told her I needed a place to live andoffered me a small studio apartment that she had available. Later I found that she had been trying to find me for a couple weeks to let me know about this place, but could never get hold of me. Her (and her husband's) prior renter had moved out almost a month before they found me. The previous renter had decided one day that the apartment was too small and that something bigger was needed, and so they moved out as soon as they were able. God provided.

I did all that worrying for nothing. God had it all under control. I just had to wait for everything to happen in His time. He was not about to rush His plans for the previous renter just to give me peace of mind earlier. I actually think that he probably delayed the decision of the previous renter and instigated the near misses between my new landlords and myself just to teach me yet another lesson about trusting Him and being less anxious.

We as believers tend to worry about things which we have given over to God to handle. We need to relearn that He will take care of it when He takes care of it, not before. We may not like waiting around and we may run around endlessly as I did looking for a new apartment, but He has it all under control He will provide what we need when we need it. My new apartment certainly is not fancy, but it is functional. It is farther from work, but its closer to everything else. He has provided just what I need and He wouldn't provide it to me earlier despite my spiritual whining.

God is faithful and will provide for you despite your worries and anxiousness. Give Him the trust He deserves. He heard you the first time just as He heard me, but He will wait until He knows is the right time. He will provide in His time. Remember, in His time and only in His time will He provide everything you need.

Psalms 26:3 “For your steadfast love is before my eyes, and I walk in your faithfulness.”

Have you ever been asked to do something? Have you forgotten to do it? You are faithless. Have you ever done a sloppy job? You are faithless. Have you ever wavered in your friendship with anyone? You are faithless. Have you ever sidestepped facts or lowered your standards even once? Have you ever lied? Have you ever mislead anyone no matter the reason? Have you ever intentionally broken your word? You are faithless! Have you ever been to an alcoholics anonymous meeting or spoken to a recovering alcoholic? They will tell you that there is no such thing as an “ex-alcoholic.” Once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic – one is just in various stages of recovery. It seems a harsh standard but it is true, and it also applies to being faithless. Once an addict, always an addict. Once a liar, always a liar. Once anything negative always anything negative – at least by worldly and fleshly standards. The bar that our standards are set to is labeled “perfection” and we are continuously falling short. We are always imperfect. It takes just one failure to be faithless just like it only takes once to be a murderer, and it only takes one sin to be unholy. Let's face it, we are unable to do anything approaching even a good job at being close to faithful, let alone holy.

Fortunately for us, God is faithful. Yes, it is a cliché statement, but God is faithful, and we do not walk, we do not live, we do not do anything anymore according to our faithfulness but instead we are in His. God is perfectly faithful. He has never broken a promise to anyone. He has never mislead anyone. He has always paid the strictest attention to His duties. He has never wavered even once in His pursuit of us, His friendship with anyone, or His loyalty to His creation. He is the original being who sets the standards for the rest of the universe. He is always true to fact. He is always reliable, trusted, and to be believed. He is faithful, and it is His faithfulness that He shares with us.

He has made us holy, set apart for Him, and now when we speak or give our word, we should not speak on our own authority, but on His and it is His word that we represent to everyone we meet. God has never let me down despite the many times I know I have let Him down, yet I know that God will never tire of helping me back to my feet because He is faithful to me. Faithfulness requires one to always be there for those who rely on you and we all must rely on Him therefore He is always there for us. He has told us to give over all our cares to Him, all our worries to Him, all our problems to Him, and to confess all our sins to Him and He will take care of it. We must do our best in turn to live for Him. He has taken ownership of everything in my life and in yours. If I were to accidentally to break or destroy something at work, my company is responsible for making things right with the customer. They must be responsible for the failures of their workers. God is the same. He is responsible for everything in our lives and He paid the price in full on the cross. No matter what we do, He has promised that He has taken care of it. This does not mean that we should slack off on our efforts to pursue righteousness and personal holiness. We represent Him now and so we must live our lives as close to the best representation of Him as is possible. The standard of the cross is the impossible standard for us to be held to, and yet He has made it possible for us to claim that standard in our lives! Let us be faithful then to live up to this responsibility that He has given to us!

I have a Friend, whose faithful love
Is more than all the world to me:
'Tis higher than the heights above,
And deeper than the soundless sea;
So old, so new,
So strong, so true;
Before the earth received its frame,
He loved me—Blessed be His name!

1 Samuel 2:2 “There is none holy like the LORD; there is none besides you; there is no rock like our God.”

Last week, I wrote on personal holiness, but we cannot be personally holy until we understand the base of holiness. We need to understand about God's holiness and what it means. Too many people equate holiness with righteousness which is not true. Righteousness leads towards holiness, but it is not interchangeable – there are two different ideas between the two words. “Holy” (or “kedushah” in Hebrew) means “To be set apart” and it refers to God as the reference point. God is Holy and the entire old testament revolves around the Holiness of God. God's grace, mercy, and justice are all offshoots that point back to His Holiness.

Holiness also means “exalted or worthy of complete devotion as one perfect in goodness and righteousnes” (according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary) as well as “pertaining to the Divine” and “devoted entirely to the deity or the work of the deity.” God claims that only He is holy (Isaiah 40:25) and that therefore we, being adopted into His holy family are cleansed and made holy like Him (Ezekiel 20:41, Romans 11:16). We are to “put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.” (Ephesians 4:24) But to do this means we need to understand the root of our newfound holiness.

God - the creator, the saviour, the eternal, the all-providing, the almighty, the I AM – has set Himself apart from His creation. He reaches down and offers to help us and to aid us, to draw us to Him and to redeem us. He wanted fellowship and true companionship with His creation, so He gave us free will to do what we want. Because we are not mindless beings or compelled to worship and fellowship with Him, we are able to sin. Because of sin we are made unholy and impure (and yes, purity is a large portion of holiness). Because of sin, God could not have us in His direct presence and the fellowship we had with Him was broken. God provided an answer though. He set a people group apart to be a witness for Him to the nations. He then a portion of that peoplegroup apart to be a witness to the witnesses. He set a portion of the portion of the portion to be set apart because He wanted to ensure that we got the idea. We who follow (of our own volition and choice) God must be different from everyone else. We must run on God's time, on His rules, on His holiness. We can not be the same as the sinful world, but we must witness to them. Then God redeemed mankind. Not just one or two people, but He made the ultimate and final sacrifice so that everyone who wanted to could become Holy by sharing in His holiness, His purity, His Sanctity, and His precious son – Jesus. God's Holiness is shown to us as love. No one can love like God can love. No one forgives like God forgives and yet no one is as just as God. No one can bring as much joy into a life as God, and yet the proximity to Him gives us all such a sense of shame and sorrow even though He has saved us from that which shames us. God's holiness demands that we too be holy.

Let us follow Paul's advice and recommendation in 2 Corinthians 7:1 “Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, bringing holiness to completion in the fear of God.”

Help me to be holy, O Spirit divine;
Come, sanctify wholly this temple of Thine;
Now cast out each idol, here set up Thy throne.
Reign, reign without rival, supreme and alone!