Great is Thy Faithfulness

"Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened."  Matthew 7:7-8

"For the Lord is good; his steadfast love endures forever, and his faithfulness to all generations." Psalm 100:5

"But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. 'The Lord is my portion,' says my soul, 'therefore I will hope in him."  Lamentations 3:21-24

As I was sitting down to write to you what the Lord has laid upon my heart, He brought an old hymn to my mind..."Great is Thy Faithfulness." This is the chorus of the hymn:

Great is Thy faithfulness

Great is Thy faithfulness,

Morning by morning new mercies I see:

All I have needed Thy hand hath provided

Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord unto me!

This is the song I am singing (in my heart) today, and the verses above are ones I am clinging to this week. As most of you know, Kyle and I are on staff with Campus Crusade for Christ. We have to raise our own financial support which provides for our salary, health benefits, conferences we attend, and even our grocery bill! Basically everything. We have a team of donors that is made up of family members, friends, and churches that support us on a monthly and annual basis, As you can imagine, we have taken a hard hit due to the state of the economy, and the past few months have been really challenging. We spent the summer making phone calls and meeting with individuals to express our needs and invite them to be a part of our team. We recently sent out a newsletter that asked all of our donors to increase $10 a month which would make up for the loss we have incurred in our monthly donations. Well, ask and you shall receive! Yesterday, Kyle and I went to campus to buy our parking passes for the year. Yes, they were $60 each! I thought it was pretty outrageous too, but being that we are campus ministers, we got to be on campus! So, we forked over the $120 and left with our passes! When we got home I went to check the mail, and I opened an envelope that contained a $120 check! I just teared up when I saw the check. The Lord is so faithful, and He will meet our every need! The story gets even better...today, I mailed in a reimbursement to Crusade for our airline tickets to our national conference that was in Colorado in July. The airline tickets had cost us $564. We had been at a staff meeting all day, and when I got in the car I had a missed call from my sister. I immediately called her back, and she told me they were increasing their support by $10. Praise the Lord! Then, I get home and go to check the mail again. Much to my surprise, we received two more checks today. If you add all three of the checks together, they total $565. GREAT IS THY FAITHFULNESS! I was simply stunned. I know that my Father knows my needs, but sometimes I wonder if He truly is going to provide, especially when the clock is ticking, and we have more month than money. I am sure some of you can relate. These past two days, the Lord gently reminded me that he is my Father and He will meet my needs. I do not know why I ever doubt this because the Scripture says, "Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?" So, why on earth do I still doubt and become anxious? Because,  I often allow my circumstances to control my thoughts and emotions more than the truth, which is the Word of God. If our support is good, then I am happy and love my job, but if our support is bad, I am depressed and doubt if this is where God wants us to be. My circumstances to a degree definitely do play a part, but it is not what I should base everything upon. I should only base things upon what I know is true, and that is the written Word. I am most certainly grateful for this realization I had today, and I am very grateful for the Lord providing for us. But instead of the money we receive being a reminder of His provision, I need to be reminded that He will provide because of what I read in His word. This is why I am clinging to the verses above. A local pastor in Oxford said, "How I handle everything each day is a reflection of my personal worship with the Lord." So, what do we do? We spend more time in His word, and preach the truth to ourselves over and over and over! At least this is what I need to do! For the moment, I will continue to sing: Great is Thy faithfulness, Great is Thy faithfulness, Morning by morning new mercies I see: All I have needed Thy hand hath provided, Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord unto me!