Devotions

I was between semesters at Baylor University, when Gary and David Wilkerson said to me, "Hey, you want to go to Detroit to be part of a church that Gary is starting?" It was the start of a two-month commitment to go to Detroit that literally changed my life.

Every week, a van would drop us off in the worst part of Detroit and leave us, so we would be there ministering. Then Gary came to me and said, "Every Thursday night, you're going to lead a Bible study in a prostitution hotel called Medtown Motel.”

Now you have to understand that I was born and raised in the church. My mother almost had me while singing soprano in the Christmas cantata at church. I was born a few days later on December 22^nd, and I was raised in a Pentecostal church. I've been to every church camp. I've been in every youth group. I’ve never smoked in my life. I've never drank in my life. I've never been high in my life. I was a virgin until the day I got married. So I'm sitting there in this prostitution hotel, and I just felt, “I’ve got nothing.”

Well, what I thought was only going to be two months ended up being the next 30 years of my life. We bought a 900-seat XXX movie theater in another part of Detroit and started a church there. That first night sitting in the Medtown Motel, though, I had no idea how God was going to use me.

Maybe you’ve felt like God said, "Go," and now you're thinking to yourself, "What in the world is going on? God, did you come with me? Or are you still back at the burning bush?”

I love what Rick Warren said about moments like these: "The teacher is always silent when the test is given." When God is silent, there's a test that's happening. There are certain things we can only see about the nature and character of God when our situation is a mystery. There's something powerful that we begin to understand about God when he almost seems to be even absent. In the silence and the mystery, you can be at the very center of God's will.

^{After pastoring an inner-city congregation in Detroit for thirty years, Pastor Tim served at Brooklyn Tabernacle in NYC for five years and pastored in Lafayette, Louisiana, for five years. He became Senior Pastor of Times Square Church in May of 2020.}

God has sworn by an oath to give us a new heart, one that is inclined to obey. God promises us not only to give us this new heart, but to write his commands on our hearts. In other words, he promises to cause us to know him.

God told his people about this incredible work he would do in the Old Testament. He said, “Then I will give them a heart to know me, that I am the Lord; and they shall be my people, and I will be their God, for they shall return to me with their whole heart” (Jeremiah 24:7, NKJV), and “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh” (Ezekiel 36:26).

The Holy Spirit is the one who accomplishes this work in us. He teaches us about the Father’s nature and way; and in the process, he transforms us into Christ’s divine image. Our Lord promises, “No matter what I demand of you, I will supply you with all the power you need to accomplish it. I won’t ask anything of you for which I have not made provision.”

Today, the same power that raised Jesus from the dead now abides in us. God’s own Spirit is alive in us, providing power over the enemy. As Paul said, “Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator” (Colossians 3:9-10). When the devil comes flooding into your soul, enticing you toward an old lust, call upon the Holy Ghost. Listen to his every whisper, and obey his every command. If you are prepared to do whatever he empowers you to do, he won’t withhold his word from you.

You can move out of the old life and into the new in a single leap. It happens when you see how impossible it is for you to overcome sin by your own human efforts. Our faithful God has sworn to give the Holy Ghost to all believers who ask, and he will accomplish in you what the Lord has promised by oath. Finally, abandon yourself totally to God and his promises. He will renew and transform you into his image.

God has given us many wonderful promises that he will break every bond of sin, empower us to defeat all dominion of sin, give us a new heart, cleanse and sanctify us, and ultimately conform us to the very image of Christ. His Word assures us, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation” (2 Corinthians 5:17-18, NKJV).

God does all of these things for us only in his time, according to his divine schedule. He has no deadlines pushing him. He ignores all demands for an instant cure-all. In short, true faith on our part demands that we patiently wait on our Lord. Our response to him should be “Lord, I believe you’re true to your Word. By the power of your Spirit within me, I’m going to wait patiently until you bring these things to pass in my life. My part is to remain in faith, waiting on you.”

You may endure awful trials and temptations. You may hear horrendous lies whispered to you by Satan. At times, you may fail. In fact, you may wonder if you’ll ever reach the goal. As you’re enduring all these afflictions, you must simply hold onto faith with patience and trust that God is at work. If you believe that he is keeping his Word and being your Jehovah Tsidkenu, he will look on you as a faithful child. He has sworn by oath, “By faith, you will receive the promise.”

The Bible could not make this any clearer. “Without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him” (Hebrews 11:6).

Simply put, unbelief is doubting God will do what he promises. We must believe the promises of God, being fully persuaded he’ll keep his word. “Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, to God our Savior, who alone is wise, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and forever” (Jude 1:24-25).

The psalmist writes the following about one of God’s greatest promises: “If his sons forsake my law and do not walk in my judgments, if they break my statutes and do not keep my commandments, then I will punish their transgression with the rod, and their iniquity with stripes. Nevertheless my lovingkindness I will not utterly take from him, nor allow my faithfulness to fail” (Psalm 89:30-33, NKJV).

God promises to never remove his lovingkindness from us, no matter how badly we may fall. However, many believers skip lightly over the heavy warning in this verse. If we forsake God’s law and refuse to keep his commands, he’ll visit our transgressions with his divine rod.

The Bible tells us that whomever the Lord loves, he chastens. We see this truth illustrated vividly in David’s life. Consider how the Lord dealt with this man, a faithful servant who enjoyed God’s favor. At one point in his life, David sinned awfully then justified it and kept it hidden for months on end. Finally, God said, “Enough” and sent a prophet to expose David’s sin. The prophet Nathan used an analogy to tear apart every excuse David had until finally the king admitted, “I’ve sinned. I’m guilty.”

David wrote, “For my life is spent with grief, and my years with sighing; my strength fails because of my iniquity, and my bones waste away” (Psalm 31:10). Like a hole in the oil tank of a car, your sin will slowly drain you of all peace, joy and strength.

I know Christians who lead lives of utter confusion because they continue to indulge in sins. These hollow souls are always downcast and weak, forever struggling but getting nowhere. If you harbor a secret sin, you’ll experience continual disturbances in your life, home, family and work. You’ll become increasingly restless, confused and tossed about by endless worries and fears. All of your peace and strength will be drained from you.

God does not want to expose his servants; rather, it is in his heart to forgive, cleanse and cover our sins. In love, he will discipline his righteous one, but his rod is for the lawless. Exposure of secret sin is God’s last attempt to save a rebellious, hypocritical child who has determined to indulge in sin yet play the part of a spiritual man. God’s rod is reserved only for unrepentant, hardhearted believers.

God doesn’t want your home, car, furniture, savings or any of your possessions. All he wants is your faith, your strong belief in his Word. That may be the one thing that other, more spiritual-appearing people may lack. You may look at another person as being more spiritual than you, but that person may actually be struggling hard to keep up an appearance of righteousness.

As God looks at you, he declares, “There is a righteous man or woman.” Why? You’ve admitted your helplessness to become righteous, and you’ve trusted in the Lord to give you his righteousness. Paul tells us we are accounted as righteous in God’s eyes for the same reason Abraham was. “Therefore ‘it was accounted to him [Abraham] for righteousness.’ Now it was not written for his sake alone that it was imputed to him, but also for us. It shall be imputed to us who believe in him who raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead” (Romans 4:22–24, NKJV).

You may claim, “I believe this. I have faith in the God who resurrected Jesus.” Despite this, the question for you is “Do you believe the Lord can resurrect your troubled marriage? Do you believe he can bring to life a spiritually dead relative? Do you believe he can raise you up out of the pit of a debilitating habit? Do you believe he can erase your cursed past and restore to you all the years the cankerworm has eaten?”

When everything looks hopeless, when you are in an impossible situation with no resources and no hope before you, do you believe God will be your Jehovah Jirah, seeing to your every need? Do you trust that he’s committed to keeping his eternal promises to you? Do you believe that if even one of his words fails, the heavens would melt and the universe collapse?

So you’ve turned everything over into the Lord’s hands. You believe in his promises to keep you, protect you and cause you to walk uprightly before him. You state, “I believe God’s Word. If he says I’m his righteousness, it’s his job to make it so in my life. I may not have arrived yet, but I know it’s not my job to make that happen. It is the Lord’s. I know that by his Spirit working in me, he’s going to get me there.”