Where God Grips You

That very thing you wish were gone, it‘s what God is using. It’s where God is gripping you. And where He is calling you.

That very trial and difficult relationship. That very circumstance and hard thing. That you wish were gone. That you hate and despise. It is the thing allowed in your life by a God Who knows best, selected by a Father Who sees the final outcome, and permitted by a Creator Who knows and loves you, oh, so intimately.

Oh, why do we doubt the ways of God?

When each trial, each hardship, each circumstance, they are what keep you in complete reliance on Him. They are what make you beautiful, when you allow them to. Because they are what keep you there, soft and surrendered, devoted to Christ Jesus, dependent on Him. In all that you wish were gone.

For God knows that when you stop wishing for riddance, and instead start welcoming Him in, you will experience life, Christ Jesus Himself (1 John 1:2).

And there, you will know the strength of His Resurrection power in you (Philippians 3:10). How life truly does come from death. You will know the Gospel as Truth, His Story written just for you. And you will see that God’s call to you is His grip on you. Not your response to Him. Not your obedience to Him. Not your devotion to Him. But His grip on you.

Nothing more. Nothing less.

Because there, where you kneel and you surrender, from within all that you wish were gone, is where you will see and you will hear the Gospel - Christ Jesus given for you, that it is really God’s grip on you, to rescue you! For only the Gospel saves!

How Christ’s death on the cross was God’s plan, arranged by Him, planned out by Him, allowed by Him (Acts 2:23). How Christ’s death to self, one of complete surrender to His Father, was where His victory with the Father was won, for you (Luke 22:42).

“Not my will, but Yours be done!”

It’s where God grips you.

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“We proclaim to you the one who existed from the beginning, whom we have heard and seen. We saw him with our own eyes and touched him with our own hands. He is the Word of life. This one who is life itself was revealed to us, and we have seen him. And now we testify and proclaim to you that he is the one who is eternal life. He was with the Father, and then he was revealed to us.” - 1 John 1:1-2 (NLT)

“And anyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” - Acts 2:21