Day 7 | 40-Day Lenten Fast & Devotional

So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. Isaiah 41:10

Good morning, good morning all of my father's children. Pray all is well with you. It's day seven of our 40 day Lenten fast and devotional experience. We've been couched in an experience to speak about really what it means to have faith and trusting in God during this season.

Trusting in God seems like a cliche that we just kind of utilize or throw out when we can, but more importantly, it is in fact a practice that we need to apply to our lives, especially when times look challenging. So for today, I wanna take a look at a passage of scripture coming from the prophet Isaiah, the 41st chapter of the prophet Isaiah. And I wanna look just at two quick verses that we find in Isaiah chapter 41. You should see or find these similar words: "So, do not fear for I'm with you. Do not be dismayed for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you. I will uphold you with my righteousness." That's verse 10. I want to read it one more time in your hearing. "Do not be afraid for I'm with you. Do not be dismayed for I'm your God. I will strengthen you and help you. I will uphold you with my righteous right hand."

Okay. I love this because Isaiah is speaking to really the gathering of the nations. What happens is God kind of calls all the nations to the courtroom, if you will, and says, listen, let me explain what's taking place. The oppressive context that you're dealing with has a lot as it does to relate to the way that you've operated with putting other things before me and really an idolatry nation. And what I'm telling you is that what you're experiencing will come to an end but it's meant to develop me. So he starts off by saying, listen, don't be afraid for I'm with you.

I love the fact that God always emphasizes his presence in our life. I don't know what you're going through. I don't know what you're dealing with, but it's important to remember that God's presence is always there. And then the second place is do not be dismayed for I'm your God. This is important too, because dismayed is like, don't be discouraged. Do you know who you got with you? When you walk out today, I want you to boldly declare, do you know who my God is? That the person that's holding me, listen, listen, I'm not normal, I'm not regular. Do you know who I have on, do you know who's governing and garnering me?

They were speaking in a place where people were serving many different gods and trying to, know, kind of garner support and protection. He says, "do you know who my God is?" don't be dismayed. For the Lord your God, that's your God. This is the power that's vested in him. And he says, listen, let me tell you why. He says, I will strengthen you and help you. There are places and points when the situation can seem so dire that we feel like we not only need to draw on a place of strength, but we need to be upheld. Has anybody been there before? I know I have. Where I needed God to just uphold me. God just sustained me just in this season.

He says, reason why I'm going to uphold you is because my hand is righteous and my ways are righteous, and because you've drawn closer to me in this season, I'm going to do everything to undergird you. Isaiah was giving a word of encouragement that blesses us on today. So on this Wednesday, this middle of the week, be encouraged. Don't be afraid. Don't be dismayed. He says listen. I'm going to uphold you.

I don't know what it is that you're directly going through, but I do know that God has already promised, to not only be with you but uphold you, and to strengthen you. So go forth today, not only be a blessing, but also be encouraged. I holler at you.