Finding God In Hidden Places by Joni Eareckson Tada is a delightful, heart-warming collection of stories in which Joni shares how she has seen God at work in some unexpected places. You can read my full book review by clicking here. Below are some of the quotes that especially stood out to me from this book.
“I take comfort in this: Although it seemed as though God were asleep when I was at the wheel, He wasn’t. He was there. I remind myself that no matter if it’s by the skin of the teeth or with miles to spare… God helps His people. If it’s not their appointed time to die, God will deliver them. God will keep us. He’ll help. He’ll intervene—perhaps just in the nick of time. Is that too close for comfort? Maybe. But our trust in Him was never meant to be comfortable—only close. And the nick of time is close enough.”
“Right now you may be in the middle of a long stretch of the same old routine. … You don’t hear any cheers or applause. The days run together—and so do the weeks. Your commitment to keep putting one foot in front of the other is starting to falter. Take a moment and look at the fruit. Perseverance. Determination. Fortitude. Patience. Your life is not a boring stretch of highway. It’s a straight line to heaven. And just look at the fields ripening along the way. Look at the tenacity and endurance. Look at the grains of righteousness. You’ll have quite a crop at harvest…so don’t give up!”
“If we’re going to stand up and make a difference for Christ while others lounge about, you can be sure we will encounter hardships, obstacles, nuisances, hassles, and inconveniences—much more than the average couch potato. And we shouldn’t be surprised. Such difficulty while serving Christ isn’t necessarily suffering—it’s status quo.”
“Labels, labels, labels. I’m glad Jesus referred to people as people. He never mentioned His friend being a coward; He simply called him Peter. He never referred to the woman who loved Him deeply as a prostitute; He just called her Mary Magdalene.”
“This is the daily stuff of my life. It always involves more than simply picking up hamburgers and cokes, or clothes from the dry cleaners. It involves a chance to make God real to people. A chance for them to serve, to feel good about themselves, to experience a new way of doing things. It’s a chance to break the mold and accomplish a task in a different manner—an opportunity to throw a hand grenade into the ordinary way of living and, in so doing, take people by surprise.”
“Problems are often God’s way of grabbing a lever in order to pry us out of our ruts. And when you rise up out of a rut, you end up enjoying the fresh air of possibilities, the new breeze of challenge and change. Your faith finds feet. Your witness begins to work.”
“Jesus didn’t pass me by. He didn’t overlook me. He answered my prayer—He said, ‘No.’ And I’m glad. A ‘no’ answer has purged sin from my life, strengthened my commitment to Christ, and forced me to depend on grace. It has bound me with other believers, produced discernment, disciplined my mind, and taught me to spend my time wisely. It has stretched my hope, increased my faith, and strengthened my character. Being in this wheelchair has meant knowing Christ better. Feeling His strength every day.”
“I wonder how many of us second-guess a prompting and ignore the Spirit’s leading. That night I learned that every urge to do good, every prompting to share the gospel, is a prompting from God. We need not second-guess. … This week you’ll hear God’s still, small voice whisper, ‘Say something to her… invite him… make that call… apologize.’ You’ll be tempted to brush it off—but don’t. Seize the moment! Today is the day of salvation! The prompting may never pass your way again. Neither might that person. Ever.”
“It’s just like God. He steps into our tightly controlled, private space, raises His hand, and says, ‘Pardon Me, everyone. I have something to reveal about this person.’ He presumes on our comfort zones, tears aside curtains, throws open locked doors, and pulls the fire alarm on stuffy, sacrosanct attitudes. He oversteps our nicely organized plans and strips the veneer off our smug ways. He boldly intrudes into our sin, brashly calling it what it is and challenging us to leave it behind. It’s called humiliation. It’s one of the painful ways we face our sin. If we remain unaware of our sin, we cannot truly know or understand ourselves. Humiliation lands a knockout blow to self-esteem, reminding us that without Christ we are nothing.”
Do you ever get lost in the “begats” of the Bible? You know those long, tedious lists of who was born to whom? In 1 Chronicles there’s an equally long list of names that goes on for five chapters(!) of who’s in charge of what. But be careful not to skip over these lists. The Holy Spirit included them in the inspired Word of God for a reason, and sometimes you find some real gems buried in these lists.
Craig T. Owens 