Considering the most important decision ever made, we might think it is the decision to accept Christ, to give Him rule over our lives. This isn’t necessarily wrong. But ONE decision has been made to precede all decisions; that is GOD’S decision to have mercy. We can almost hear the decision-making process in the heart of God:

“I was enraged by his sinful greed;
I punished him, and hid My face in anger,
yet he kept on in his willful ways.
I have seen his ways, BUT I will heal him;
I will guide him and restore comfort to him” (Is 57:17)

Do you feel the anguish and the pause…a pause turning Him in mercy? God will instead heal this man He’s created. Something will have to give, though. And that will be Himself.

We are totally bent on proceeding willfully, “yet he kept on.” God says to us, “You were wearied by all your ways, but you would not say ‘It is hopeless” (Is 57:10). After giving out punishment after punishment, God is, so to speak, at the end of Himself. What will he do? The songwriter says: “He placed His love upon the altar.” Why?

Why does He love? “God IS love.” How tenderly He looks at us:
“…nor will I always be angry, for then the spirit of man would grow faint before Me-the breath of men that I have created” (Is 57:16)

Oh, how He loves His man! In God’s vulnerability, He will place His love, His healing…His Son upon the altar and call out “Peace, peace to those far and near…and I will heal them (Is 57:19b).

Behold the decision of Father.

“Almost you persuade me to be a Christian. ” (Acts 26:28 ) 
  
There is no sadder statement than to say as King Agrippa to Paul: he almost was persuaded to believe. We can assume the process went no further than what is recorded in Scripture.
 
What does it mean to “almost” believe? We know no one can create spiritual hunger but God. He alone draws people, causes people to seek Him, reveals truth, and convicts of guilt, righteousness and judgment. If this is at work in an individual, we know we are seeing the handprints of God’s activity within them.

But at this stage, the person still remains outside the promises of God. Almost is not enough. “Once you were not a people…once you had not received mercy” (1 Pet 2:10), “you were once darkness…” (Eph 5:8). “Once” has not been changed.

A vivid memory to my husband remains with him of the night before he surrendered to the Lord. As some street preachers at a festival encountered his gang of friends, one other friend stayed to hear. While the gang tried to drag the two away, his friend consented to being pulled away. My husband will never forget the longing look on his face as he looked back to the preachers talking to my husband. He was killed 3 1/2 months later as he drove drunk into an oil well. It is a look he can’t forget, the look of “almost.”

You may have been interested, even stirred. This could not happen without God’s drawing (Jn 6:44). You may think you can stay or return to this point…only indefinitely.

Please make that step of your will. If you are stirred, God is doing His part. May your story not be recorded as “almost.”
 

“We give thanks to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ…” (Col 1:3)

I think if our own children would look back, they would admit the “downside” of their earlier Christmases and birthdays was the required thank-you notes.  For the following week seven givers would equal seven notes, which meant seven envelopes to fill out with seven stamps to place on them.

What a grief to our society when we face the byproduct of our lives reflected in our children: ingratitude! Since we don’t know how to tackle this completely, we are sufficed with a mere forced “thank you” on our way to the next thing to try to gratify them. This unending cycle gnaws in us for something more.

Is this really what the Father is after: our saying “thanks”? Recently I made a discovery: biblically thanks means (eu) good + charizomai (to give freely, gift). There’s nothing forced in true thanking, just freedom of expression for the good! This can include SO MUCH: a praise, an encouragement, a blessing, a clap, a smile, a “yes,” a good report, a raised hand, a thumbs up…

The key components of a thankful heart are liberty and good. Saying “thank you” isn’t even required. Quite honestly, probably this verbalization might even undercut the true sincerity of that rare moment.

God made everything the right way (“You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free…).  He is after uncoerced free expression, not the surface level show that we’ve reduced to calling thanking.

If we can realize how desirable it is for us to freely give expression to good, and that our Father receives wide variations as thankfulness, won’t we be healed of ungratefulness? Won’t gratefulness begin to grow within us? And if it isn’t too late, our liberation can also raise up our children…