Daily Devotional – July 9, 2020

Just how hot is it out there in the Midwest? He's from the East Coast. So I told him, I said, it is so hot out here that you can't even make a chili dog. In fact, it's so hot that Chuck Gommer, one of the members of our church, he's feeding ice to his chickens so they won't lay boiled eggs.

And speaking of his chickens, it's so hot that you can poach his eggs in a pool. It's so hot that some of our farmers are seeing the corn popping on the stocks out there in the fields. And yeah, you get in your car and you go to turn it on and the temperature gauge says it's already overheating.

It's so hot. And it's so hot that all the bread in the store, it's already toast by the time you get it home. And hey, I don't know about you, but it's so hot that I'm using Celsius instead of Fahrenheit just to have a lower number.

Makes you feel better. Now it's kind of like the, uh, the wind chill or the heat index. You know, don't tell me the heat index. Just let me know the real temperature so it doesn't feel quite so hot. Well, when was the last time you were stuck?

And what I mean by that is that you're in a place that you don't want to be and you don't see any end in sight to being in that place. And the thing of it is you don't even really have a clue as to why you're there and what the purpose of it all is.

You certainly don't see anything positive coming out of it. And you find yourself thinking things like, I'm sure I could be so much more effective if I weren't stuck here. And it's really not a question of if, is it?

It's more like when have you been stuck? I recall feeling that way about a year after we had moved to Vermont. Now we lived there from 1992 to the year 2000 and it was less than a year after we moved there and I was really feeling stuck before moving to Vermont.

I pastored a church in Tennessee, in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. And Oak Ridge is that community where the atomic bombs were built during World War II and there's still a huge national laboratory there in that community.

And so I pastored in that church and led the church through making some really, really difficult, challenging decisions. And before that I served as an assistant pastor at a church in South Bend, Indiana, and it was a church of about 700 or so people.

And there was always something positive going on and it seemed like the church was moving in a very positive direction. But in Vermont, I just was struggling and felt stuck. So the summer after we moved there, we took a vacation, came back to the Midwest visiting family and so forth.

And I went to visit the church where I served as an assistant years before and the pastor was still there, same pastor was still there. And I met with him and was explaining to him, is this how I feel?

I just feel stuck. I feel like maybe I need to go somewhere else where I could be more effective. And I've told him, after telling him that plight and asking, you know, what in the world should I do? He simply said to me, Hey, stay put.

Just stay put. Work through it. Be faithful. He said, the Lord will use you in ways that you can't see right now. And if he wants to move you later, he'll move you later, but just stay put. So we stayed, we stayed, stayed there for eight years.

And the stuckness, well, it pretty much went away. He was right. You know, and the Lord ended up using us in ways there that we did not absolutely could not have seen in those first few months after we arrived.

God Uses Seasons of Feeling Stuck for His Purposes

Well, we've been considering what Paul went through when he was in Caesarea this week. He got stuck in a Roman prison there in Caesarea for two years, for two years. And it wasn't because he did anything wrong.

He didn't, he didn't break any laws and he committed no crime, neither against God nor against the Jewish law nor against the Roman empire. He did nothing wrong. There was literally no reason, no justification for his being held captive.

Yet there he was, stuck in this prison in Caesarea for two years. So I've asked you to think about that. I've asked you to think about, you know, what issues arise when you feel stuck? What do you struggle with during those times?

What do you do? What do you do? Yesterday we asked the why questions, right? Why, why did God allow this to happen in the first place? And why didn't God intervene and get him out of that situation like he had in Philippi?

And why has God seemingly sidelined this chosen instrument, this special apostle? Why is he leaving Paul stuck? And while we can't know all the reasons, we concluded that God used the time to provide an opportunity for Paul to fulfill some of what he was called to do in the first place, which was to preach the gospel to kings.

What Paul Did While He Was in Prison

Well, another question we want to ponder is what do you do when you're stuck? So when you total up the time that Luke tells us that Paul actually stood before these different magistrates, Felix and Festus and so forth, and the time that he shared the gospel to some extent, it really doesn't amount to very much time over those two years.

You know, what's actually recorded, maybe an hour. So what did he do with all that time? Well, again, we can't say for sure all that he did. Scripture doesn't tell us, but here's what we are told. We're told that five days after he arrived in Caesarea, he went before Felix for the first time.

We read about that in the beginning of Acts chapter 24. And then about two years later, Festus took over for Felix. Read of that at the end of chapter 24. And we know only three things that took place in those two years.

One, he had enough freedom that his friends could come and visit him, could minister to his needs, they could encourage him. Secondly, we know that he was called by Felix to come to talk to him. And we're told this about those encounters, that Felix sent for Paul and heard him speak about faith in Christ Jesus.

And as he reasoned, Paul reasoned about righteousness and self-control and the coming judgment, Felix was alarmed. And the third thing we know is that Felix sent for him often and conversed with him.

Accepting Encouragement and Refusing Self-Pity

So what did Paul do while he was stuck in prison? Well, for one thing, he accepted all the encouragement that was offered by others who cared for him and his difficulty. Now, this can be difficult for some people.

It can be a real challenge. And for one thing, they don't want to admit to anyone that they're actually feeling stuck. They won't ask for help. They won't share this very real need. It's like they would be admitting some kind of weakness or failure or something and they just won't do that.

Well, Paul wasn't reluctant to do so. And then the second thing Paul did when he was stuck in prison was he didn't wallow in self-pity and allow that to shut him down, to distract him from his mission in life.

How about you? How about you? When you're stuck, do you just get depressed and end up neglecting the very basic things of your life vocation? Well, let me encourage you to follow Paul's example here and not allow yourself to wallow in that self-pity.

That's the easiest thing to do. And I can tell you that from personal experience. You get to wallowing in that and it demotivates you and it robs you of energy and vitality and vision and enthusiasm, motivation.

Don't allow that to happen. Follow Paul's example here and stay focused on the mission at hand and look for opportunities to use your calling even when you're stuck. Well, let's have a word of prayer and ask the Lord to use us and use you.

Prayer for Faithfulness When Life Feels Stuck

Even if you're feeling kind of stuck right now, he will. Let's pray. Father in heaven, we thank you for your encouraging word that gives advice and counsel to us even in times when we don't feel like we're being very effective and we're really accomplishing anything.

Times we're feeling stuck. I pray that you'd bless these thoughts to our hearts today, these thoughts from your word. And we pray this in Jesus name and for his sake. Amen. All right. Well again, as I've been saying this week, keep cool and stay by the stuff.

Lord bless you. Have a good rest of your day.