Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

It happened one Sabbath evening when the quiet, holy calm of the Lord’s Day should fill one’s soul, but it wasn’t there. I was embroiled in a silly unholy spat with my dear wife that left me crushed with shame. I hadn’t realized there was a demon still lurking deep in my soul; I felt honestly like Paul’s “chief of sinners,” “less than the least of all saints,” the one “born out of due season” (1 Tim..1:15; Eph. 3:8; 1 Cor. 15:8); Christ’s “unprofitable servant” (Luke 17:10). What made it most painful was that not only was I a husband who now felt most undeserving of the wife the dear Lord had given me—horrors, I was also a pastor! The senior pastor of this big Nairobi Central Church, and I was to be the speaker tomorrow morning! I felt polluted because of this quarrel; “self” had gotten the mastery in me. For me to enter that pulpit would be utter hypocrisy. I got on my knees, and for sure it was “out of the depths [that] I cried unto thee, O Lord” (Psalm 130:1). I felt as “lost” as anyone on earth, polluted with the ugly sin of self-love. I was at the bottom, “I said, ‘Woe is me, for I am undone! Because I am a man of unclean lips’” (Isa. 6:5).

 

But I couldn’t cut and run; I was in prison. I had to keep that appointment! No one else could take my place in that pulpit; I couldn’t stay in bed and mope. I had to enter that “most holy” spot totally “undone,” the most unworthy penitent in the “great congregation” (Psalm 40:9). “If I perish, I perish” had to be my resolve (cf. Esther 4:16). What kind of lightning bolt of hot wrath would the Lord send on a hypocrite in His pulpit? If you want to know, read Psalm 130 all the way through. It became my psalm.

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.