He Holds Me Forever - Held Tightly by His Promises, Part 1

No matter what you've suffered through your experience, God has a special plan for you. What you see as a damaged and tattered life, God sees as a precious child who He wants to love and shape into a masterpiece to display His glory. If you're struggling to believe that, stick around and listen to my wife, Theresa, as she shares how you can experience God's best for your life. Welcome to this Edition of Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. Living on the Edge is an international teaching and discipleship ministry motivating Christians to live like Christians.

Do you constantly wrestle with feeling worthless, unlovable, or that you never measure up? Well, today our guest teacher, Theresa Ingram, will expose the roots of those lies and point us to the truth that we are deeply loved and valued by God. Well, there's a lot to get to today, so here's Theresa to continue our series, He Holds Me Forever, with her message held tightly by His promises. Well, I was talking with a young girl just a few weeks ago, and she's in that time of her life where she's early 20s, and we were talking about love and relationships. And she is obviously getting close to that time where she would like to be married and would like to meet someone and is looking forward to that in her life. And I was so impressed with her attitude.

And she told me that she had memorized something, and I wrote it down because I was so impressed with what she said. And she quoted a line for me out of Oswald Chambers' book, The Love of God, and this is what she said, drink deep and full of the love of God, and you will not demand the impossible from earth's loves. And the love of wife and child and husband and friend will grow holier and healthier and simpler and grander. And I realized that this young woman was looking to fill up her love tank with God's love. And a lot of time, God uses people in our lives to do that.

He does use people. He uses others to express His love to us, but He wants us to experience His love first, and He wants us to be the one who fills up our love tanks. Well, when I was in my early 20s, I looked at life totally different than this young woman, and I tried to find all the love in my life met solely in another person. And so I fell in love with this young man, and I got married, and I just, I loved him so much, and I just put so much weight upon this one person in my life to fulfill all my needs. And there were many things that were wrong in this relationship with him, but I overlooked them because I wanted love so much that I let those things go because the entire focus of my life was on this person. And the sun rose and set upon his life, and whether he was in a good mood and whether he treated me kind or not, it didn't matter because I needed his love so much. And so I worked hard not to cause any waves in the relationship. And several years later, though, he left me and left with another woman and left me alone with two little boys.

And you see, I tried to fill up my love tank with something that wasn't stable, that something could not satisfy my life. And again, I was at that place where I truly longed to be loved, and I was empty inside, and I felt like I was more damaged than I ever was before. Remember, we said that God loved us first. He loved us before we even knew him, and that he was pursuing us, even though we weren't aware that he was there at the time. As I look back now in my life, I see that God was doing that for me, and he was putting his arms around me, and he was orchestrating the affairs in my life to draw me to himself, even though I wasn't aware that he was there. Well, after my husband left, I took a new job working at a college, and the director of admissions at this college, who I worked for at the time and I didn't realize at the time, was a very godly Christian man. He loved the Lord, and I would work with him every day, and he would ask me questions about my life, just trying to be friendly. And he would ask me, well, how are you doing?

How's your family doing? And I try not to take my problems to work with me. But one day, he kept asking this every day, and I couldn't hold it in anymore.

And I just started crying right there, and I said, oh, my life is just a mess, and my husband left me, and I have these two little kids to take care of, and I don't know how I'm going to make it. And then I was really shocked that I was saying all this to my boss. But he was so kind. You know, an amazing thing that I see now is how God used this man to draw me to himself, to draw me to God. And John Conaway didn't quote Scripture to me.

He didn't do that. And he didn't tell me that I needed to go to church. And at the time, he didn't even tell me how to be saved.

I didn't know that for a long time. But every day, what he did was tell me how much God loved me. He told me that over and over again, how much he loved me and how much he wanted to take care of me. And so as I listened to this, I decided that, well, maybe there's something to this. And I wanted to find God. I wanted to know if he was real. And John Conaway was also a lay preacher there in some of those, in West Virginia, there's all these little country churches. And so he would go around to some of these churches and preach on Sunday evenings.

And so I was searching. And I wanted to find out if this God of love really did exist. And so I went with him and his wife one Sunday night to church.

And we sat through the service and just did all the things that you do in a typical church service. And I went there with a purpose, though, and that was to find God. And he didn't know that.

He didn't know where I was in my life. But I wanted to find God. And so as I sat through everything that was going on, I was looking for something to happen. I was waiting with expectation. I don't know what I expected God to do.

But I thought he was going to do something to reveal himself to me. But nothing happened. And I sat through that service.

I listened to the message and the singing and everything. Nothing happened. And so I walked out of that church.

It was over. I was out on the sidewalk about ready to get into my car. And I felt so disappointed and almost devastated to think that, well, you know, I hear all this about God, but he doesn't seem real. He certainly didn't reveal himself to me in any way. And as I was about to get in my car, there was a little old lady there. I didn't know her. She didn't know me.

She didn't know a thing about me. And she walked right up to me and she said, Would you like to be saved tonight? And I just thought, God is doing something here. And I said, Yes, yes, I want to be saved.

I want to know the truth. And I didn't even know even yet how to do that. And so she and everyone that was outside of the church went back in to this little free Methodist church and we went up to the altar and I prayed and I asked Christ to come and live in my life. And it was just the most tremendous night that I've ever experienced because for the first time I knew that God loved me. And I was experiencing for the first time what true love really was. I was experiencing truth, God's truth. And I was experiencing God's love through his people in the church. And he reached down into my life like he promises that he does.

And he loved me. And I learned and have been learning ever since what it means to be truly loved by God. And so we can't fully understand his love because it's so great that we can never fully understand it. But what we want to talk about today is that we can't experience his love in our lives.

We can experience it on a regular basis. In fact, God expresses his love to us in many ways and every day. But many times we keep missing the signs, don't we? We don't see his love. Often we fail to recognize God's love or sometimes we find it hard to believe that he loves us. And why is this? Why do you think that it's so hard to experience God's love?

What the hindrances are to experiencing God's love in our lives and then how can we remove those hindrances so that we can know his love and experience it in our lives? When I grew up in West Virginia, I remember my bedroom so well that I spent hours and hours in. And in the winter sometimes it could be really cold and we could have a lot of snow and the winters could be pretty harsh sometimes. But then I remember when the springtime came and it finally warmed up and you could smell the flowers in the air and you can hear the birds singing. And I just loved it when it could finally be warm enough that I could open up the window in my bedroom and I could have that fresh breeze blowing through.

And I could even see the curtains moving, you know, as that breeze would blow through my bedroom window. And I thought today, we're going to pretend that there's a window to our soul. And when the window is closed, then we close ourselves off from experiencing God's love. But when we open it, then we begin to experience the love that he has for us, a love that is already there.

It's there already all the time. You see, it's a choice we make, it's like I could open and close my window. It's a choice that we can make whether to open or close the window of our souls, whether to experience his love or not, because it's there all the time. And we're going to look at four ways that we close the window, what keeps us from experiencing God's love in our life, and then how do we open it, how do we remove those hindrances so that we can know how wide and how long and how high and how deep his love really is for us.

And so the first closed window that we see here is that sin in my life and disobedience to God's word keeps me from experiencing his love. In John 15, 9 and 10 it says, I have loved you even as the Father has loved me. Remain in my love. When you obey me, you remain in my love just as I obey my Father and remain in his love. Jesus is talking here and he's saying, I love you in the same way that my Father loves me.

That's how I love you. He says, stay close to me and you'll experience the joy of knowing my love if you stay close to me. And he says, I tell you how it is that you can remain in my love. It's by obedience to my word.

He says, I came to set an example for you to show you how to do this. As I have obeyed my Father, then you obey my word and remain in my love. You see, God is holy. And his holiness is incompatible with sin in our lives.

It just doesn't mix. And he can't associate with sin or have any part of that. And so when we have sin in our life, when we're disobeying God, then we separate ourselves from him.

We pull away from him and that intimacy that he desires for us to have with him is broken. When I was a child, I remember one time picking up this figuring that I wasn't supposed to touch. It was one that my mom had said, you know, I don't want you to touch that because I think it was very valuable to her. Well, one time I was in the room and I picked it up and I dropped it and a piece of it broke off, but nobody was there.

So I took the piece and I stuck it back on and it stayed. And so I set it back up on the shelf and she never found out for a long time. She never discovered that that thing was broken. In fact, when she did find out, I was in the room with her, but she thought one of my cousins broke it. So I didn't say anything, but I lived for a long time with the fear that she was going to discover that I broke that thing.

And then I lived with the guilt of allowing someone else to take the blame. But you see, what I did was I allowed my disobedience, you know, I wasn't supposed to touch it, to place a barrier in my relationship with my mom. And so when I was in that room with her, well, what do you think was on my mind? I was afraid she was going to find out. And so what it did was it placed a barrier in my relationship with her.

It caused me to pull away from her. And that's what we do when we sin, when we disobey God, it causes us to pull away from Him. In Deuteronomy 5 10, it says, But I lavish my love on those who love me and obey my commands, even for a thousand generations. You see, being able to experience God's love is conditioned on our obedience to Him. He's holy. And even though He loves us more than we could ever imagine, as a loving father, He disciplines His children as any loving father would.

And He does it for our good. And it's only in our obedience then, as we obey His word, that we open the window to God's love and to have that intimate relationship with Him. And so we open the window by living righteously because God's love is perfected in lives that are pure.

1 John 2 4 and 5. The one who says, I have come to know Him and does not keep His commandments is a liar and the truth is not in Him, but whoever keeps His word in Him, the love of God has truly been perfected. By this we know that we are in Him. It says the love of God is perfected in the believer.

The word perfected here does not mean that we reach a state of perfection. That's not what it means at all, but it means that we are continually growing and continually maturing in our walk with the Lord, that as we live in obedience to Him and to His word that we're growing in Christlikeness, we're growing in our knowledge of His love for us. And He proved His love by dying on the cross to pay for our sins and then to forgive us so that we could come to Him and be close to Him. But every day He shows us His love by forgiving our daily sins. I don't know about you, but I sin just pretty much every day.

I do something. You know, I may have a bad attitude or say something unkind or worry about something that I should have trusted God for, but every time that I ask Him to forgive me, He embraces me with His love and He forgives me. Now, did you ever think that the forgiveness of your daily sins is a sign of God's love?

Did you ever think about it like that? That every day that He forgives us, He's showing His love to us. And it doesn't matter what we've done, how big we've messed up, it doesn't matter. When you recognize you're wrong and you come to Him with a sincere heart, He's waiting to embrace you and forgive you. David Wertzen writes in a book called Love Without Shame, this divine loyalty is more tenacious than the compassion a mother feels for the child she carried in her womb. Forgiveness flows from this womb-like tenderness God feels for His babies. Human parents sometimes quit on their children, but the ultimate father's heart stirs within to restore his child. When grievous sin stains our heart, Satan attacks with his potent lie. God has given up on you.

The relationship is over. Why return to a father who has disowned you? True confession breaks through this deception and remembers God's unchanging mercy, loyalty, and compassion. When God's rebellious children cry out for mercy, He always listens. He gives far more than a spot cleaning. He bleaches out every stain.

He bleaches out every stain. And so the steps to take, if you look in your notes here, the steps to take is daily confession of our sins. Don't let sin stay for long periods of time.

Keep short accounts. When you're aware that you've done something that's in disobedience to God's Word, confess it right away wherever you are. You don't have to hold onto it.

You don't have to wait until you can get in a room all by yourself. Just confess it and be free of that and stay close to God. As soon as you're aware, confess it right away. In Psalm 51, 1 and 2, David prays, Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love, according to your great compassion, blot out my transgression, wash away all my iniquity, and cleanse me from all my sin. You see, King David knew what it was like to blow it big time, and yet he came to God with a repentant heart, and God forgave him. David did experience consequences in his life for what he did. It's the sin of adultery and murder. I mean, they're big things we think of as big sins, and sin always damages us, and it always damages other people. But David came to God with a repentant heart, and he was completely forgiven, and his record was wiped completely clean, wiped completely clean. And so the steps to take, first of all, is make confession a part of your daily life, and the second thing is spend time in God's Word on a regular basis.

And I'm going to be bold enough to say five to seven days a week. We need to be in God's Word. Psalm 19 11 says, I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you. You see, God wants to speak to you. He wants to tell you how to live, how to live a good life, how to have a life filled with joy. He wants to be close to you, and he wrote you a love letter. It's in his book, the Bible, because he cares for you so much. He wrote this book as a love letter to tell us how much he loves us. You're listening to Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram, and we'll continue our guest teacher Teresa Ingram's series, He Holds Me Forever, in just a minute. But quickly, are you looking for a practical way to deepen your prayer time with God? Then stick around after the message as Chip talks about an easy tool we've developed to help you be more intentional in your daily time with Jesus. You won't want to miss it.

With that, here again is Teresa. When I first realized that I was falling in love with Chip, he was about to go overseas on a missions trip, and we hadn't communicated to each other at this time that we were really in love. And so he went away on this trip, and I didn't hear from him. He was gone for the whole summer. I didn't hear from him for quite a long time. But after about a month or so, there was a letter in my mailbox from South America. And I got really excited, and I went and picked up this letter, and I opened it up with anticipation of what he was going to say to me.

I was so excited to hear. And you know, I believe that that's how God wants us to open up his Word, that when we open it up, that we are in such anticipation of what he has to say. What's he going to say to me? He has important things to say to me, and he wants to speak to us, but he wants us to be excited about getting in his Word, and he will speak to us through his Word. He wants us to know him.

He wants us to know how much he loves us. And so a question that I would ask for us to take to heart, is there any area of my life that needs cleaned up, any sin in my life that I have not confessed to God that is separating me from him? And secondly, do I spend regular time reading and meditating on God's Word so that I can know him and have an intimate relationship with him?

We need to answer these questions individually in our own hearts. Well, secondly, we close the window of our souls by a believer's learned way of thinking about themselves. The self-talk, what we say in our minds to ourselves, can keep us from experiencing God's love. In Proverbs 23, 7, it says, as a man or as a woman thinks in her heart, so she is.

As she thinks in her mind, that's how she's going to act. And we learn to believe certain things about ourselves that may or may not be true. They may not be true. We live in a world system and a culture that is telling us every day that we need to have certain things and we need to behave a certain way. We need to look a certain way. We need to believe certain things in order to be loved, accepted, and significant in our lives. And what we believe about ourselves affects our actions and it affects our emotions. It affects the decisions that we make. It affects everything in our lives, what we believe about ourselves.

And particularly in our growing up years, we learn to define ourselves in a certain way. I grew up in a home where I was afraid to mess up. I was afraid to even make an accidental mistake because even those things were punished. And during those years at home, I was afraid of my dad. And when I wanted to ask him to go someplace or to do something special, it would take me hours just to get up the courage to go ask him and I would sit there and I'd go through all this torture in my mind trying to build up the courage to ask him to do something.

And then when I did, most of the time he said no. And so I learned that unless I do everything perfectly, that unless I don't mess up, I'm not a good person. And then early in my Christian life, as an adult, every time I messed up, I thought God didn't like me.

I thought he didn't like me. And I believe that he certainly wouldn't give me good things and that if I asked him for something, he would probably say no. You see, that's what I learned about myself. And so it's very important that we take a good look at what we think and what we believe and compare it with God's Word to see what our self-talk is, to see if it's really true or not. Because of what we believe about ourselves, we may try to earn a love, God's love, that is freely given.

We may try to earn it, but it's already there. And because of what we believe about ourselves, we might not believe that God would take care of us. And because of what we believe about ourselves, we may believe that he sure wouldn't listen to my prayers.

He sure wouldn't give me good things. And because of what we believe about ourselves, we may not believe that God really loves us. And so then we close the window of our soul from experiencing his love. Well, we can open that window by filling our minds with God's truth to overcome the negative belief systems we have learned, and we will cling to his promises for our lives.

That's how we can open that window. In Philippians 4-8, it says, And now, dear friends, let me say one more thing as I close this ladder. Fix your thoughts on what is true and honorable and right. Think about things that are pure and lovely and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise. In this passage, the Apostle Paul is putting on his psychology hat.

Did you know he was a psychologist, too? And he tells us how do we deal with the lies we believe, how do we deal with all of these negative things that we think in our minds. And he says to think about what's true, think about what is a fact, what are statements that are real, that are not lies, that are not rumors, but they're real, they're sincere, and they're genuine. Think about things that are true. He says think about things that are honorable, that are respectful. Think about things that are right, things that are in keeping with God's truth, with his word. Think about things that are lovely, things that are beautiful, that are pure, morally pure. Think about things that are admirable, he says. Think about things that speak well of the thinker. Think about things. Who's the thinker?

It's you. Think about things that speak well of the thinker. If someone could hear your thoughts about yourself, what would they hear? Would you want them to hear it? For a long time, I believed down deep in my heart that I was unlovable and that because I kept messing up, God wouldn't give me good things. He did that for other people.

He does that for smarter people, but he wouldn't do that for me. But I learned that through God's word that I was wrong and that he tells me in his truth that his love for me is eternal and that I am his and that his desire is to be close to me, that I am his child and that he treasures me and that he will withhold no good thing. He says he'll withhold no good thing from those who walk uprightly and he gives us the desires of our hearts. And so let me ask you, are you lovable? Do you believe that God sees something infinitely precious in your life, that when he looks at you, you are precious to him?

Do you believe that God wants to do good in your life? Well, this is what he says. This is what his word says is true. But we must begin the process of recognizing the lies we believe and choose to replace those lies with God's truth.

This is Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. And you've been listening to the first part of our guest teacher, Teresa Ingram's message, held tightly by his promises from her series, He Holds Me Forever. She and Chip will join us shortly to share some additional thoughts on what we've heard. In these handful of messages, Teresa is highlighting a fundamental attribute of God, his love. She'll explain why people view God as cold and distant and shed light on the deep rooted issues that cause people to struggle with their identity. Join us as we better grasp our Creator's deep love and care for us. So if you're wrestling with your self-worth or purpose in life, this series will renew your mind with gospel truth. You're not going to want to miss a word. Well, before we go any further, here's our Bible teacher, Chip Ingram. Thanks Dave.

And let me ask you a direct question. Have you ever struggled with the goodness of God? And if so, what I want to suggest is that is very, very normal. We tend to remember pain, difficulty, and struggle, and we tend to really forget blessing.

It's not so much your actual experience as it is the faulty memory. And that's why the Psalm 103 says, you know, bless the Lord O my soul, bless the Lord O my soul, and forget not any of his benefits. And I share that because I think we need a tool to remember. And so I keep a journal for that purpose.

And I don't feel like I have to write in it every day, but you know, a few times a week, I'm writing down. I put a little asterisk, thank you God for. And I mean, it may sound mundane, but thank you that one of my sons called and, you know, he's been out of town for a long time.

Thank you so much for the sunset. Thank you so much for speaking to me out of, you know, Psalm 46. And I'll list things I'm thankful for or, you know, I'll have a struggle and I put a little box and I'll write a prayer request.

And when it's answered, I go back and I put a check and I put a date and a little answer. And then I do get discouraged. I do forget that God is good. I have mornings and times where I don't want to pray, I don't want to read. The issue is I've lost perspective and I get that journal and I'll go back a week or two weeks or a month and I'll read what God has done the last month or so.

And all of a sudden my perspective is, oh wow, you have been good to me. And so if you've never kept a journal, we have created one that is uniquely designed for you in a way that will help you personally. It has some great quotes, some great songs and hymns, some prompts. I would encourage you if you struggle with remembering and tracking your journey, this journal will be a great help.

Dave, why don't you take a minute and tell people how they can get a hold of it? Well, to learn more about our prayer journals, visit LivingOnTheEdge.org or call us at 888-333-6003. These beautiful, compact notebooks have plenty of space for your prayers and personal journaling, along with scripture verses, hymn lyrics, and quotes to encourage you. If you want a more intentional, enriching time with God, this tool will help. Again, for more details about our prayer journals, visit LivingOnTheEdge.org or call 888-333-6003.

Have listeners tap special offers. Well, here now is Chip and Teresa to share some application from today's message. Teresa, near the very end of your teaching time, you said something that really struck me. You said His Word is true, but we have to begin the process of recognizing the lies that we believe and then replace those with God's truth. What were your first steps in recognizing the lies that you believed and then getting God's truth into your mind, into your heart? I was a believer for a few years, and I had no idea of the lies I believed.

When you live with a certain belief system, you grow up with that, and that's how you think. I had no idea that my thoughts were wrong, that those weren't the thoughts that God wanted me to have. And I realized that what we believe, what we think about ourselves, really affects our relationships, and it affects our lives in lots of different ways, in a negative way, and especially in marriage.

It was affecting Chip and I's marriage. I grew up with such a poor self-image. I was afraid of everything. I didn't believe that I was really useful or that people really liked me and just had so many lies. And so it was during that time that we got started on these affirmation cards, and that's where I would write down the lie that I was thinking about myself or about life, actually. And then I would turn on the other side and I would find scriptures.

I would find what God says is true in that situation. And so I began to practice that every day for days until these truths about myself got in my mind. And just something I want to say here, too, is this isn't about me.

It's not about us. It's about God wants us to know who we are in him. It's about God and it pleases him when we realize how much he cares for us and that we are made in his image and we are precious to him and he loves us more than we can ever imagine. And he has good for us and he gives us all that we need to do whatever he is asking us to do. And those were truths that I needed to have deep in my heart. So God opened my eyes and I learned to believe the truth that his word said about me.

And the verse that I think about here is that God says that you shall know my truth and my truth will set you free. And the freedom of not listening to the negative things that Satan would want to put in my mind or that I learned as I grew up was was an amazing thing. And I still struggle. I've done this for years and years and I've changed a lot. I have so much more confidence than I used to have. I actually like myself now. I didn't like myself for a long time.

And I really believe that other people like me, too, and that I don't have to please everybody all the time, but that I can be free and live my life and do it in a way that honors God and brings glory to him. Great challenge, Teresa. And let me encourage those of you battling with lies about your worth and identity.

Dig into God's word, because when you hid that truth in your heart like Teresa did, it will change you from the inside out. Well, just before we close, can I ask you to take a moment at some point today and pray for Living on the Edge? We've never seen a greater need for God's truth to go out. And by His grace, Living on the Edge has provided encouragement, teaching, and personal discipleship resources to more people than ever. So thank you to those who support us in prayer. God is doing amazing things. We'll listen to next time as our guest teacher, Teresa Ingram, picks up in her series, He Holds Me Forever. Until then, this is Dave Druley saying thanks for joining us for this Edition of Living on the Edge.