BUT FOR HIS PURPOSE

About a week before Jesus would go through Gethsemane and to the cross of Calvary, His agony is seen visually and heard verbally in regards to His impending death. However, His death was the purpose in which He came and it is important to know that death did not interrupt His ministry, it fulfilled His purpose from eternity.You see, I love the authenticity and emotions that Jesus allowed for us to see in Him (John 12:27-28) so that in our anguish we too may be encouraged and endure through. Very often, it is for His purpose that we have found ourselves in the hour of suffering. God knows that in our broken and battered state, like grain that must be grounded, we are in the process to being made whole, like bread. And upon being grounded for His purpose, we too will be a blessing and a comfort to others as they feed on our experience and testimony for God’s glory.Our Master and Savior gives us so much in this little caption of prayer dialogue with His Father. In an almost rhetoric approach, Jesus says, “Now my soul is troubled, and what shall I say? ‘Father, save Me from this hour’?” (John 12:27)In anguish and knowing that He was facing His death, Jesus essentially states, “I’m going through it, and there is nothing that I can say that can make anyone understand this except My Father. You may believe that because I am troubled that I should call out to My Father to save me. I could very easily, but not so!”And then He hits us with a statement that should be uttered and prayed by every believer in their day of distress. Jesus prays, “But for this purpose I came to this hour. Father, glorify Your name” (verse 28).Again, simply put, Jesus is saying, “But for this purpose, My Father's purpose, I came to die.  And in this sacrifice My Father's character will be glorified. It’s worth My emotional and mental anguish. It’s worth the physical suffering.  It’s worth it, because My Father and I will be glorified and you will be saved.”"But for His purpose I’m going through this or that, and that God would receive all the glory, honor, and praise in my circumstances."  

Would you dare to say such a prayer? Friend, I have learned the essential truth in the power of such surrendering. When we know that our very own God went through it Himself to save us, nothing on this side of heaven should bury us, for death itself could not bury Jesus. He is risen and it is because of His purpose that we are risen in Him too.I challenge you to say such prayers when you feel as though your soul is troubled. Of course it would be easier to lay down and give up, but if our Redeemer was obedient to the point of death for us, so too should we be obedient to His purpose for our lives.   The glory of the Father is always for the greater good and with that in mind, we too will begin to recognize our ‘But For This Purpose’ moments. They are there for our progression and not our destruction.  They are allowed to enter into our lives to conform us into the image of the Son. The breaking and grounding process must be done first before the bread can be made. And with the “Bread of Life” in your life, everything that you go through is ‘But for HIS PURPOSE, to glorify God!' Friend, dare to pray such prayers and know that if God be for you, nothing can be against you.