Faith is the foundation of our walk with the Lord. The enemy of our soul does everything possible to shipwreck our faith. Faith is believing though we cannot see. Hebrews 11:1 says, “Now faith…” Fresh faith right now, not faith from yesterday ~ moment by moment faith.

The verse says that our present faith, “…is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Abraham believed God when He promised he would have a son. Years went by. Sarai decided to take matters into her own hands. Her scheming created an Ishmael.

What lie did she believe? We have no power to fulfill God’s promises, nor any that we make to ourselves or others. Only the Lord is in control of all things. The Lord never draws away from us, but when we believe a lie, we are drawn away. James 1:14 says, “But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed.”

I encourage you to write down all the things that you are still holding in your heart as unmet. These may be promises by others, promises from God that you have claimed and stand in, or desires you have for others.

Examine your attitude towards them beside this Scripture. Psalm 62:5 says, “My soul, wait silently for God alone, for my expectation is from Him.” Waiting is a trial that causes the buried lies we have believed to surface. Impatience is the fruit of believing a lie. It is crouched in the subtlety of our own timing for the promise to be fulfilled.

Intimate communion with the Lord is a life-time pursuit of One. James 4:8 says, “Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded.” It is imperative that we release our broken expectations to the Lord.

Our lack is His opportunity to reveal Himself to us in ways we have not known Him before. Jesus knew what He was going to do to feed the multitude. He knows the journey we must travel to prepare us for His provision for our longing. Every aspect of our journey has nuances of spiritual truths. Through our intimate communion with Him, He will fill our deepest longings with Himself.

Long term unmet longings cause hidden emotional pain to come to the surface. We might unconsciously try to ignore it through self-protective ways. I’ve written before about emotional fillers. They are counterfeit fulfillers that block the Lord’s work in our heart.

Jesus came to set the captives free. We become captive through our own thoughts by clinging to our own ways. God’s way is perfect. He will continue to intercept our ways to redirect us into His ways. He calls for surrender.

With the Lord there is no lack. He meets our deepest longings through our relationship with Him. Do you have unmet longings? Our unmet longings are often from misplaced expectations. 

Let me disclose a trap of derailment. We take our longing before the Lord. We then expect Him to fulfill it. When He doesn’t, the temptation to become bitter and resentful looms before us. If we take satan’s bait, we will be hooked ~ captured in a trap of broken expectations.

Our longings are God given. They are part of our progressive sanctification. It is crucial to keep our expectations on the Lord. When our lack becomes our focus, we will miss out on the essential lessons for our spiritual growth.

In the feeding of the five thousand, the disciples only saw the lack. They compared the five loaves and to fish to the multitude of 5,000 plus folks. Yet Jesus used the circumstance of their lack as an opportunity. 

We are the only ones who have control over our thoughts.  We are the ‘keepers’ of that part of our vineyard. If we apply Proverbs 24:30-31 to our hearts, failure to keep our vineyard will cause it to become overgrown with thorns and nettles. and our stone walls of truth will be broken down. 

Once we have our first negative thought against our circumstances, others, or ourselves, we can stop it in its tracks. How? Through thanksgiving. Remember the loaves and fishes did not multiply until after Jesus gave thanks.

Expressing gratitude is like taking some pruning shears to our negative thoughts. If we cut them off they will fall to the ground and wither. Their source of life is instantly cut off. However, if we allow them to remain, they will become like a rolling snowball. It careens down the path gathering more negative debris. Cutting off the negative thoughts will allow a harvest of grateful thoughts to flourish.

Numbers 11:4 says, “Now the mixed multitude who were among them yielded to intense craving…” 1 Corinthians 15:33 says, “Do not be deceived: Evil company corrupts good habits.” We are influenced by those we hang out with. God judged the mixed multitude first. His fire consumed some in the outskirts of the camp.

Numbers 11:5-6 says, “We remember the fish which we ate freely in Egypt, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic; but now our whole being is dried up; there is nothing at all except this manna before our eyes!”

What provision has the Lord made for you in your trial that you are tired of? We need to take note of how our complaining affects others in our lives. Complaining is the fruit of bitter root judgments. Hebrews 12 15 indicates that when we allow bitter roots to spring up, we defile everyone around us.

I just typed my online devotional for July. I was reminded again of how our complaining displeases the Lord. Our complaints are often rooted in broken expectations. We think we know how a situation should go but our expectations are dashed.

We bury our resentment and forget about it. Then when adversity comes, our resentment surfaces and voices itself through complaining. Numbers 11:1 says, “Now when the people complained, it displeased the Lord; for the Lord heard it, and His anger was aroused…”

What was the root of their complaining? Comparison that led to discontent. They looked back to some foods they ate in the past. However, they forgot the fact that they were enslaved to the Egyptians. Once they looked back, their thoughts snowballed into a cascade of negativity. They only saw their lack. They disregarded God’s miraculous provision through the daily manna.

Walking in the fear of the Lord is a spiritual life-skill. Psalm 34:9-10 says, “Oh, fear the Lord, you His saints! There is no want to those who fear Him. The young lions lack and suffer hunger; but those who seek the Lord shall not lack any good thing.”

How do we walk in the fear of the Lord? Verses 11-14 answer that question. They say, “Come, you children, listen to me; I will teach you the fear of the Lord….Keep your tongue from evil, and your lips from speaking deceit. Depart from evil and do good; seek peace and pursue it.” You might also read Psalm 15:1-5.

What we speak in our heart will be expressed through our words, body language, habits, and attitudes. We cannot see into another’s heart ~ only the Lord knows everything in it. 

When Jesus distributed the food, all four gospels recorded that they all ate and were filled. Reading and digesting God’s word fills our spirit. I love Psalm 107:9. It says, “For He satisfies the longing soul, and fills the hungry soul with goodness.”

We often misunderstand our ‘hunger pangs’ and look for food or other things to fill an emotional need. Emotional fillers can not satisfy an empty void that we misinterpret as lack. Have you ever thought or said, “If only…”?

Our heart is our communication center with the Lord. We can pour out our heart to Him without even verbalizing our pain. Hannah did. Read this carefully. 1 Samuel 1:13 says, “Now Hannah spoke in her heart; only her lips moved, but her voice was not heard…”

Our way is to bury. Here is God’s way. Psalm 62:8 says, “Trust in Him at all times, you people; pour out your heart before Him; God is a refuge for us.”

Expressing thankfulness in the face of an impossibility, opens the way for the Lord to work unhindered. I often visit Psalm 78:41. It says, “Yes, again and again they tempted God, and limited the Holy One of Israel.” Hindered by their complaining. They were stubborn and rebellious. Verse 40 says that they provoked and grieved Him.

Hebrews 13:15 says, “Therefore by Him let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name.” Psalm 22:3 says that He enthrones Himself in our praises.

Thanksgiving is the fruit of a trusting heart. No matter what we face, we have the assurance that He will bring us through. He was with the three Hebrew men. He walked with them in the midst of the fiery furnace. They were thrown in bound, but His Presence broke the bonds. He is Omnipresent ~ Ever Present. Psalm 46:1.