Jentezen Franklin Daily Devotional (October 21, 2024) The Remedy For Discouragement (Part 2).
“The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.” James 5:16
He was not raised in the priesthood for the first 30 years of Jesus’s life. He was raised in a carpenter’s home. God had him rebuilding broken things for 30 years until the time came for Him to start rebuilding people. Carpentry has always been God’s remedy for scattered and broken people. Jesus showed up with the spirit of a builder when He arrived with the tools to restore any marriage, family, nation, or person to God. With two beams, three nails, and a ham,mer Jesus came to rebuild every lost and broken life.
When the Pharisees dragged the adulterous woman out of her bed of sin and threw her at the feet of Jesus, He decided to rebuild her life. The enemy comes to demolish and destroy, but Jesus came to build and restore. Jesus came to give hope to anyone who has failed or fallen. There is life beyond the affair, the divorce, the abortion, and the shame. There’s no sin too great. Jesus wants to repair and renovate your life anew.
If you are in a discouraged and defeated place, there are three things that God wants to help you rebuild. First of all, you have to rebuild the altar. If you fix your altar, you will fix your life. There comes a point where you need to get so desperate for God that you go back to listening to Him in His word and talking to Him in prayer. And if you rebuild that altar, your altar will rebuild your life, marriage, children, and future. There are no shortcuts.
When Elijah wanted the drought to end or God’s blessings to fall on his nation again, he built an altar. Ironically, he requested that the people pour water out on the altar. It’s easy to trust God with what we already have, but God wants us to trust Him with the things we desperately need. Maybe you have a relationship that seems impossible to fix, and it is your desperate hope that you can see things return to how they were. Perhaps you have a lost child, and the situation looks hopeless. Build an altar. Pour out those needs before Him. Elijah prayed, and the fire from Heaven came down and consumed the wood and water, marking the end of the famine. When you admit your need for God, He will show up.
