HE HEARS OUR HOWL
BREAD
1 Hear my prayer, O LORD; let my cry for help come to you. 2 Do not hide your face from me when I am in distress. Turn your ear to me; when I call, answer me quickly. Psalm 102:1-2 (NIV)
8 Record my lament; list my tears on your scroll– are they not in your record? Psalm 56:8 (NIV)
1 I love the LORD, for he heard my voice; he heard my cry for mercy. 2 Because he turned his ear to me, I will call on him as long as I live. 3 The cords of death entangled me, the anguish of the grave came upon me; I was overcome by trouble and sorrow. 4 Then I called on the name of the LORD: “O LORD, save me!” 5 The LORD is gracious and righteous; our God is full of compassion. 6 The LORD protects the simplehearted; when I was in great need, he saved me. 7 Be at rest once more, O my soul, for the LORD has been good to you. 8 For you, O LORD, have delivered my soul from death, my eyes from tears, my feet from stumbling, 9 that I may walk before the LORD in the land of the living. Psalm 116:1-9 (NIV)
8 The LORD is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. 9 He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever; 10 he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. 11 For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; 12 as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us. 13 As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him; 14 for he knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust. Psalm 103:8-14 (NIV)
1 I call on the LORD in my distress, and he answers me. Psalm 120:1 (NIV)
16 Come and listen, all you who fear God; let me tell you what he has done for me. 17 I cried out to him with my mouth; his praise was on my tongue. 18 If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened; 19 but God has surely listened and heard my voice in prayer. 20 Praise be to God, who has not rejected my prayer or withheld his love from me! Psalm 66:16-20 (NIV)
6 In my distress I called to the LORD; I cried to my God for help. From his temple he heard my voice; my cry came before him, into his ears. Psalm 18:6 (NIV)
29 But if from there you seek the LORD your God, you will find him if you look for him with all your heart and with all your soul. 30 When you are in distress and all these things have happened to you, then in later days you will return to the LORD your God and obey him. 31 For the LORD your God is a merciful God; he will not abandon or destroy you or forget the covenant with your forefathers, which he confirmed to them by oath. Deuteronomy 4:29-31 (NIV)
1 I will exalt you, O LORD, for you lifted me out of the depths and did not let my enemies gloat over me. 2 O LORD my God, I called to you for help and you healed me. 3 O LORD, you brought me up from the grave; you spared me from going down into the pit. Psalm 30:1-3 (NIV)
7 To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. 8 Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. 9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. 10 That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong. 2 Corinthians 12:7-10 (NIV)
BUTTER
“You need not cry very loud; He is nearer to us than we think.” Brother Lawrence
“All we love is in his hands. He hears our prayers and our tears when there are no words. He counts them as liquid intercession, which is precious to him. He is our Mighty Warrior and contends with those forces that are contending with us.” Sylvia Gunter
“Tears have a tongue and grammar and language that our Father knows.” Samuel Rutherford
“A Jesus who never wept could never wipe away my tears.” Charles H. Spurgeon
“Tears are never a sign of weakness. Tears are always the sign of an open heart.” Ann Voskamp
“Tears are our stake in the ground, our tender yet tenacious protest against things like death, mourning, sorrow and pain—things that we know intuitively are not supposed to be…. God weeps over things gone wrong in his world. He is a tender God who takes no pleasure in sorrow, suffering or death. He is a God who comes alongside and assures us that he is there, and that we are never alone. Moreover, he is a God who suffered a voluntary death-blow, to save us from death’s ultimate and final sting and to assure us that he knows and has tasted death and sorrow firsthand. As we face our mortality, we now know that the immortal God did also. As we grieve the decline of those we love most deeply, we now know that God did also. God buried a Son, after all.” Scott Sauls
“Do not think that your prayer, however weak or trembling, will be unregarded. Our God not only hears prayer but also loves to hear it. ‘He does not ignore the cry of the afflicted.’ True, He does take into consideration haughty looks and lofty words; He doesn’t care for the pomp and pageantry of kings; He doesn’t listen to the swell of martial music; He doesn’t regard the triumph and pride of man; but wherever there is a heart big with sorrow, or a lip quivering with agony, or a deep groan, or a penitential sigh, the heart of Jehovah is open; He marks it down in the registry of His memory; He puts our prayers, like rose leaves, between the pages of His book of remembrance, and when the volume is opened at last, a precious fragrance will release itself from it.” Charles H. Spurgeon
“If you have gone a little way ahead of me, call back – ‘Twill cheer my heart and help my feet along the stony track; And if, perchance, Faith’s light is dim, because the oil is low, Your call will guide my lagging course as wearily I go. Call back, and tell me that he went with you into the storm; Call back, and say He kept you when the forest’s roots were torn; That, when the heavens thunder and the earthquake shook the hill, He bore you up and held you where the very air was still. Oh, friend, call back, and tell me for I cannot see your face, They say it glows with triumph, and your feet bound in the race; But there are mists between us and my spirit eyes are dim, And I cannot see the glory, though I long for word of Him. But if you’ll say He heard you when your prayer was but a cry, And if you’ll say He saw you through the night’s sin-darkened sky If you have gone a little way ahead, of friend, call back – ‘Twill cheer my heart and help my feet along the stony track.” Mrs. Charles Cowman
“What you think you can’t handle — might actually be God handing you a gift. And I think of everything I have chaffed against and railed about and howled to the heavens and who am I to know what is best or not — but when you bow and surrender to the sovereignty of God then you are in the posture to receive all as a gift.” Ann Voskamp
HEART SAVOR
• God hears the cries of His children. He records their tears.
• God tells us to call on Him and He will tell us great and unsearchable things we do not know.
• God is never far away or too busy to hear. Indeed, He delights in the heart petitions of His saints.
Beth Yoe's Sharing Bread 