This is because their disadvantages have become their total focus in life. They allow it to rob them of the joy they could be experiencing as they walk with the Lord right now. If we proceed to focus upon our disadvantages of life than we will most certainly have our vision removed from us. However, in light of this let us look at what God's plan and purposes are for us that believe and cast our cares on Him.

 

1 Corinthians 1:27-29 (MSG)
27 Isn't it obvious that God deliberately chose men and women that the culture overlooks and exploits and abuses,
28 chose these "nobodies" to expose the hollow pretensions of the "somebodies"?
29 That makes it quite clear that none of you can get by with blowing your own horn before God. 

Psalms 113:7-8 (MSG)
7 He picks up the poor from out of the dirt, rescues the wretched who've been thrown out with the trash,
8 Seats them among the honored guests, a place of honor among the brightest and best. 

If a person could honestly look at his own burdens, his own trials, his deficiencies of life and truely understand that they are nothing more than the very thing that has shaped the lives of the many heroes of God; we would develop a whole different perspective about these disadvantages. And that is that there is an advantage when faced with a disadvantage when God is with you!

 

We should never let the devil steal our spiritual advantages in this life through getting us to focus more on the disadvantages. Our Lord has not filled us with His glorious Holy Spirit for us just to sit around waiting for the Lord's return someday. There is a world around us that needs the people of God to be radically evangelizing it despite the difficulties that we might face.

 

Our text to which we opened this weeks devotional speaks about the life of the Apostle Paul and how he demonstrated for us how that disadvantages played a crucial role in accomplishing kingdom purposes. That statement is not to be interpreted as that God creates hardships for us to learn obedience either. If we look at our text in Philippians 1:12-14, it says that the "things" that have happened to me have done nothing but further the cause of the Gospel of Christ. Does your troubles strengthen you or weaken your resolve that God can be trusted?

 

But, to the delight of Paul, his disadvantage has also added salt to the wound of our adversary by causing many others to grow fearless in speaking out more boldly about the Gospel because of Paul's patience to endure these temporary disadvantages to which he was facing. And we learn from the Scriptures that there were a great many disadvantages in the life of Paul, but he found the ability to rejoice in them despite their strain upon him. One of these disadvantages was known through Scripture as being a thorn in his side. This thorn came because of his many revelations of the mysteries of Jesus Christ.

 

There will always be a price to pay for any man or woman of God who desires to reach for the revelatory things of the Lord this side of heaven and willing to share them with others at all cost. If we look to the Word we will find one of the paradoxes of the Holy writ is that it says when I am weak then I am made strong (2 Corinthians 12:10). We have to learn that in Paul's life there could be no stretching, and reaching without weakness. That troubling and aggravating thorn was a constant reminder that Paul needed to rely on the grace of the Lord for his help, and it will be the same for you and me. 

 

Although Paul had been bound and in prison, his whole mindset in that situation was that his disadvantage was one huge spiritual triumph that would further the cause of Christ. Paul in his plight of things had enlarged the capacity for others to develop a mentality that, "If he can do it, then I can" attitude among the brethren in the faith. There is something dynamic about a person who faces a disadvantage but knows from where their help comes from. Their stance breathes encouragement to others and brings out the best in all of us. 

 

The Philippians viewed imprisonment as a grave calamity. However, the apostle Paul assured them that his imprisonment was an investment into spiritual prosperity. In fact, to Paul, his incarceration at Philippi meant an opportunity in Rome. In other words Paul may have been behind bars, but the Gospel was free to move about the city of Rome and its reach was changing lives everywhere.

 

Let me ask you a question today. How long has it been since you really felt that God has a unique purpose for your life? We often fail to realize at those times when we are kept in from recess that there is a greater purpose working; or did you ever consider that God pulls us away from the day to day activities that everyone else is getting to do to inform us that life is about serving Him. Our adversary for too long has kept many of God's children in the ruts of life through making the disadvantage so big in our lives that we become consumed by it.

 

God seems to have an infactuation with weakness. And this can be seen as He robes Himself in the flesh of a man when He came to save the world from its sin. God chooses to fill the weak, not the strong. It is emptiness to which God prefers to fill rather than something that has no room for Him. A disadvantage is not a disadvantage if God is the one you are looking to for help. God always steps in where someone is looking to Him for their sustenance in life rather than themselves. When God steps on the scene: Jails will become a place of worship. A lion's den will become a resting place for those who trust their God. The fiery furnace becomes the catalyst for the fires of revival. 

 

Everywhere we look in Scripture we find the consistent pattern of God showing up where there is weakness acknowledged by one of His children that admit without Him they are nothing! This seems to be God's preferred manner of entrance onto the scene of a life when they casts their care on Him and lay no claim that they are self-sifficient without Him. When we are faced with a disadvantage in life it is here that we can expect to gain the advantage if we are trusting in the Lord.

 

James 1:9 (KJV)
9 Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted: 

Hebrews 11:13-16 (KJV)
13 These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.
14 For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country.
15 And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned.
16 But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city. 

 

I pray you will lift your eyes unto Him that loves you and promised to to take care of you. And when you stare at your next disadvantage of life, I sincerely pray that you will see that there is an advantage for something incredible to happen because of the God you serve and trust!