- No one can tell me that God does not have a sense of humor, I’ll bet many of you are reading this and nodding your head, maybe even smiling. The funny thing about it, is that we THINK we are in charge of our steps, the truth is – we are not and often, its only when we are at a point in our walk where we can turn our head and look back at how far we’ve come and what God has done with us that we can honestly thank Him that HE is the one in control. Because whether or not we acknowledge it, recognize it or want to admit it – HE IS.
Proverbs 16:9 says:
“The mind of man plans his way, but the LORD directs his steps.”
Jesus even told a parable about this in Luke 12:16-21:
“The land of a rich man was very productive. And he began reasoning to himself, saying, ‘What shall I do, since I have no place to store my crops?’ Then he said, ‘This is what I will do: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years to come; take your ease, eat, drink and be merry.”’ But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your soul is required of you; and now who will own what you have prepared?’ So is the man who stores up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.”
And in James 4:13 we read:
Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, and spend a year there and engage in business and make a profit.” Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away. Instead, you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that.”
If we are honest, we can admit that we “expect” tomorrow to come. We do. As I have written in previous posts – we act as if tomorrow is “owed to us.” When in reality, it is not. Tomorrow is a gift. But so is today! We act arrogantly with our days when we should be grateful for EVERY day the Lord blesses us with! I am speaking this not only as a Christian woman, but also as a breast cancer survivor. I remember ALL too well the phone call I got twelve years ago as I sat at my job working, telling me that the biopsy they took revealed that I had breast cancer. Like cold water being thrown upon the plans of my life, I felt as though I was now living in a different vortex than the rest of the world. The truth of the matter is ALL of our days are numbered, we just don’t think about it. We don’t LIKE thinking about it and so we “ignore it” and go about making our plans as if that day will never come. (This is where some will stop reading this post because it involves having to step out of that place of denial and step into the place of facing the fact – even when ALL is well, we at one point or another will have to face our own mortality). And because God really DID create us with the plan of having us live forever, with the fall of the world came sin, sickness, illness, disease and death our mindset is one NOT to think about what tomorrow *may* bring, other than what WE have put in our planners, in our watches on our calendars with full expectation that our plans will come to pass.
And God watches from Heaven and waits for us to make a choice for Him. To commit our lives and our days to Him, to His will – which by the way is SO much better than ANYTHING we can plan for ourselves. Don’t believe me? Let me share a funny part of what is now my testimony to hopefully prove that point, get you thinking and make you smile. I can personally attest that as in Psalm 37:23-24:
“The LORD makes firm the steps of the one who delights in him; though he may stumble, he will not fall, for the LORD upholds him with his hand.”
Although I already had a full-time job, I decided to benefit my family and help us financially, I would take a part-time, occasional, weekend office position. Well (at that time) the position was one that was unorganized, unsupervised and just a chaotic mess. One that I ended up running from, determined that I would NEVER venture through those doors again.
And God in Heaven saw me, raised His eyebrow, chuckled and said:
“That’s what YOU think.”
Let me give you a friendly word of advise:
NEVER SAY NEVER.
(Especially if you are a Christian, one who has professed that they have “given their” lives over to Jesus)
You *might* just end up eating your own words…
I speak from personal experience – I’ve eaten my own words, in fact, a year and a half later (during what I did not know was an absolute “divine appointment” from God), I was offered a full-time position working with/for a woman who happened to be one of the MOST on-fire for the Lord women, I have ever had the privilege to meet! (One who clearly walked with HIS agenda over her life), in that very SAME place that I had sworn up and down (to myself and to God) I would NEVER work for in ANY capacity! Let me tell you in complete honesty and transparency and in humbleness of spirit – it ended up being one of the biggest blessings of my life. And here is the thing – you CANNOT out bless God. When your steps are ordained BY God and you line up with the GOOD and PERFECT will of God – it becomes one of those “mouth-opened-wide-I-cannot-believe-what-God-has-just-done” kind of blessings.
And BELIEVE me – when it’s of God, you know it. This blessing encompassed so many aspects of my life that the blessing of working under this anointed woman of God was one where the areas God has used her to touch in my life (areas I hadn’t EVEN thought of praying about), spiritually, personally, career-wise. This is someone who has become the sister that I never had (and never even thought of asking God for) , not only did God bring her into MY life, but because He never does anything in a half-kind-of-way, He brought her family into my life too! (That’s what I call a “bonus” blessing – so I not only was blessed in my job, blessed in my home, blessed in my finances – but He took it a step further and provided me with a God-ordered Sister! He gave me THREE sisters at once (thrice the blessing), and a spiritual mother and a father – who all have their own individual God-given anointings. I teasingly refer to them as God’s modern day version of “Little Women.” :). (They truly are). God knew my earthly family was 1,950 miles away from where He had moved me and saw fit to show me members of His body, RIGHT where He had situated me. (NOW THAT IS GOD…). You see, I saw only “part” of what He was doing – but HE saw in full of what it is He wanted for me. I only had to choose to walk IN His purpose and HIS will for my life instead of remaining in “mediocre” and staying in my comfort zone (which in hindsight, wasn’t as comfortable as where I am now). We truly can miss out on “next chapters” He has for us – or blessings that HE sees and we didn’t see coming if we don’t determine to listen closely to what He is telling us to do, instead of questioning Him EVERY step of the way and determine to pray that we WILL indeed, walk in the steps He has ordained for our lives.
God knows what is best for us, if we line up with His will for our lives, because God uses people as His vessels He is able to use them to bless, to heal and for those who are committed to serving and being used by Him – they become vessels FOR Him. Why should we trust God instead of trust the plans we have made for ourselves?
BECAUSE GOD SEES THE BIG PICTURE, WHEN WE ONLY SEE IN PART.
In fact, it even so much says that in 1 Corinthians 13:12:
“For now we see through a glass, darkly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; but then shall I know, even as also I am known.”
We plan, but we don’t SEE the whole picture of what occurs with what we plan. We don’t know the number of our days, we see from only in-the-physical point of view. The present moment. But God sees in ENTIRETY. It is when we commit our days over to Him, it is when we make a decision to give our lives to Him, recognize what has always been the truth any how – that our lives are NOT our own, that God is able to show us what our best was truly meant to be. In fact, we truly have NO inkling in ALL the ways God will use us as His willing vessel in the lives of others, once we do. When you purpose your life to glorify God, there is NO telling WHAT He will do.
Our Best becomes our best, when we give back to the Creator ALL that He has given to us.
And 2 Timothy 4:8 tells us:
“Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that Day, and not only to me but also to all who have loved his appearing.”
Isaiah 28:5 tells us:
“In that day the LORD of hosts will be a grown of glory, and a diadem of beauty to the remnant of His people.”
If you think about it, it really makes sense – God IS the Creator. The Bible says in Jeremiah 1:5:
“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.”
Who KNOWS better than the One who formed you what your potential is???? So many people are living mediocre lives because they have never known what it was in the first place the plan that God had in mind, when He created them!
HE CREATED YOU, SO YOU ARE HIS OWN PERSONAL WORK OF ART! YOU WERE CREATED IN HIS IMAGE!
HE CREATED YOU WITH GREATNESS IN MIND – AND HIS HOPES FOR YOU IS THAT YOU WILL FIND GREATNESS IN HIM BECAUSE BEING IN THE CENTER OF HIS WILL FOR YOUR LIFE IS THE ABSOLUTE BEST PLACE TO BE!
We don’t know what the number of our days will be – but when you have accepted Jesus Christ as Savior and made Him Lord OVER your life – than the beauty of that is we have the promise and the gift of eternal life, which was God’s intent when He created man in the FIRST place. It was NEVER God’s will that ANY should perish. And the fullness of our lives (problems and all that accompany residing in a fallen, sinful world) outweighs ANY plans we could possibly consider for ourselves. That is something you don’t realize UNTIL you have made a commitment to Him. But 34 years ago, I made a decision and prayed the prayer to ask Jesus into my heart, to be my Savior and Lord over my life and I can look back over the years that have passed and see where He has grown me, where He has carried me, where He has changed me – and I praise Him for my purpose in Him, the purpose He created me for – to write for Him. To share with others about His love for them, to help others know that GOD LOVES YOU. And to recognize that no matter HOW many days He gives us IF they are full with Him as the center of those days – there IS no greater joy.
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