I was thinking tonight. I think a LOT! Is it obvious??? Who doesn't? I suppose everyone does. It's just that most people aren't prone to pen their thinking. Please forgive. Or ignore me if it bothers!
Tonight a friend asked me to pray for her boyfriend about a job. Another friend asked me to pray for her husband's. Another friend, a single mom, asked me to pray for her's. And I know of countless others looking for jobs as well.
The boyfriend doesn't have one and needs to. The husband, in this economic spiral and major cutbacks, hopes not to lose his. And the single mom is unhappy with hers and would like to find another one.
I've wondered about that. God tells us that He has a purpose for us (Psalm 57:2). That He knows the plans He has for us (Jeremiah 29:11). That we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works which He Himself prepared in advance for us to do (Ephesians 2:10). He tells us that ALL of the days ordained for us were written in His book before even one of them came to be (Psalm 139:16).
Therefore, it's easy to pray. It seems simple to. Surely, it's not a stretch. It shouldn't be something we have to beg and plead to God for. He made us to work. He wants us to work. He tells us that if a man doesn't work, then neither let him eat (1 Thessalonians 3:10). And He already knows exactly what it is that He not only wants us to do, but He also knows what it is exactly that He has talented and equipped and created and gifted us to. He put us on this earth (as He did Adam in the Garden) to man it, to till it, and to work it. So... why would He not help us with a job when asked?
Proverbs 3:6 tells us to acknowledge Him in ALL our ways and that He WILL direct our paths. HE WILL! Did you catch that?
We're told in Proverbs 16:9 that, "In his heart a man plans his course, but the LORD determines his steps." In his heart, in his mind, in his will, his knowledge, his thinking, his inclination, his determination, his understanding, his appetites, his emotions, his passions....... a man plans his course, he plans his way, he plans his journey, he decides his direction......... but God determines, God establishes, God fixes, secures, prepares, arranges, sets up, makes ready, provides, settles, and orders.... his steps, his goings, his course of life.
Jeremiah 10:23 says, "I know, O LORD, that a man's life [his road, his journey, his path, his direction, his course of life] is not his own; it is not for man to direct [to set up, to fix, to establish, to prepare, to ready, to prepare, to arrange, to order] his steps." It's only for GOD to arrange!
Therefore, He either will or He won't. He either does or He doesn't. He either said that and meant it... or He didn't mean what He said.
I won't have to elaborate on that. We all know that God is always faithful! He always speaks truth! That it's always true what He says. He's not a man that He can lie. His ways are not our ways........ So, how can we know unless He tells us? How can we go unless He prepares us?
So (again)......... does God set it up, determine it, make it ready, prepare it, arrange it, order it, settle it and secure it.... or not?
I'd like to not only suggest that I think He does. I tend to believe it! It's what I know!!! Simply because He tells us so!
Wonder with me here for a moment, all those of you seeking employment: Maybe we're missing a step in our journey? Maybe we're failing to see its significance? Maybe we're losing sight along our way? Maybe we're peering into our future and forgetting to notice our present? Maybe... just maybe... maybe part of the path that He's arranged and directed, prepared and readied, set up and ordered includes [INCLUDES, mind you!] the very step where you're standing? Maybe He has reason for where you are! Maybe it's been prepared to equip you for something you've not thought of on your journey? Maybe it was ordained in advance to be used? Maybe it was meant to fall into that category of God working all things out for good for those that love Him and are called according to His purpose? Maybe, because God FOREKNEW something we don't, He actually predestined this moment that you feel as wasted time (a time of unanswered prayers... or a time when you feel God doesn't see you or He doesn't care) intentionally? Maybe it has Acts 17:26-27 significance ["From one man God made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; He determined the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek Him and perhaps reach out to Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us."]? Maybe it's simply to cause a greater seeking and reaching out to our God so that we'll FIND Him in a way we've never found Him before???
Maybe there's more purpose in your now than you realize? Maybe it has tremendous importance? Maybe, just maybe, this very season, this exact spot, this precise place, this actual circumstance, this very time of waiting, this very in-between (as we think of it) is really no 'in-between' time at all! Maybe we need to take a second look to notice where we are! Maybe we are exactly where He planned for us to be at this very exact time? Maybe this very moment was one of those days ordered and prepared and ordained and written in His book about us before we ever were born?
Could it be? Might it be so? That this moment too has reason? That this too was part of His plan? That there's something that He wants to teach you, to show you, to use to change and transform you? Maybe there's somebody there that He wants you to minister to? Let me ask you this, are we always waiting until we get into that very exact place that the desires of our heart wants us to be, to that place where we think we've been called to, before we start seriously thinking about doing our work? Are we waiting until then and there to minister? Do we think that that's where His plan is? That that's where His purpose begins for me?That that's my mission field? Do we forget to know that we are to minister to whoever that's around us in the very place (every day!) that we are? Are we waiting until we finish school? finish college? finish training? Are we waiting until that door is opened? till an employer calls? till the job is secured? until.....??? What are we waiting on? WHERE ARE YOU????? And wherever that is (even if it's jobless at the moment), can you look to your Creator God, your Father, Jesus, your Savior, your Intercessor, and say, why do you have me here? How can you use me? Transform me? What are you doing? What am I to do here? What is the reason? What is its purpose?
And when we still don't get clear answers, when we still don't see it, when the light bulb still shows dark and we have no grand revelation that reveals it, can we not trust? Can we not still believe Him? To a God that requires that we have faith (who says that it is "impossible to please Him without faith"), do we think we won't be given times to show that faith that we have in Him or that we don't?
I don't want us to miss our moment! I don't want to miss mine! I don't always want to be looking to another time, to a time that hasn't gotten here yet, to a time I'm not in. I want to trust that the Ordainer of all purposes and plans and directions and courses of life ordains my direction for me... that the Preparer that sets up and arranges and settles and orders my path prepared this exact step in my journey too... that the Author of Life that wrote in His book every single day of mine before even one came to be actually predestined and wrote this very day that I am in at the present in it as well!
I'm not saying we shouldn't seek our Savior. I'm not suggesting that He doesn't want us to have a job. Because I believe that He does. I just want to prompt your thinking (and mine) to ponder that perhaps maybe this day that you're in might very well have been written for a reason. That this day's not in vain. That this moment isn't futile. That this here-and-now aggravation, too, has its purpose. Because in all honesty, life is so short, how dare we miss our moments waiting for our dream of perfection to come. What are we thinking? That comes on the other side of life... not in this one.
Woe! Look at how King James put it: "... all my members were written which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them." Looking the words up in the Hebrew, look what I found:
"all were written [all were inscribed, all were engraved, all were described in writing, all were registered, all were enrolled] which in continuance [each day, each time, each year, each 24 hour period, each day's journey, each period, each today, each yesterday, each tomorrow] were fashioned [were formed, were framed, were pre-ordained, were planned, were purposed, were created, were predetermined] when as yet there was none [before there was even one]."
Wow, God really wrote each day? all of them? Really? Even this one too? :-) I don't know how that makes you feel, but that's a really good and secure feeling for me!
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