The Lord will work out his plans for my life—for your faithful love, O Lord, endures forever. Psalm 138:8a, NLT*
I love David’s quiet assurance in this psalm. There’s danger all around, he’s calm in his confidence that A) God has plans for his life, and B) God will fulfill those plans despite circumstances which give evidence to the contrary.
The psalm says nothing about what God’s plans for David are, or even whether David knows them or not. I don’t know if this psalm was before or after he became king, because he definitely knew that plan.
God has plans and purposes for each of us, sometimes large-scale leadership roles, but also smaller ones in the everyday.
And we don’t need advance notice of what they are, although we try to insist on it. It’s enough that He knows, and that we be ready and recognize them when it’s time.
Father God, help me be content with the step I’m on. Help me trust You to make the next step clear when I need to take it. Forgive me for those times I’ve strained to see ahead and felt entitled to know what’s next. You know. Let that be enough.
∞
Here’s a song of trust in God from Robin Mark: “All is Well,” from his Year of Grace album. It’s a long one, but it’s beautiful.
Why do we get so caught up in wanting it both ways? We long for closeness with God, but at the same time we want to be powerful enough to handle things on our own.
We’re not God, we can’t do it all, and in the grand scheme of things we’re pretty insignificant. But He loves us. And He cares for us. And He works His strength through us for far greater impact than if it came from us.
Dependence on Him doesn’t diminish us. It completes us and lets us live in close relationship with the One who embraces us as His sons and daughters.
Father God, help me quiet myself in Your care. Help me remember to live in confidence in You instead of wanting to put confidence in myself. Help me delight in what You’re doing.
Turn to me and have mercy on me,
as you always do to those who love your name. Psalm 119:132, NIV*
Do you hear the absolute trust and confidence in God’s character and in His commitment to care?
“As You always do.”
We may not have a clue of what God will do, or how or when, but we can know that He will always keep His word. For those of us who love Him, part of our responsibility is to actively trust Him, and to keep alert to recognize His mercy when it comes.
Or, as Oswald Chambers expressed it in My Utmost for His Highest, we need to live in “Gracious Uncertainty”:
Leave everything to Him and it will be gloriously and graciously uncertain how He will come in—but you can be certain that He will come. Remain faithful to Him. Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest, April 29. [Click the link to read his entire message—it will bless you.]
It isn’t easy for people who like to see, touch, and forecast our world. People who are used to instant fixes. But that’s how God works, and it trains our spirits to trust Him.
Sovereign and loving God, thank You for Your Word that teaches who You are and what You’ve said. Help us in our unbelief, increase our faith, and open our spiritual eyes and ears to notice Your touch on our lives and circumstances. Help us to give You praise, and to live in this “gracious uncertainty” that is certain of You—for our own benefits and for a demonstration of Your goodness to the people around us.
All these people [Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Jacob] were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth. Hebrews 11:13, NIV 2010*
These and other heroes of the faith listed in Hebrews 11 were commended for being sure of what they hoped for and certain of what they did not see. Their faith was not in themselves or in their hopes and dreams. They put their faith in God, and His nature gave them the assurance to believe.
This chapter highlights some of the ways they showed their faith: understanding that God made the universe (v 3), sacrifices of praise and worship (v 4), obedience (lots of obedience… building the ark (v 7), leaving home for the promised land (v 8), Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac (v 17), believing God’s promise (v 9), blessing their descendants who were one generation closer to receiving the promise (v 20). And the list goes on.
Faith brought a lot of victories, and it strengthened people to endure a lot of pain and persecution. Because they considered the Promise Maker faithful. I love how verse 27 describes Moses: “he persevered because he saw him who is invisible.”
So what about us? Most of us are in that safe, ordinary range between the two extremes: we’re not going to be big names in the history books for either our victories or our defeats. But like I said last week, that doesn’t mean where we are is any less important to God.
We’re still called to please Him by our faith. We can believe He made the universe, we can offer the sorts of sacrifices He really wants (mercy, justice, walking humbly with Him). Instead of getting distracted by the here and now, we can live today mindful of God’s promises. He said He’d always be with us in our todays, and He also said we’d be with Him for eternity.
Creator God, You keep Your promises and nothing can change that. Forgive us for getting distracted by the present. Help us to enjoy the present and serve You well in it. But help us keep our eyes on You—and on eternity with You. That makes our time here more purposeful, because we’ll be acting in faith in Your promise.
Last week’s devotional thought, “Willing to Give,” was about the wholehearted, willing offerings we make to God out of love for Him. Lots of times these are actions, but beneath the action is the true offering that comes from the heart:
Faith.
Love.
Trust.
Believing in God, trusting Him, just because of who He is. Because of what we know of His character. Because we know He’s trustworthy.
Even when we don’t see the whys and hows. Even when it hurts.
Our love and trust will result in obedience if it’s real. If we act on it. If we don’t put it into practice it stays theory and we’re never truly sure about God.
Many of my favourite novels have a hero/heroine who’s a strong leader, one the other characters will follow in the bleakest circumstances in blind (but fully warranted) trust. One who operates on the “need to know” principle because stopping to explain takes too long and because the followers don’t have the knowledge base to be able to understand. One who brings them through incredible odds to victory.
God is like that, except better. He’s real, and nothing surprises Him.
Reading the novels, when I see characters mistrusting the leader or trying their own ways, I know they’re wrong and I keep hoping they’ll wise up before it’s too late. Before they either ruin everything or at least get themselves killed.
In real life, it’s sometimes easier to be the doubter than the faithful follower—even when God is the leader.
Father, I’m glad You know our weaknesses. I’m gladder still that You love us anyway, and that You’re working all things out to the end You’ve planned from the beginning. You are the only wise, all-powerful God. The only one who can bring victory in the mess we’ve made. Help us to love, trust and obey You, in the big and in the small. Sometimes the small is the hardest part.
This was my devotional reading on Monday in the NIV**, but when I saw how The Message phrases it, with that “listen in everything/everywhere” that has been encouraging me lately, I knew that was the version to use here.
Monday… definitely one of those days I longed to crawl back into bed. I wasn’t sick, just painfully sluggish in body and mind.
It was also a day full of commitments.
These verses from Proverbs are old friends to me, and still verse 5 brought a new insight this time:
It brought back recent advice I’d heard to dwell on the positives: to say “I’m great, thanks” instead of “I’m so tired”. The idea was to talk oneself into a better outlook, not do deny serious trouble, to choose good over bad when both are present.
Denial is another form of lying, and trying to think things better because we want God to agree with us is shaky ground.
But for me, it’s more a case of settling for less, of listening to my own understanding of how I feel instead of trusting God to be enough to make a difference. Sure, I’m tired, but am I really as tired as I say I am? As I’ve come to believe?
Today’s Wednesday… how did Monday play out? I was slower than normal, but everything got done that needed doing. The biscuits I made to go with supper even turned out fine!
I’m glad feeling weak can remind me of God’s strength. Here’s a vintage Amy Grant song (written by Gary Chapman & Michael W Smith) with a similar perspective: “I Love a Lonely Day”.
I get excited every time I go on a spiritual retreat, because God always tells me something. The message is often a surprise, sometimes painful, and always requires work on my part.
But it’s so precious to experience personal communication with Him, to sense He knows and cares about my needs. He understands.
At previous retreats, there’s been one clear moment when my spirit “gets” what God wants to say. This time it came in hints and clues, pieces. A trail to follow. It started with my friend Mary Waind’s post at Beech Croft Tales, before I even zipped my suitcase.
As I mulled over this matter of releasing control, I realized when I refuse to let go I’m surrendering to fear. I’m still not in control, and instead of giving the situation over to the One who wants to give me His best, I’m actually letting the enemy, the one who wants me to be afraid, take over. (read the full post here)
I thought about Mary’s words all the way to the retreat. And should not have been surprised to discover this was one of the recurring themes of the weekend.
Control, and the need to quit grasping for it. The need to trust God, who really is in control and is quite capable, thank you very much. To take down the walls we put up that only block what God wants to release.
After an enlightening weekend, the theme’s next instalment came from Ginny Jaques’ Something About the Joy:
I want the peace that comes from knowing God is sovereign, even though I’m not in control. (read the full post here)
Then what should appear in my in-box but the current issue of Sheila Wray Gregoire’s Reality Check newsletter?
Sheila says most times we’re in full control-freak mode it’s because we’re afraid—and she challenges those in the fallout zone to “bridge the sanity gap” by understanding the root cause and by helping, instead of pulling away. The article is meant to help husbands understand their wives, but it got me thinking.
I’ve been taking note of these nudges to quit trying to control the universe, and making some subtle progress. But I also need to cut some slack to the controllers around me. Not to start doing everything their way, but to stop, pray and wonder what’s really behind their actions. And to respond in light of that.
How can I respond in a way that doesn’t compromise me but doesn’t threaten the other person? Is it a minor enough issue for me that we can simply do it her way? Can I at least remember that in protecting herself she’s not personally attacking me?
There are plenty of times when we try to control out of fear—fear that we’ll lose something precious, that we’ll look stupid or be hurt.
God understands our weaknesses and our fears, and we can trust that no matter what, He will be there. He will be enough. We can encourage one another to let down those walls.
There are other control battles that come from our own selfishness, or from the belief that if we don’t do it ourselves, it won’t be done right…. He wants to pry our fingers loose from these walls too.
For me, control links with resisting, holding back, protecting self and trying to force others. It’s trying to be author, puppet-master and stage-manager. Quite the opposite of trusting God’s sovereign authority.
What I’m hearing is that the call is to trust. To remember God’s sovereign power, to go out through my self-built walls to where Jesus wants to use me.
Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. Matthew 11:28-30, NIV*
The rural language of yokes isn’t as clear to me as a city-dweller in 2010 North America, but I’ve been told that farmers will pair a new ox with an experienced one to help the new one learn how to pull (and probably how to interpret and obey the farmer’s guidance).
Usually when I think of learning from Jesus I think of His teachings, although He was a living model of following the Father. (Paul wrote about following Jesus’ example too.)
Today it’s the example, the attitude, I see He wants me to learn. Yes, there’s the doing, but it’s too easy to overlook or neglect the how.
Jesus demonstrated a life that’s gentle and humble in heart. He didn’t try to control or dominate. Although by His nature as God He has that right, He modeled submission to, obedience to, and trust in God the Father.
Rest for my soul indeed! Trying to be mentally in control, pushing to do it my way, is not just unsatisfying and unproductive, it’s soul-draining.
Father, let me learn from the Son, and be led by the Spirit, to live the way You intended, and to come into Your rest.
∞
An appropriate prayer this week is “O Master Let Me Walk With Thee,” (Words: Washington Gladden, 1879. Music: Henry Percy Smith, 1874.)
I do not concern myself with great matters
or things too wonderful for me.
But I have stilled and quieted my soul;
like a weaned child with its mother,
like a weaned child is my soul within me. Psalm 131: 1b-2, NIV*
This is one of those psalms God uses to remind me to draw nearer to Him, to learn to abide in Him. After He nudged me through 2 Timothy about needing to steep in His presence, I shouldn’t have been surprised to see these verses show up in my daily reading calendar.
Two more gentle invitations to abide arrived in my in-box, posted on other blogs. At Under the Cover of Prayer, Judith Lawrence’s post, “Contemplatives Without Cloisters,” lures me with the promise of ongoing communion with God, even amid life’s ordinary routines.
“The call is to prayer, to be at one with the Sacred at any and every given moment of the day or night.”
Meanwhile, at Other Food: Daily Devo’s, Violet Nesdoly posted “Walking with God”:
“When we walk with someone we go in the same direction. We move at the same speed. A walk conjures pictures of conversation and fellowship along the way. It is exercise non-strenuous enough that we don’t tire quickly — a relationship for the long haul.”
Violet’s post includes a selection of quotes from Andrew Murray. This one stirs a longing in my spirit:
“Abiding in Jesus is not a work that needs each moment the mind to be engaged, or the affections to be directly and actively occupied with it. It is an entrusting of oneself to the keeping of the Eternal Love, in the faith that it will abide near us, and with its holy presence watch over us and ward off the evil, even when we have to be most intently occupied with other things. And so the heart has rest and peace and joy in the consciousness of being kept when it cannot keep itself.” (Devotional Classics: Andrew Murray George Müller Collection [Andrew Murray Collection, Kindle Edition], Location 847)
Father God, Creator, Sustainer, my spirit longs for this awareness of “being kept when it cannot keep itself”. Only You could plant such a desire, and I thank You for it. You are also the only one to fulfill it. Help me do my part and learn to walk with You. Help me not to waste time fretting about things that are Your responsibility. Help me rest in You, securely held in Your keeping. Help me trust and love You in complete faith.
…if we are faithless,
he will remain faithful,
for he cannot disown himself. 2 Timothy 1:13, NIV*
And this is why we can trust Him: we can trust His character. God can’t be other than who He is.
I look at the foolishness, immorality and capriciousness of the Greek and Roman gods and the only reason I can figure that people worshiped them was fear. Not the good kind, the healthy respect and awareness of sovereignty that God asks of us, but the terror and need-to-appease kind.
God’s character—and our understanding of it—is central to our ability to live in confident faith in Him. He is who He is. As the hymn declares, “there is no shadow of turning” in Him. Not even a hint of uncertainty. No reason to doubt.
Holy and sovereign God, You are worthy of worship and I praise You. You are worthy of our worship, our trust, and our love. And You love us. You’ve proven that through Your Son. Teach us and help us to live by faith in You, so that we can grow into all You’ve designed us to be.
