God works the details
I've been praying with several friends of mine who are going through excruciating circumstances in their lives right now. There is nothing I can physically do to help them in their trouble, but I can pray with them and for them, and offer whatever counsel they request.
My general practice is to preach expository messages to our church family. Since that puts me in books of the bible, and in a practice of laying out fairly well in advance what I will be preaching, I don't always have the luxury of choosing a topic to preach on that I feel would be appropriate on a particular Sunday. It is interesting to me however, just how often God brings that to pass without my knowledge. This past Sunday was one of those occasions. I had been preaching through James, the "How-to Manual of the Christian Life" for several months last fall. I took a break from it during the Christmas celebration and then spoke on a topic that I was burdened about on the first Sunday of the new year. I returned for the last 2 studies in James for last Sunday and this one coming.
The passage this past Sunday was James 5:7-11 and my topic was "Hang on!" It was about what to do when the difficulties of life surround us and we feel like we are going under. It was all about staying power and finding the strength we need to bear up under the trials we are facing.
The circumstances that I have been praying with my friends about have, in some cases, arisen just recently. Others have grown in their intensity just recently. I could never have known that this past Sunday's message would be so appropriate to so many who are either in the fire or walking with those who are. Of course, God knows how to arrange my thinking and planning so that he can say what he wants to exactly when he wants to say it.
I've been glad this morning for a God who can take our meager plans and use them in such detail as to accomplish what he needs to through us in a way that we couldn't have planned, left to ourselves. It would seem so contrived and forced. God just works, often quietly in the background, to do what he needs to do and say what he needs to say.
Aren't you glad to be a servant of a God like that? Be faithful. Serve with all your heart. Use the gifts and abilities that he has given you. Then get out of the way and watch him work.
My general practice is to preach expository messages to our church family. Since that puts me in books of the bible, and in a practice of laying out fairly well in advance what I will be preaching, I don't always have the luxury of choosing a topic to preach on that I feel would be appropriate on a particular Sunday. It is interesting to me however, just how often God brings that to pass without my knowledge. This past Sunday was one of those occasions. I had been preaching through James, the "How-to Manual of the Christian Life" for several months last fall. I took a break from it during the Christmas celebration and then spoke on a topic that I was burdened about on the first Sunday of the new year. I returned for the last 2 studies in James for last Sunday and this one coming.
The passage this past Sunday was James 5:7-11 and my topic was "Hang on!" It was about what to do when the difficulties of life surround us and we feel like we are going under. It was all about staying power and finding the strength we need to bear up under the trials we are facing.
The circumstances that I have been praying with my friends about have, in some cases, arisen just recently. Others have grown in their intensity just recently. I could never have known that this past Sunday's message would be so appropriate to so many who are either in the fire or walking with those who are. Of course, God knows how to arrange my thinking and planning so that he can say what he wants to exactly when he wants to say it.
I've been glad this morning for a God who can take our meager plans and use them in such detail as to accomplish what he needs to through us in a way that we couldn't have planned, left to ourselves. It would seem so contrived and forced. God just works, often quietly in the background, to do what he needs to do and say what he needs to say.
Aren't you glad to be a servant of a God like that? Be faithful. Serve with all your heart. Use the gifts and abilities that he has given you. Then get out of the way and watch him work.
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