I have a future that
is no longer determined by the poor choices of my past. Jeremiah
29:11-14 (NLT) For I know the
plans I have for you, says the LORD. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to
give you a future and a hope. In those days when you pray, I will listen. If
you look for me in earnest, you will find me when you seek me. I will be found
by you,” says the LORD.
What an awesome promise from our
God. Even though He was talking to the people of Israel in captivity in Babylon
we can accept that God’s Word is true and applies to us today. We are all
captives held by the influence of sin in our life. Jesus sets us free and
teaches us how to live free.
The promise we have for a God
encounter that will change our life forever is given in writing; “If you seek
me earnestly, you will find me.” WOW! When we talk to God, He is always
listening. The biggest challenge we have is when God doesn’t answer us the way
we want Him to or in the time frame we are expecting. These two conditions, when
we put them on God, an infinite being with no top, sides or bottom, who do we
really think we are?
We who have been created in God's image are by design to have an
intimate and personal relationship with our God, the most powerful being we
will ever know. We have been chosen to participate in accomplishing God’s
sovereign will upon the earth. When God gave Adam dominion and authority over
the earth, in that moment even though God is already complete by Himself and
does not need us, He chose to need mankind to accomplish His will on the earth. This position from God about mankind's purpose is that we are to take dominion over creation while in an active relationship with our God and Creator. What a secure and trusting God we
have. He who knows all things and is unable to learn because He already knows
everything has enough confidence in His creation and His purpose that He
chooses to need us, ordinary people just like you and I in order to succeed. This alone
should make us sit down and rethink our part in the cosmic equation called
life.
Our God has done it all for us so that we may know Him and
yet He still honors and respects our choices enough to let us choose life or
death. He gives us an understanding of what real and true love is about in our very own personal relationship with Him. He is forever giving
someone, including our self what is needed most when the least deserving. Since God believes in
us so much that He knows He can win with us on His team in the poverty stricken
conditions of a fallen world, maybe we could believe more that He is for us and
not against us.
Father God, I ask you this day to
destroy the box I have been trying to keep you in. Please forgive my
stubbornness not to learn the way You think and not accepting how You see me
through Your eyes. Fill me with hope and the desire to reach out for all of
you, to become everything You created me to be with You from the beginning.
Please forgive me trying to get You to agree with my thinking and fulfilling my
wants. Help me to surrender all of me to You in every area of my life, trusting
Your plans and timing over my own. Thank You God for being such a loving and
faithful God and friend to me. Amen
Today’s Reflection
What is the Holy Spirit saying to
me…?
How
does today’s message apply to my life?…my beliefs? |