Heaven Came Down! Part 5

Who needs more drama in their life?

 

Last time I wrote: 

 

His love desires what is best for us, His wisdom knows what is best for us, and His power is able to bring it to pass.

 

Reflect for a moment on what this word formula means to you in practical ways. It is stunning to realize the depth, breadth, length, and height of God’s work of providence in your life and in the life of those you love and pray for. It is stunning. 

 

What does God’s providence mean to you? 

 

God has the capability to look at you and wrap His love, His wisdom and His power around the coming and going of your life, down to the millisecond, and bring about His perfect story of your life. The perfect story of your life, written by God’s love, wisdom and power, will bring glory to Himself, redemption to your soul and purpose to your life. 

 

But wait; there’s an apparent problem. For many of us, it’s a big problem. The apparent problem is God’s providence in your life is not a straight line; it’s a crooked path, a bumpy journey, a contradiction of the continuous joy our hearts long for. 

 

Consider the story of Joseph in Genesis. God’s providence was for him to be second in command over the mighty nation of Egypt. However, his path to the position God had for him was a crooked path, a bumpy journey, a contradiction of the continuous joy his heart longed for. Joseph’s path to God’s providential plan for his life included the hatred of family, human slavery, betrayal, deceit, imprisonment and hopelessness. 

 

God has a curious way of directing His love, wisdom and power toward us who believe. He does it with dramatic means. Every good drama weaves a story of the heroes’ journey down a dark path, filled with difficulty, struggle and despair before the triumphant, and often unlikely, victory takes place. 

 

Like Joseph, God’s providential story for you may be a story of the eleventh hour; the nick of time, or coming in under the wire. And not only you, but also the ones you love. The joy of the prodigal son and the gracious redemption of his father was a story of selfish ambition, wonton and lustful pleasure, pig slop and poverty. It was an end of the rope story with a God’s triumphant providence making the rescue. 

 

God’s providence in your life is this:  

 

His love desires what is best for us, His wisdom knows what is best for us, and His power is able to bring it to pass.

 

But he often brings it to pass in ways that are curious, dramatic and challenging. But the crooked path He takes in your life never alters for one second His love, wisdom and power that is directed toward you like a laser.

 

I pray that you may know … what is the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe. Ephesians 1:19. 

 

All of God’s greatness is directed toward His providence in the lives of those who believe. Do you believe it? Are you His? Whisper to Him now to forgive you, to save you. 

 

What is your response to God’s providence?

 

Habakkuk teaches us a lot about grappling with God’s providence. Habakkuk 2:4 summarizes our response to God’s just in the nick of time, end of the rope and eleventh-hour providence with this: but the righteous will live by his faith. I wish I had more, but that’s it. Live by faith! Live by faith that His love, wisdom and power are fully and completely in place in your life … even when it doesn’t seem like it. 

 

Here’s a last minute, eleventh hour, nick of time passage from Habakkuk (3:17-19) for you to read every day for the next seven days: 

 

Though the fig tree should not blossom and there be no fruit on the vines;

 

Though the yield of the olive should fail and the fields produce no food,

 

Though the flock should be cut off from the fold and there be no cattle in the stalls,

 

YET I will exult in the Lord, I will rejoice in the God of my salvation.

 

The Lord God is my strength, and He has made my feet like hinds’ feet, and makes me walk on my high places.

 

Father, our heart’s desire is to live by faith. Give us faith to remember and recall, even in the darkest times, that Your love for us never fails. You are always with us; You are always near; You never fail us.

Amen!