Trusting in Him

In Paul Tripp's book Broken-Down House he has an insightful passage about God's sovereignty and our desire to understand what is going on in our lives. Though the following passage is lengthy, I believe it is worth quoting.

God's sovereignty will inevitably take you where you did not intend to go. He will bless you with things you could not possibly have earned or achieved. But God will also choose for you to go through things that are difficult, and to endure things that are painful. In those moments - some of which may stretch into quite lengthy seasons - you will be tempted to question his wisdom, or his love, or both...

To question the love of him who died for us is a testimony to our own frailty. To question the wisdom of the One in whom all things hold together is a testimony to our own foolishness...

It is not a sin to desire to understand. Your rationality is a gift of your Creator. Your ability to reason, analyze, interpret, organize, and explain is one of the things that sets you apart from the rest of creation. You should endeavor to know everything you can about God, his character, and his plan for the world and the people he has placed in it. Yet you cannot allow the analytical power of your mind to be the source of your hope, confidence, and continuance.

This is why real rest and peace is not found in knowing and understanding. It is only found in trust. Only when you have a quiet confidence in the Lord behind the plan and have come to know his love, wisdom, power, and grace, will you be able to rest in hope - even when you do not understand what God is doing in a particular moment in your life." p 57-58.

All too often I desire for God to explain to me why I am going through a difficulty. Tripp reminds me that I am not called to rest in understanding - but to rest in Him alone. No wonder Jesus calls us to childlike faith - to trust in our Heavenly Father who is at work, exercising His sovereign plan. God, grant me that childlike faith and trust in You.

Our Days are Numbered

Our days are numbered before we are born. And just as one hair of our head doesn't fall to the ground unnoticed by our God, neither does one day pass without His sustaining us. But eventually, for each of us there is that day, when God calls us Home. For the one going Home, it is as if life has just begun. Paradoxically, for us that remain, it is as if our life has just ended. Our hearts are torn apart by our enemy death. Life as we have known it has suddenly taken a new, unwelcomed direction.

Death is hard to understand. When faced with death, our souls scream out that it is not right. We are made for living, not for dying. Recently a friend with four children died of cancer at the age of 37 years. My mind races with all kinds of questions: who will take care of the children when they are sick, who will listen to the stories of their day, who will cook their dinner? But God deemed it good for her to go Home. Her days were numbered.

Within a couple of days of her death, I learn of another's friend whose granddaughter is killed in an auto accident; she is 16. Surely, there are many more things for her to learn, ways to serve God, life to be experienced. But God deemed it good for her to go Home. Her days, too, were numbered - just as they are for each of us.

I have to fight the notion within myself that these women's lives were cut short. It looks to me as if they had so much living ahead of them. But this is not God's perspective. Just as one hair doesn't fall to the ground unnoticed by Him, neither does one saint die without His knowing. Even in death, God is about His good purposes; He is accomplishing His plans. Through the pain of death, we can also rejoice – for one of those purposes is to abolish death!

Day by Day

Day by day life happens. Often it feels as if I don't have much control over the things that happen in my life or in the lives of those I love. And I guess I have lived long enough to see that the reality is I don't. But rather than being left in despair, I have hope. My hope does not come from what I can see and feel around me; I fear that would leave me in despair, for life is hard. My hope comes from the One who created me as well as this world I live in. Life is not spinning out of control. This life is straight on course; this life, my life, is speeding straight into eternity. We are headed toward life eternal. In the meantime, I can live each day confident that His purposes are being accomplished and that nothing can thwart His hand. There are many sitiuations I see and experience that I do not understand. But this I know: we rest in the arms of a God who loves us greatly, who is working out His purposes, and whose hand cannot be thwarted.