September 18

“Christians often feel at liberty to murmur against other people when they would not dare to murmur against God.  Seeing God in all things, therefore, will make it impossible even to murmur.”  Hannah Whitall Smith, God is Enough, 9/14

This message keeps showing up in my life.  I guess because I haven’t received it into my heart yet.  It’s like a special delivery package that can’t be left on the doorstep--I have to sign for it.  Well, Lord, I’m home this time.  I’ll open the door and sign for it because I really want this package.  I want to stop murmuring and I want to start rejoicing.  Because I can’t murmur and rejoice at the same time, I have to decide which I want.  Perhaps it’s taken me this long to realize I can’t control my world.  I can’t change it, but I can change how I view it.  But this is going to require that I stop listening to other people.  Very few people want to believe that God is in control.  There are scads of books written on the subject of why bad things happen to good people.  Hannah, on the other hand, is telling us that only good things happen to God’s loved ones.  What the rest of the world is missing is the fact that just because something looks bad and feels bad by it’s economy doesn’t make it bad in God’s economy.  The whole point of trusting God is to receive His gifts.  Some of his gifts come wrapped in rough paper--like the one that keeps coming to my door that I’ve kept refusing to receive.  I must look past the paper--even to the point of not seeing it--and see the gift.  This is the only way I’m going to open that door.

“But as for you, you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.”  Genesis 50:20