Wandering thoughts...

Sitting in church yesterday I learned that God can speak through whoever and whatever He wants to use. The pastor was preaching on foreign missions and somehow God used it to teach me a life lesson... or, let me rephrase that, to re-teach me a life lesson (it seems I don't listen too well sometimes :)

"Stop it!"

That's what caught my attention during the sermon. The pastor said it and, while I had been listening, this sentence seemed to jump out and grab at my wandering thoughts. It was like God was saying "stop it! Stop obsessing about what you can't change. I have way better plans than you do and I can't wait to show them to you."

A few months ago I was listening to a guy speak about Abram and Sarai. I had always thought that Abram was not such a smart guy, I mean who needs to pretend that he's his wife's brother so that he feels secure?!? What in the world. But this speaker made Abram's story sound exactly like mine in a way. Too often I think that I can help God along in His plan for me. Just like Abram said "I know that you called me to have descendants that numbered the stars, so I'm going to help you out by not getting myself killed in this situation," I was basically saying to God: "I know You're good and mighty but I'm going to help You help me." As if. God isn't in the business of letting us have the glory for His works.

In Matthew 6 it says: "But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you" (v. 33). Before this Matthew is talking about how people worry about what they will eat, what they will wear, what they will drink... maybe it's even who they will end up with, what job they will get, what university they'll get into... And God tells us to seek Him first and then these things will be added to you. Somehow we've gotten it the other way. Somehow we've turned God's plan into something that is secondary to what we want. We need to go to Him first and then He will point us in the direction He wants us to go.

Later in the book of Matthew, he writes: "Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened" (Matt. 7: 7-8).

We need to stop trying to figure it out all by ourselves for God and start seeking Him first. He doesn't need our help, in fact most of the time our "help" just gets us into unnecessary messes. He just wants you and then He's big enough to figure out the rest.

Have a great week!