Many times we find the phrase above in scripture. Almost as many times we find that while it was just as the LORD said, it was not just as we thought!
During this down time I have been putting my time and focus on drawing near the heart of God. While that is best done just sitting quietly in HIS presence, it is also enhanced by deeper study of HIS Word. A friend gave me the scripture Micah 7:8 right before my surgery. One day after the surgery Jesus told me to turn to that scripture but this time to read the entire chapter. As I did my eyes were caught on verses 14-16. As I began to meditate on those verses my imagination ran wild. I had so many petitions before HIM. I needed my body healed and the ministry needs supplied and my personal expenses to be supplied. I began to imagine how HE might accomplish all of that since at this time there was no way to “help” HIM with the task.
Many of you may be like me, in believing that we truly trust God for everything in our lives. But then things come into our lives that remind us that as humans we still feel we have to put our effort as well into the mission. Without meaning to we have adapted the old saying, “God helps those who help themselves”. While the scriptural truth is God helps those who cannot help themselves.
This does not negate our duty to be responsible in how we live our lives and steward all that God has put in our hands. But it does stand as reminder that life often hands us things that we are incapable of handling. At those times we remember verses such as Micah 7:15. In the NLT Bible it states “Yes, says the Lord, I will do mighty miracles for you like those I did when I rescued you from slavery in Egypt”. While Moses and the people had their idea of how the deliverance could be accomplished, God had a different plan. Just as I would lie awake trying to figure out how God and I would take care of everything until I was fully on my feet and had some conferences booked for 2015.
I remember telling Jesus recently that I just wish I had my life back. I longed for “normal” again. In HIS sweet way HE informed me that what I thought was normal would not be considered as such again. That what HE was doing was helping me be new in many ways. The new would not be limited to being without my breasts or having to turn my eating habits upside down or learning it is okay to rest. But rather when this adventure is completed there will be a depth of knowing HIS ways that has never been there before. No longer knowing HIS acts but learning HIS ways.
HIS Word tells us that HE will supply every need. That if HE knows when a sparrow falls how much more does HE watch over us. But the method of HIM supplying and watching is totally in HIS hands. In the circumstances that touch our lives, let’s give HIM the liberty to work in the way HE knows best.