Let us begin today with a few images. The photos below were more or less a “snatch & grab” if you will. I just grabbed anything, regardless of the subject. No plan to it whatsoever. You get a bit of variety that way, and variety, was always what I was about.

I must be thinking horizontally today, with the lack of verticles.

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God Has a Plan.

If you’re anything like me, you like to control your own life. You’ll take help yes, but control no. It’s about not having anyone else calling the shots. Not even Almighty God. Or so I thought.

In the Bible we are given to examine the lives of many people. Those people include some bad ones, and some really great ones. They were however fallible humans as all of us are.

Those great ones just like the bad ones, are no longer with us here on this earth. Their bodies died. All of them. Even our Lord and Savior’s body died on that Cross. He became our Sacrifice.

Moses, David, Mary, Paul, John. They all did great things and then died, despite their importance to God.

Just maybe, when Paul endured yet one more occasion of imprisonment and threats to his life, or beatings for what he preached, is it possible that in the quiet darkness of that filthy and ragged cell he was kept in, he prayed to God that he did not have to endure this? He may well have prayed to God to save him from the pain.

He endured and kept on preaching until finally they put his head on a rock, and chopped it off with an ax.

Why did God allow this faithful servant to endure so much, and then die? Far worse than we’ll ever have to experience?

The truth is, God has a plan. In fact he has a plan for you and me too. God’s plan will occur even if it means that some of our prayers are not answered. Of course, we can always turn our back on that plan. God offers us the freedom to make up our own minds and even to reject Him. Many in society, be they religious or not (religion by itself is not the answer), will ultimately reject God. If we wind up rejecting the Father in the first place, Salvation through Christ, cannot be offered.

Of course, along with the Holy Spirit, the Father and the Son make up the Trinity. Also called the Triune God. One God, three aspects of Him.

To me, His plan comes first and foremost. I certainly will not trust my own ideas. He is God, not my next door neighbor.

No matter what we do, our time here is very limited. Our time however after our bodies die and waste away, is an eternity. It lasts forever.

That eternity is spent in Heaven or hell. One or the other.

The apostle John was tortured and beaten. It is certainly possible that he might of at least once prayed for this to stop. He was human too. Eventually, they boiled him in oil. He survived, although he would be blind for the rest of his earthly life.. He was in fact, imprisoned for most of the rest of it. He wrote Revelations while in prison and blind. John was better than me, and a stronger believer than I sometimes am. He and I can however, share Heaven together, thanks to what Christ did for us.

God had a plan for John.

You and I are not Paul or John. or for that matter, Moses or David or Mary.

Their bodies died, but today, they live in Heaven.

God has a plan.

I pray a lot. It is the highlight of not just my day but my life. I do not insist on or expect direct answers, but more often than not, I get them. My prayers are often answered. Far more often than I deserve. Sometimes they are not. That is God’s prerogative. He has reasons far beyond my capacity to understand.

Not trusting God, but considering myself a Christian, is beyond my humble human logic.

Trust.

God is greater than I am or ever could be!

In the end, I will rightfully be recognized by God for what I was. A true believer, who tried to move God’s plan forward, but was ultimately too small and weak to accomplish as much as I wished for. Average in life, average in death.

Still, Heaven is on my horizon.

I am happy that He gave me life in the first place. Many never see a full life. I give thanks for what He has given me. I do so daily.

I have already been given a long life that I did not earn. I have been in fact, better at sinning than anything else. The often gentle kindness God has shown me despite that, is most inspiring. The rougher times, were educating. The new chances, given over and over and over and over again. More than I ever deserved. I have been a superstar sinner, but only an average Christian.

The last thing I am going to do at this point, is give up my faith of an eternity with Jesus in Heaven, just because my simple mortal brain struggles to comprehend it all. Or because my all too mortal body is beginning to give up.

That body eventually will give up, but I won’t!

It is God’s plan. I get cold shivers up my spine from what would transpire if I made the decisions for this world instead of God. Everything in the universe would be in jeopardy.

It is always difficult to take “self” out of how we look at things and how we deal with our emotions. At least for me it is. Sometimes it just needs to be done anyway.

God’s plan will be done on earth, as it is in Heaven!

Having a relationship with God, is not about Him lowering Himself to our standards, it’s about us putting effort into raising ourselves closer to his standards, and having faith.

Faith.

1 Timothy 3:15
If I am delayed, you will know how people aught to conduct themselves in God’s household, which is the church of the living God. The pillar and foundation of the truth.

Mark 1:14-15
Now after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming the gospel of God, and saying, the time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand, repent and believe in the Gospel.

John 14:6
Jesus said to him, I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.

God’s Blessings to each of you,
Wayne