It can be difficult to balance the here and now with what’s next, but the good news is God has already given us the tools we need to make a wise decision. Here are three ways I’ve learned to focus on what really matters when making decisions.
Joseph’s life offers us a magnificent portrayal of the grace of God as He came to our rescue in the Person of His Son, Jesus.
Some of us are fearful of silence. If we stop we may have to think for ourselves. If we listen we may not like what we hear. We find solitude synonymous with loneliness. And so we miss the quiet whisperings of God.
Prophets like Isaiah were not rookies who carried out hit-or-miss pre-game chapel programs for a few teams in Judah. No, they were the real deal, sent and anointed by God to be trusted and revered.
Waiting on the Lord means we are looking to Him for grace—the desire and power needed in a situation. Sometimes we know the thing to do, but don’t want or desire it. We need to wait on the Lord to supply even the desire to do the right thing.
One reason we might not see Scripture’s relevance is because we focus on the discontinuity between the world of the Bible and our world and conclude Scripture’s irrelevant. Instead, we need to look at the points of continuity.
God has wired us to find comfort, security, and identity in the familiar, the routine, our customs and traditions. Losing them or changing them can throw us off balance and that’s uncomfortable.
We can use a lot of energy and resources in our lives to build up our internal sense of worth or to form an identity for ourselves. Who we believe we are defines how we behave.
We want to be right (as we see it, of course) more than we want to love our neighbours as ourselves. At that point our personal preferences eclipse any evidence of love. I am of the firm conviction that where grace exists, so must various areas of grey.
Like the Japanese art of Kintsugi, in which a potter creates priceless treasures by fusing broken pieces of porcelain together with gold, the Lord fills the cracks in our lives with the glowing gold of second chance.
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