‘Stand Up!’ Meditations No.29: Total Faithfulness
Isa 46:10 “I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come. I say, ‘My purpose will stand, and I will do all that I please.”
This is a direct follow-on from yesterday’s thoughts. This ‘standing’ is not us, but God’s purposes, God’s will. As we said several days back, from Creation to Conclusion He is working His purposes out and they will not be thwarted. He will weave the self-will of mankind into it (see Acts 2:23). Where he finds obedience, He blesses; where He sees disobedience, He sometimes disciplines it, but other times just waits for the right time – which may even be in eternity. He is the all-wise Sovereign Lord, His will, will be done – rightly! Worship Him.
Now let this really sink in. Yesterday we faced the potential awfulness of what could possibly happen with the power that God has put in our hands. We’ve already used it – growing technology – unwisely and without thought so we have an environmental crisis quietly (and sometimes not-so-quietly) brewing in the background. We have allowed human carelessness to set loose a Pandemic on the world that has brought the world to a halt and grabbed our attention to death in ways we had rarely seen or thought of before in our lifetimes.
We have witnessed the violent division of the world in horrific war, never before seen so graphically displayed on our TV screens, we have witnessed man’s inhumanity to man in the most terrible of ways that have left virtually all of us shaken and dismayed (at least those who have TV news stations covering the big action on a twenty-four hour basis) and distraught for those millions being displaced at the whim of a madman who has cowed all those around him and imposed lies on them, in order to make them conform to his will. We have seen the worst face of humanity since the two major wars of the twentieth century.
In the face of all this, it is easy to lose focus, easy to forget the truths that the Bible conveys to us. Let’s list some of them:
1. God has a plan from before Creation to make possible redemption within mankind, through His Son, Jesus Christ.
2. He does not impose it on us, overriding the free-will He has given us, but He does quietly work ‘in the background’ and while He does that, still the free-will of sinful mankind means that terrible things happen.
3. Even as with the Cross (see Acts 2:23,24), He works such evil into His plans and purposes with the ultimate goal of drawing people to Himself so they can enter into that which He intended for them from the beginning – a life of love, joy, peace, goodness, kindness (Gal 5:22,23) and so on.
THIS is why it is working out at it is. Be at peace and pray
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