I've been at a weird place. One that is unfamiliar. One that is uncomfortable. One that I would like to see changed. One that I am only partially able to control. Your thoughts can carry you away when there is change. How much more do we need to focus on the Word?! I keep coming around to a particular passage:"Actually, I don’t have a sense of needing anything personally. I’ve learned by now to be quite content whatever my circumstances. I’m just as happy with little as with much, with much as with little. I’ve found the recipe for being happy whether full or hungry, hands full or hands empty. Whatever I have, wherever I am, I can make it through anything in the One who makes me who I am." Phil 4:11 The Message
Paul writes these words as he sat in jail in Rome awaiting his trial. He writes to those whom he led to Christ; the "holy people" who filled the church in Philippi. Paul had a calling to evangelize. The idea of being shackled in prison is not good for evangelism efforts. Or is it? Obviously, he had the focus to pen his many letters while in jail - the same ones that were deemed inspired and cannonized. Being imprisoned was not Paul's plan but it was used by God beyond Paul's wildest imaginations!
After a few months of having my plans changed up, and not necessarily liking it, my thoughts are brought back to the outline of the book of Philippians. Ch 1: Jesus is our Life. Ch 2: He is our Model. Ch 3: He is our Goal. Ch 4: He is our Sufficiency. The world cannot provide perfect peace in life, only the Prince of Peace can do that. So I surrender my plans to His watchful care and can continue knowing that I can make it through anything in Him who makes me who I am.
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It is amazing how God moves us, especially when we become comfortable. God does not want our lives to be lived in a small box, He wants to expand our territory, so we can expand His. There are times when His shaping and molding are subtle, and others when we feel like we are being torn in two. Either way, God is doing what He needs to do, guiding and directing. And He will use whatever means He needs to, so we follow His will, not ours.
Remember, if God leads you to it, He will being you through it. Notice, not around it, over it, or move it. He takes us through it.
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