Sunday, October 16, 2016

Lean Not On Your Own Understanding


“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.” (Proverbs 3:5)

It’s so hard for us to be happy when we can’t have what we want.  If you were to truly stop and think about it though, there are so many people that don’t even have what we do have and yet we aren’t grateful for that.  There are things in life that we may ask for, hope for, dream about, and even pray for. Some of those things may or may never happen.  Then again, it may come much later than we had ever expected.  Perhaps, we are given something else in its place to make way for what is yet to come! 

It wasn’t long ago when my husband and I were looking for some property and day dreaming with some friends about buying land next to each other for our retirement and investment.  We made a pretty bold prayer, and we were all pretty confident that it would come to pass.  In the end, it was not God’s plan; at least not yet!  What He did give us was the knowledge and understanding of our next step towards that dream.  We came to the conclusion that it was not a wise decision based on the financial hardship it would put us in.  Instead God led us down the path of refinancing our home at a better interest rate and a shorter term.  He also led us to investigating ways to practically become debt free in a much shorter time frame than we had imagined; which, will allow us the ability to afford our dream retirement home when the right time does come!  In God’s time!  Not ours!  For this, we are grateful for what we have, and the gifts He is giving us, and our faith remains intact for what is yet to come!
 
You see, our understanding is not the same as God’s all-knowing sovereignty.  He knew everything we were going to face in this life before we were even born.  He knew every wrong road we were going to take before we took it.  He knows the plans He has for us and it will not happen until it is in His timing.  Therefore, we have to have faith and believe that even during the storms life throws our way, we will get through and in the end we will be stronger for it.  Even when we take the wrong turn, God is there to lead us down the right path again.  It may be a detour, but eventually we will get there and we will have endured what we thought we couldn’t.  Keep that in mind the next time you don’t get what you want, but keep the faith and be grateful for what we do have!  Most of all, be thankful for the opportunities to grow that God gives us so that we can become stronger, and we will endure the next storm a little easier!




We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, 
for we know that they help us develop endurance. (Romans 5:3)

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