sober-minded

Sometimes God answers prayer in surprising ways. One way it can be a surprise to us is when we realize that a difficult circumstance we have found ourselves in for some time, is the very means He’s been using to work a long-sought change in our heart and behavior.

A rocky time in marriage can be the means of God’s working that change; or difficult people or situations at church, or a number of other things. It is a beautiful thing when an awareness begins to dawn: “I have been changed. I see more fruits of sanctification, of holiness in my life. I feel more love in my heart for people, more thankfulness to God. There is a greater faithfulness evident. And it is directly due to this hard place I have been in.”

I would have expected God to bring about good changes in another way. Through some sort of transformational power encounter during a particularly great song sung at church or a conference, perhaps. Or maybe in my prayer closet, He would completely overwhelm me with a sense of His presence and I would descend, like Moses, face shining and clutching a Bible, from that mountain top back down to the family room, forever altered.

But no. He used, it turned out, the completely mundane and frustrating details of an everyday life, lived out faithfully, to bring about a greater dependence on Him, a greater trust, a greater suspicion of my own strength and thoughts and abilities. He grew bigger, I grew smaller.

This is a surprise. It is ever His way. He seems to take our preconceived notions and turn them topsy-turvey all the time. Now that I sort of get the hang of it, I like it. He is great, and I am not. This is ever the surprising truth about God.

This entry was posted on Saturday, May 10th, 2008 at 15:14 and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.