Scripture

Then Job replied to the LORD :

“I know that you can do all things;

no plan of yours can be thwarted.

You asked, ‘Who is this that obscures my counsel without knowledge?’

Surely I spoke of things I did not understand,

things too wonderful for me to know.

“You said, ‘Listen now, and I will speak;

I will question you,

and you shall answer me.’

My ears had heard of you

but now my eyes have seen you.

Therefore I despise myself

and repent in dust and ashes.” Job 42:1-6

Observation

Job was a scab-picker and he had a bone to pick with God. He was gutsy. Job believed not only that he would be able to speak to God face to face, but also that God would explain himself to a man on his sick bed.

What did Job get for asking too much of God?

Job did get his appointment with God, but it wasn’t what he imagined. Instead of him asking God questions, the Lord questioned Job.

Like the rest of us, Job blamed God to make himself feel better. What drives that demand is the notion that there is some standard even higher than God himself that somehow the Almighty must answer to. And of course, we imagine that us humans have the right to take God to the complaint desk.

What Job got for asking too much of God was a graduate course in the sovereignty of God. The Lord is in control and he doesn’t have to answer to anyone. The Lord has plans greater than our imagination and he does not have to explain himself. Yet what motivates his silence is love.

Application

What are we supposed to do when God doesn’t explain himself to us? We certainly can’t become fatalistic, that whatever will be will be. No, we don’t resign ourselves to fate, we have a Father. The best response to God’s silence is silence of our own. Instead of trying to stop God dismantling what we treasure, we ought instead to ponder his ways and give him time. He does not explain himself, but love is at work. Our Father does make all things beautiful in their time.

Prayer

Father, I’m done trying to figure you out. If I want you to be bigger than my problems then I must let you be out of my control. You don’t have to explain anything to me. I will just follow and be amazed at what can happen when you do as you would like. Amen.

Press the arrow to listen to 10th Avenue North “By Your Side” as you read today’s devotion about God’s direction.

Scripture
Trust in the LORD with all your heart
And do not lean on your own understanding.
In all your ways acknowledge Him,
And He will make your paths straight. Proverbs 3:5-6

Observation
This Post-It note sized verse was one of my mother’s favourites. As a child it seemed simple. But now life is complex. It’s tempting to look for more complicated things. However, this simplicity is just what we need.

Here’s my paraphrase:

Instead of trusting your instincts and distrusting God, totally lean into everything he says with every part of your willing and choosing. Hold your own opinion with skepticism, because you don’t know best.

Don’t worry about knowing what to do, instead just know God and then you will know what to do. Strive for the deep knowing between friends that is wordless but deep. Sitting in a silent room both know the others thoughts. As you fall into that friendship with the Lord you will know what is on his mind.

The blessing is not so much that God will take you to the right road, but that he will bring the good road up to meet you. He will straighten the kinks and bumps.

Application
The choice word in this is “acknowledge”. The Hebrew word is one we all know. “Yada”, made famous by Jerry Sienfeld, “Yada, yada, yada.” The word means more than “to know” as if God’s direction were just information. The word means more like “knowing”, because through deep relationship we know what is on the mind of a friend even without words. Life is confusing and requires direction not so that I will get directions and make my way, but so that through all the bewilderment I will come to really know the Lord.

Prayer
Father, today I want to know you more than I want to know my way. That is the test of whether I’m leaning on my understanding or my own. I don’t want just information, I want an ever deepening relationship with you. Amen.

Press the arrow to listen to Leeland sing “Count Me In” while reading today’s devotion about hope.

Scripture
“We are doomed to die!” he said to his wife. “We have seen God!” But his wife answered, “If the LORD had meant to kill us, he would not have accepted a burnt offering and grain offering from our hands, nor shown us all these things or now told us this.” Judges 13:22-23

Observation
Life can go well. God can answer a prayer. But we can still assume the worst.

Manoah was in that boat. God called at his door and gave a promise of a child to their empty home. But he feared the worst. He thought that God would kill him for opening the door.

I love Mrs. Manoah. She is nameless in the Bible but priceless. With earthy pragmatism she pointed to all the good things that God had done for them and concluded: would God have brought us so far to kill us?

Application
There are days I fear the worst. There is a residual fear that comes from our days without Christ that lingers on us like smoke smell in our clothes. But when I consider all that God has done for me in the past twenty-nine years of following him, it is hard to imagine that he has brought me thus far to embarrass me. There are many more glad and happy surprises that he has in store for my life. I’ve opened the door and seen the face of God and I believe that he won’t kill me for it!

Prayer
Father, today I dare to believe even better things are to come. Amen.

Press the arrow to listen to Michael Card and Phil Keaggy sing “The Poem of Your Life”

Scripture
“Naomi took the baby and cuddled him to her breast. And she cared for him as if he were her own. The neighbor women said, ‘Now at last Naomi has a son again!’ And they named him Obed. He became the father of Jesse and the grandfather of David.” (Ruth 4:16-17).

Observation

God is the author of each life story. That clear from the first biography God ever wrote – the book of Ruth.

Ruth as a book is perfectly balanced.

The introduction and the conclusion have the exact same number of words. The novel starts bitter but ends better.

There are four main sections that pull the reader along.
Each section has an introductory sentence that introduces segment.
Each chapter starts with a problem that is answered and leads to the next problem.

There is balance between selfless Ruth and selfish Orpah and between selfless Boaz and the selfish relative.

The story starts with a picture of Naomi an empty a widow with two dead sons.
The fairy-tale ends with a picture of Naomi now filled with a baby in her arms.

And in the first biography in the Bible everyone lives happily ever after in the end.

Why is the book of Ruth so perfect? Ruth is not beautiful just because the writer spun a good tale but because the Lord was the author of her life. The book of Ruth is beautiful because Naomi had a God-written life. The book is a masterpiece because there was a master-plot planned by the Master Himself. Remember, God is the best selling author of all time.

Every human life is like a story. Some are tragedies. However, lives given to God are stories authored by the Almighty Himself. If my life is in Jesus then my life is a story written by God. No matter the character, the plot, the scenery, every life-tale under God’s control ends better than it began.

Some like Naomi want to stop reading the story of their lives too soon. At the start of the book Naomi tried to stop the story of her life. When her husband and sons died she thought her story had come to an end. But it was really the beginning of a brand new story.

Application

My life is like a book, being written by God every day. It all takes longer than I think it should sometimes. Writers are notoriously slow. I heard James Mitchner wrote just 3 pages a day. God takes his time working out the plot of our lives.

Our lives are like a book, a plot written day by day. Many pages are senseless. Some seem to have temporary purpose only to be lost in the next chapter. But Jesus is the author skilled at turning bad beginnings into better endings.

In all of the Bible, any human life participating with the Lord has ended better than it began. Jesus wants to dip his pen into my life to inscribe his eternal purposes. My choice is, will I scrawl an autobiography, with each chapter written by me, struggling to find meaning. Or will I let Jesus story blend with my own story so that I can inscribe eternal purposes?

Prayer

Father, here’s a pen, here’s my life, please write your story all over me. Amen.