Week Twelve - Shall, shall, shall

I love it when God's Word jumps off the page and meets the concerns of my heart. The other day, I woke fearful about war. I hate conflict of any kind because, as I wrote in my journal, "It unnerves me and causes my whole body to react."

I finished my journal entry by writing, "So I am speaking to myself in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, trying to focus on God, who is with me wherever I go and has already overcome. Jesus says, 'Be of good cheer.' I must choose to obey and leave Him with the rest. This old world is coming to an end, and it will go out in war, not peace. I need not fear God's plan but rest in His promises and the purpose of His will. Eternity awaits where there is no conflict."

I prayed a bit and laid aside my journal to do my chapter-a-day Bible reading. Today was Job 26, fourteen little verses. Job is answering Bildad, who had, in the previous little chapter of only six verses, painted a picture of man's hopelessness.

Job's answer comes back to two thoughts. First, he questions his friends - "How are you helping me?"  They haven't.

And then, he turns his words toward God's might. God hangs the earth on nothing, filling the clouds with water, controls the tide, and divides the sea, he says, and these are only a part of His ways.

And that's when God's Word grabbed me."These are parts of his ways." I only see a little part of His ways. If He can do all these things, what in this world limits Him? Nothing.

Nothing is too hard for Him. Nothing is outside His power or wisdom. No man's pride can overcome God. No weapon fashioned against Him will stand. And when we try to comprehend His greatness and all-encompassing wisdom and control, we fail miserably. For truly, what little we are capable of understanding is, as Job says, only part of His ways.

Isaiah 55:8-9 came to my mind. "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord, for as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts!"

My fear faded into faith, and then it turned to hope as I read on in Isaiah 55 to verse 11. "So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth; it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it."

God's purpose will be fulfilled, and even there, we only know a part of it.

But the promise of verse twelve set me up for a much better day. "For ye shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace; the mountains and the hills shall break forth before you in singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands."

Shall, shall, shall. That is a word of promise. Do you see it sprinkled through all the verses the Lord sent me? And even with these promises, this is only a part of His ways. He knows how to bless and comfort, for He is the Comforter. I'm so thankful I know that part.

So today, if you are feeling fearful or worried, take time to consider how little you know compared to how much He does. We only know a part of His plan, and we only understand a part of how things will work out. But we need to fear, for He knows it all exactly. He isn't afraid of conflict. These are only a part of His ways.

Let's follow Jesus' instruction in John 16:33, "These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world."