God's Sovereignty

"Oh Lord, to see You, even if the Light of Your presence is best seen against the veil of darkness!" Priscilla Shirer

This prayer was shared by the woman who wrote the Bible study I just completed. It is a reminder to me that God is faithful and unfailing. He is good all the time. His character never changes. He is the same today, yesterday and forever! What I know of Him now and know of Him from His Word will never change. My circumstances, my situations, the seasons of my life may change, but God never will. I can count on Him to sustain me. May I purposely turn my attention on to what God is doing. May I have His perspective on life and the situation I am in. Whether this be the wilderness and dry season of my life or a season of abundance. I must have a "bedrock of remembrance" of Who God is. He is Sovereign. He is good. He is unchanging. And through the difficult times of the wilderness walk, God peppers the desert with oases.

"The Lord is righteous in all of His ways, and kind in all of His deeds." Psalm 145:17

A dear sister made a delightful statement the other day. "If you don't like the fruit, the problem is in the root!" How true this is. If we are unhappy with what we are seeing in our lives, the fruit we are bearing, then we must evaluate the problem as being a root problem. We are to be rooted and grounded in God. Then the fruit of His Spirit can abound to us.

No plant or tree can bear fruit in poor soil. The roots will not bring up the necessary nutrients for life. The fruit will be of no good to anyone. Agricultural parables were often used in Scripture to explain difficult spiritual concepts. "If we don't like the fruit, the problem is in the root." Are we nurturing our minds with things of God. Are we having our lives, our hearts, our minds renewed by God and His Word? This is being rooted and grounded in God. When our foundation is in God, we are firmly established and can face anything this life throws our way as we trust our Sovereign God, who is Lord over all.

And as the parable of the sower speaks of where the seed falls will determine it's success, so too with the lives of people who hear God's Word. (You can read this parable in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark & Luke).

Some seed falls by the wayside and is quickly snatched up by the birds. This seed is likened to the people who hear God's Word but Satan quickly snatches it away.

The sower sows and some seed falls on rocky soil. Seed in rocky soil cannot have substantial roots. It quickly sprouts up only to wither and die because it has no roots to bring in life sustaining water and nutrients. This seed is like the individual who hears God's Word with zeal but never allows a life change to occur. This individual does not have roots that sink down into the Truths of Scripture. Interest in spiritual things last then only for a short season. I am speaking of the necessity to not only hear God's Word but believe it and receive Christ's gift of forgiveness and new life in Him.

The sower sows and some seed falls on soil but thorns also are there. Weeds and thorns compete (and usually win) for nutrients and space in gardens. The sower sows and when the seed sprouts, the life is strangled out by the thorns. This situation is the person who hears the Word of God, receives it but then allows the world, it's cares and materialism to choke out the Truths in God's Word. Jesus gives another picture of this when He says it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich person to enter Heaven. Why? Materialism. This view of life is idolatrous. One of the Ten Commandments tells us to have no other gods. Yet, we cling to the things of this world and it chokes the life from us.

The last soil receives the seed and is fruitful to abundance. Why? Because the seed was able to sink down roots into the good soil and grow. This soil is the person who hears God's Word, believes it and receives the gift of forgiveness and new life in Christ. This person allows her life to sink roots down into the Truths of God's Word. What does this parable promise? Fruitfulness!

So, where are we sinking our roots? Are we abiding in Christ, the Vine? Are we being rooted and grounded in God by being in His Word and in fellowship with His Body? Are we allowing the Holy Spirit to renew our minds and conform us to the image of Jesus? Are we being the sweet fragrance of Christ?

I pray that we all would be actively living our faith...not because it saves (because it does NOT) but because we love the One Who came and died in our place. And on the third day, He rose again.

In Christ Jesus there will be no disappointment with the fruit. And we, in Christ Jesus, abide in His sovereignty knowing that He is using all that comes in to our lives to draw us into His likeness. Though difficulties arise, we know God remains the same. He will never forsake us. He may even deliver us out of difficulties. But if He doesn't, we can trust Him and be assured that He will see us through to the end because He loves us and we belong to Him.