Let’s Not Tell the Truth

I’m sure you—like me—have experienced great disruptions in life—changes that throw you off course and leave you questioning everything, perhaps even your faith?

I didn’t sign up for depression after grieving a grandmother nor walking through the brokenness of a difficult adoption. Nor did I sign up to be a missionary for two years to suddenly have the door close in my face. These disruptions have raised hard, even painful questions—about myself, my plans, my trust in God, and even my very faith.

Even so, I would not go back and tell myself the answers. Sometimes questions need to linger because eventually, the good God behind the scenes is going to show up. He always shows up. Often it isn’t with answers but with direction and peace. Maybe if I had to tell my nine-year-old, sixteen-year-old, or twenty-year-old self anything it would be this: God’s sovereign goodness will show up every time.

Our plans will fail. That’s a fact of life and a painful one. Sometimes you might feel like shouting, “I didn’t sign up for this!” The shift to understanding why plans failed, and then accepting those changes, finally happened for me when I realized it wasn’t about my plans at all. Life isn’t about how well I plan, but about God’s plan, which reveals His purpose, presence, and promises. My plans will always be shifting and changing, but “God’s plans are not written in pencil.”

God’s words are true, and they can never be erased. His plans are fixed in heaven. Can this be comforting? Moses certainly thought so.

Exodus 33:9 says Moses would go to a tent outside the camp of Israel and “speak” with God.

Thus the Lord used to speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend.

Moses was intimately aware of God’s Word. In a final prayer to God, he says something all of our hearts need when life hands us disappointment.

“Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations.” (Ps. 90:1 ESV)

More than anything, Moses found a home. What if, even in the middle of the most devastating and unexpected shifts, you found a home in God?

During this devotion, you and I will look together at the story of Moses, and I hope that you’ll come to see the place you belong is found not in a place, but with a person: God— the everlasting God. It is hard to imagine that God can use these rearranged pieces of our lives for His glory, but Moses is going to show us how.