Just Such A TimeSample

 A Time Of Need

“It wasn’t supposed to be like this!”

For me, that cry came from the depths of despair. I was seriously ill in hospital, wondering if the whispers I believed I’d heard from God were now obsolete. 

How could I be called by Him when everything I loved was the other side of a morphine drip?

We understand, don’t we, that trouble will come in life. But how does that match up to those treasured words in Jeremiah that say God has nothing but good plans for our lives?

We all have hopes, desires and plans; ideas about how we’d like to see our lives unfold. But oftentimes, life itself gets in the way. As we begin this journey together, I can’t claim to know what your “this” is. 

Perhaps you never imagined your marriage/relationship turning out like this.

Maybe you never expected your job, or hoped-for financial success, to end up like this.

Perhaps there is nothing specific you can point to, but you look at your life and can’t help wondering, “Is this it?” 

Speaking for myself, I wanted to know the answer to the question, “If you really have great plans for my life God, then what happens now?”

Now that illness has crept in.

Now that I’m in a time of need.

Now that I can't do what I dreamed I would do.

Now that life has simply got in the way.

What NOW?

You may be asking those questions of your life today. I’m asking you to stay with me this week as we journey together through the steps we can take to rediscover a God who is not fatalistic. Who doesn’t cut us off from our destiny when we make mistakes. The things life throws at us cannot divert His purposes and, regardless of the messes we make, He always buys back our purpose. He redeems the things we would rather forget or move on from. He uses them in ways we could never foresee.

A great friend once said to me, “Nothing is wasted in God.” She was absolutely right. Hang on as we discover again the vastness of God’s love and grace; His unbelievable redemptive ways. You weren’t born to end up with a dead dream or a hope deferred. Even in a time of need, you were born for just such a time.