My grandfather and I were talking about it yesterday – He said, “what’s the difference between providence, luck, and God?” When is God directing us on a certain path, and when are we simply choosing which way to get to get around the lake?
In John 15:16 Jesus says:
“You did not choose me, but I choose you and appointed you…”
Just before this, Jesus says that He no longer calls us servants, but now friends, because He has told us everything that He has heard from His Father.
It’s interesting to realize that – if Christ has told us everything He heard from God – why do we still have so many questions? Why don’t we know when to make choices, and how to make choices?
The truth is – Christ tells us everything that we need to know, at the “right” time, and God has given us knowledge of Him – but not a full understanding:
“He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, He has put eternity in to man’s heart, yet that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.” Ecclesiastes 3:11
In Psalm 18, David writes about the Lord rescuing him from his enemy, King Saul. David eloquently writes about how he cried out to God, and God saved him from “distress,” “destruction,” and “death.” Then David writes, “He brought me out into a broad place; He rescued me, because He delights in me.”
David had kept the commandments of the Lord and as the scripture says – God delighted in David. So God brought him into a “broad” place: “You gave a wide place for my steps under me, and my feet did not slip.” (v.36)
It sounds to me, like God was giving David room to make choices. If there had been only one “right” way to step in this battle, David would not have needed a “broad” or “wide” place to step. He would have only needed some small stepping-stones.
So, what’s the point?
“Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways, acknowledge Him, and He will make straight your paths.” Proverbs 3:5-6
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
ReplyDeleteAnd sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth.
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same.
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference
Robert Frost: The Road Not Taken