Hiyer. Thanks so much to everyone for the positive feedback on my previous blog - I am so happy people were blessed by it - and I'm really sorry if it was too much for some people. All good though.
Anyways. Today I'm way confused. Hmmm so the passage for today is 1 Samuel 18. v14 says the following...
'In everything (David) did he had great success, because the Lord was with him.'
Ok. Pretty straight forward, it implies that God is with us so we will have great success, just like King David. Cool. So why doesn't it always work? This raised many questions for me. I will outline them below; perhaps you can share your thoughts.
1. Why so often do we suffer? If God is with us, surely we should have success, right? I believe God is with me, so why has so much of my life felt like a battle? Why do bad things happen to good people?
2. If you don't believe in God, can the Lord still make you successful?
3. What about successful people who don't believe God is with them? Where has that success come from?
4. A REALLY interesting question - Did the Lord bless what David was doing and thus make him successful, or did David get blessed through doing what God was doing and following His will? I.e. should we follow the blessing and take part in what God is already blessing, or should we just start from scratch and ask God to bless it?
I'd really love some thoughts on this, cos I'm really confused.
Thanks
:)
We had a sermon on suffering at St Nic's on Sunday - the preacher actually crowdsourced most of the content from the church's student Facebook group! As a result, he completely avoided the cliched texts from Job and talked about Jesus - the ultimate case of bad things happening to a good person. Fundamentally, it's a case of redemption - bad things allow us to contrast the good, and it's God's redemption of bad things for his good work that underlines his power.
ReplyDeleteMatthew 5:45 says that "He sends the rain to fall on the righteous and the unrighteous". I think that if "every good and perfect gift is from above" (James 1:17) then it's easy to look at the work of non-Christians and see God at work. It's why I have no problem with listening to non-Christian music (as long as it's not promoting things that I disagree with!) - I can see God in it even if its creators don't.
Why does it have to be a choice between one or the other? I'd actually hope that as we deepened our relationship with God, the two would converge - as we start to see the world as God does, we'll see the needs as he does and we'll naturally start to join in with what he's doing. But, while the two are separate, I think it's wise to pray about what God's doing and ask to join in, but also to pray for God to bless and guide the things that you feel you want to do. You're a created being with free will to mirror the creativity and free will of your creator :)
Thanks Rob, again I love your perspective and outlook and wisdom. xx
DeleteA really amazng comment on Facebook from Heather Bailey...
ReplyDelete'I'm never sure whether to comment - Ive only been a Christian for about 2 months so I never know if what I wanna say is christiany/biblical (is that the right word?!) but I here's my thoughts on q 2/3 anyway!!... For 27 and a half years I wasn't a Christian and had loads of successes. I had amazing friends & family, a lush flat &I'm in a job that I love & am good at. So although I was pretty sure god existed, I jus didn't really feel as thou I needed him yet - I thought I was doing fine on my own. But I came to see that it wasn't that i had nothing to be grateful for but noone to be grateful to. Success jus never really made that much sense on my own.
This wk gods really been revealing to me how he's loved me & blessed me throughout the last 28 years, even thru the 27 and a half years that I rejected him. It's been amazing for me to see how god really did have a plan for me & has been intervening & blessing me even when I had no idea what he was up to! So ultimately yeah I think all my successes have come from god even thou it's taken me this long to realise & say thank you!!'
I love this!