Before I started this blog I was writing for a blog on the Family Worship Center - Algoma Campus website. This is a copy of one of those posts with links to the original blog.
God Wants You To Rest More
Originally Posted May 11, 2020
Original Blog Post
"And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to His purpose for them." Romans 8:28
I love the part that says “God causes everything to work together for the good.” I would like to explain what this verse means to me and how we can make use of it to bring us closer to God.
Let's begin with the term “everything” in the above verse. It covers all the events and situations that are in our lives, both good and bad. If you look back in your life, I am sure you will find good and bad things happened in the past. God has promised us that He will cause all of them, both good and bad to work together our good.
This is a great encouragement for those of us who are troubled by mistakes we made in the past. You could be troubled today because of something you did years ago. You made wrong choices that led to terrible consequences. The damage was done. Right now, you wished you could go back to the past and unmake those decisions but you know you can never do that. God is telling you to let go of that guilt and trust in Him. He is giving you a promise that He will turn this bad experience of yours into something good. This is the nature of our God.
Notice that the above verse does not name God as the one who caused the bad experiences to happen. God is the person who made bad things into good. He did not cause the bad things to happen in the first place. He will not push you into the water and then throw you a float to save you in order to show you how much He loves you. That may some people’s version of God, not the Bible’s.
I remember some time ago I was hospitalized because of congestive heart failure. After several rough days in the hospital, a couple of people said, “Maybe God wants you to rest more.”
What do you think they meant by that? It seemed to them that God could be the one who gave me the disease because He wanted me to rest more. What do you think of this? Do you think God loves you so much that He wants you to have good rest and He will do everything it takes to make you rest even to the extent of giving you some disease? In my view, I don't think so. God is not the kind of a god who causes bad things to happen to us in order to give Himself the opportunity to play hero. God was not the one who caused the troubles I faced. He is my savior. He cannot be my deliverer and oppressor at the same time. You have to make up your mind on whether God is your deliverer or your oppressor. As for me, I choose to believe in what the Bible says. God causes everything to work together for my good. I caused the problem myself by not taking better care of the temple that He gave me.
The last part of the verse tells us the conditions to have God cause everything to work together for our good. This privilege is for those who love God and are called according to His purpose for them. The first condition is we must love God. The question is how to love God?
The only way we can love God is for us to find out how much He loves us. Read the Bible. Read how Jesus treated his people. See for yourself how kind and loving He is. There is nothing He wished more than for you to prosper and be in good physical and spiritual health as your soul prospers. Not only that, Jesus was willing to die for our sins. At the Cross, He took on all our sins for us to live in righteousness. He took all our diseases for us to live in health. He died poor for us to live rich. The more you are aware on how much He loves you, you can’t help loving him.
The second condition is we are called according to His purpose. This is not our call but His. So, God has fulfilled this condition for us and for us to fulfill our part we must totally surrender ourselves to Him and be obedient to His Word.
Father God, I thank You for loving me as only You can,. I ask for the strength, the courage, and the discernment to understand the Scriptures. I want to turn my life over to You completely. I want to be obedient. I want to love You with all my heart and soul. I ask you to help me become the person that You created me to be. I ask for all these things in the precious name of Your Son Jesus Christ. Amen
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