"God Willing"

Have you ever come across a plaque that says,

"Good Morning! This is God.

I will be handling all of your problems today.

I do not need your help.

So have a good day!"

I was reminded of that statement/quote/saying by the following UCC's Stillspeaking Daily Devotional Newsletter. Every morning I get a devotional. These quick little reads are more than insightful and even personal! Interesting how this edition is on the same day of my surgery. Yet again I am humbled and reminded that it is in God's hands and God Willing this surgery will work. If not there is another path, journey and/or plan for me. The ever "event/gift/package seeking peek-er" in me wants to know NOW the answer to "What has God got up God's sleeves for me?". So, God it is in your plans & I trust you will see me safely to where I need to go. So, without ado here is the devotional for 9/25/08.

Home: i.UCC Community: Newsletter
Thursday, September 25, 2008 What Tomorrow Will Bring
Bible Excerpt from James 4:11-16


You who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a town and spend a year there, doing business and making money." Yet you do not even know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, "If the Lord wishes, we will live and do this or that."

Reflection by Anthony B. Robinson

I've just moved to Toronto for the year to, as James puts it, "do business and make money." Not much money as I am teaching at a seminary. I am trying to imagine how people might have heard it if every time in recent months that I had talked about these plans and changes, I had said, "If the Lord wills it," or "God willing," or "It's really in God's hands." I suspect I would have felt a little showy, overly pious, and maybe phony. Moreover, I imagine that a fair number of those with whom I spoke would have thought the same--that is, if they weren't wondering if I were in need of a psychiatric evaluation! We tend to think we're in charge, in control.

But however odd it may sound in the ears of a secular age, James strikes me as closer to the truth. Our illusions of control are just that: illusions. Maybe it's the people who think they are in charge of life that need the psychiatric evaluation or attitude adjustment? And life has a way of giving us those little evaluations, those attitude adjustments. Which is not to say that we shouldn't make plans or have our projects. We do and we should. And yet we don't, can't, know what tomorrow will bring. The only thing we can know for sure is that God's grace will uphold us, God's wisdom will guide us, and God's peace shall keep us. And knowing that is enough.

Prayer
When you challenge my foolish idea that I am in charge, when you send your attitude adjustments, grant me grace to receive them graciously and learn that you are God, not me. Amen.

About the Author:
Anthony B. Robinson, UCC pastor, speaker and author, teaches leadership at Emmanuel College at the University of Toronto. His newest book is Changing the Conversation: A Third Way for Congregations.



The Stillspeaking Daily Devotional is a free service and is supported by your gifts to Our Church's Wider Mission. Scripture quotations are from New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America, adapted. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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Happy Birthday taller little sister. It did not bother me when I turned 30. Yet having my sister turn 30 bothers me. I suppose that while she was in her 20s I still had my foot in the proverbial door of young adult. Now we both have to be grown-up.