There is a story about an apartment landlord who had no regard for God and despised those who did, including the sweet, Christian lady who lived alone in the next apartment.<\/p>\n
He could often overhear her praying and thanking God for taking care of her.<\/p>\n
One day she was laying out her needs before the Lord because she was out of food.<\/p>\n
Then she peacefully went out for awhile, trusting that He would take care of her.<\/p>\n
When she returned, there were bags of groceries on her table.<\/p>\n
She started really thanking and praising God, out loud, for His provision, as she had prayed.<\/p>\n
Just then the landlord came to her door, very smug, and with superiority said, “Lady, gotcha this time. God didn’t provide that food—I did. So much for your prayers.”<\/p>\n
The lady didn’t miss a beat and replied, “Oh, no, not so. God always provides for me, even if He has to use the devil to do so.”<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
So, really, just how many things can work for good, even in the midst of hostility?<\/p>\n
“All things” ?<\/p>\n
Good things—Bad things ?<\/p>\n
Not all things are good.<\/p>\n
“All things work together . . . ”<\/p>\n
I can’t make everything work together, no matter how hard I try.<\/p>\n
So, Somebody bigger has to be in charge, capable of working all things together.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
” . . . for good . . . ” ?<\/p>\n
You say, “God, I hope so.”<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
There’s more—more than “hope so”:<\/p>\n
” . . . all things work together for good to them that love God . . . ?<\/p>\n
Oh, so there is a catch—it does depend on me after all.<\/p>\n
No way—loving God makes me totally depend on Him.<\/p>\n
I trust Him, that He has a plan, and that He is working out His plan in my life.<\/p>\n
He has called me for a purpose, His purpose.<\/p>\n
And that makes everything in my life have meaning, whether I understand it all now—or later.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
How sure about “all” this?<\/p>\n
“We know<\/span> that all things work together for good to them that love God—to them who are called according to His purpose.”\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 —–His Book<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Added note:<\/p>\n Jesus “went about doing good.”<\/p>\n Any of my feeble efforts to do good to others will also come under the promise that He will work them together for good—“making a difference in their lives in the parts that are for keeps.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" There is a story about an apartment landlord who had no regard for God and despised those who did, including the sweet, Christian lady who lived alone in the next apartment. He could often overhear her praying and thanking God for taking care of her. One day she was laying out her needs before the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,2,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3573","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-educational","category-faith_based","category-inspire_lifter"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3573"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3573"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3573\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3582,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3573\/revisions\/3582"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3573"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3573"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3573"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}