Written by Pastor Jack Wellman– Rick Warren
No Accidents
There are no accidents as far as God is concerned. We are the ones who have accidents, but even these are part of the overall purpose of God. Nothing that happens to us is without purpose. If we can look at our lives in this way, we’ll be a lot less troubled when the wheels fall off in our life. We can trust God in all this because God has already seen the future and He knows it will all work out for our very best. The only question that remains is, will we trust Him with this?
Good from Evil
When Joseph’s brother threw him into a pit to leave him to die, by chance (or was it?) a caravan of traders came by who were headed to Egypt and so they sold Joseph into slavery, but even this intentional act of evil done by his brothers came back to save them and many people alive because Joseph had risen to second in command only to Pharaoh, and Joseph planned for a coming seven year drought, and so what they meant for evil ended up as good (Gen 50:20). Just looking at the cross we can see that God can bring much good from much evil.
Intentional Purpose
God never does anything without purpose, even if it looks that way to us. The difference is that God can see down the corridors of time and know that what happens today will benefit us in the future, even if it’s exceedingly bad today. What we know is that God can use all things, good and bad, to work out for His purposes but His purposes are always for our very best (Rom 8:28).
Sovereignty of God
Not even a sparrow falls from the tree that God is not aware of (Matt 10:29), so don’t think that God doesn’t know what you’re going through and what you’re feeling right now, and even if no one else knows it, God does, and He’s not finished with you yet. As long as we’re drawing breath, God has plans and purposes for us. When we seem to be at a dead end, we know that this too is part of His purpose. Perhaps God knew that if He didn’t put a dead end to the path we’re taking, we’d hurt ourselves. I trust Him in all of this. Do you?
Conclusion
God sees what we cannot, and sometimes He doesn’t want us to see everything because then we’d think that this must not be a part of God’s plan and purpose, however God never has accidents; God uses evil for good; He is intentional in working all things out for our best; and God doesn’t want us to put a period where He intends it to put a comma.
