What We Don’t See

And this same God who takes care of me will supply all your needs from his glorious riches, which have been given to us in Christ Jesus.                                                                  Philippians 4:19

Well, my dear readers, this has been quite a couple of weeks for my family! For regular readers, you are aware that as we were leaving our family vacation in South Carolina, my son-in-law had a stroke.  After the fact, we saw all the blessings of how circumstances could have been disastrous had some events happened a bit differently. My son-in-law is back home and healing nicely from this life-threatening event.

On our way back home, our car blew out a wheel bearing, causing us to make some large changes in travel plans, but we were able to get the car fixed and get home after a long ride (and a long delay). Again, what if we had not discovered the wheel bearing problem the way we did? Maybe we could have been stranded along the way at night in the storms we encountered, or worse, had a highway accident with loss of control. Looking back, we understood that God’s provision was there, even when we did not immediately see it. All we saw at the time were some miserable events that caused us pain and suffering.

Our pastor this past weekend had a sermon (we listened on the way home) on the Book of Joshua, regarding the crossing of the Jordan River. God’s provision for that crossing took place upstream at a place where the Israelites did not see God’s hand in the miracle.

So, isn’t it true that God’s provision usually takes place out of our sight? Only later do we see his hand in things we could not possibly understand or do for ourselves. The folks in AA (Alcoholics Anonymous) have a saying- “God does things for us that we cannot do for ourselves.”

To that I simply say, Amen.

Prayer: Lord, we trust your hand, even when we do not immediately see it, Amen