FBC Neches: On Demand

Instead of always looking forward at the problems that confront us and seem to have no viable solution, it helps if we will pause and look backwards to see all that God has done for us and through us because of His plans and purposes. In many cases, the best way forward is to stop and count our many blessings to remind us of God’s faithfulness.

God makes a way for His plans and His purposes to be accomplished on this earth. Ultimately, His will must be done and because He is truly sovereign, there is nothing that can stop Him. Therefore, if we are standing in His will…there is nothing that can stop us! BUT, that doesn’t mean it will be easy or that our life will be without suffering.

God is faithful to His promises and God is faithful to save us through the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. We don’t have to wonder if He will save us, no matter how “bad” we think we are; God is faithful and just to forgive us because He has already taken your sin into account when Jesus died for you.

Jesus wanted His people born from His redemptive act to be in the world but not of it. This means that the transformative power of a relationship with Jesus must change not just our behavior, but who we are to our core, including the way we react in very difficult situations and with very difficult people. Joseph’s brothers are sure of what is about to happen to them, but Joseph is going to treat them very differently because of how God has dealt with him personally.

It is easy for us to get caught up in the tragedy and pain of the present that we forget the hope that we have in Jesus. Our hope and joy as the children of God is not based upon our circumstances, but instead, must transcend the present so the power, presence, and hope that we have in Jesus can carry us through the pain of our present circumstances.

Christians tend to hyper-spiritualize so much that we forget that God gave us the ability to reason and come to logical and rational conclusions. In fact, the crux of biblical wisdom is grounded in making logical and rational decisions unless God directly intervenes with a miracle; since those don’t happen every time, we must pursue common sense as a component of biblical wisdom.

When we think about the faithfulness of God we tend to think about it in relation to how it benefits us, which isn’t wrong. The more meaningful thought concerns how does the realty of God’s faithfulness change our identity? Is God’s faithfulness just something we believe in as a part of our religious expression or does the reality of His faithfulness transform the way we live and our worldview?

The continuous expectation placed upon believers in Scripture is to overcome this life and to share in the victory given to us through the plan of God, the power of Jesus, and the presence of the Holy Spirit. Many of us do not experience victory in our life because we really don’t understand what it looks like, how God wants to bring into our life, and why He does it. Joseph’s life is a perfect teaching illustration for the how and why God brings victory to us.

Wisdom is a gift from God that is meant for His purposes, His story of redemption, and ultimately for His glory. Throughout the entire story of humanity, God has chosen His people to be the conduit through which His story would be carried out, this requires His people to have wisdom. God gives this gift of wisdom not just we can make “good” or logical decisions, but so we can be in the center of His will for His purposes.

Part of living a life of holiness is being prepared for the life changes that come our way. Many times, what sets us back is that we are prepared for the way life is now but not for the changes that can occur in our circumstances. The only way to mitigate these behaviors is to have our life transformed and defined by Jesus so He becomes our source of stability not our circumstances.