[Faith-talk] Good Night Message for Thursday, November 8 2012

[Paul]

Hello and good evening to my fellow North Americans, and a good Friday morning or afternoon to the rest of you wherever in this world you happen to live.  I hope and pray that your day went well or is going well, by God's matchless grace and His providential care.  My day went well.  This evening, after too long a time, I went to a local franchise of Bed, Bath & Beyond and bought a coverlet instead of a bedspread.  It was in the clearance items and only cost $21, which I thought was a reasonable price.

Ruth O'Neil is back with us again with her article entitled "Two-by-four," rendered as follows:

Have you ever felt God's presence so strongly that you could only pray? I have. It happened when I was driving, so I could not fall to my knees, but I certainly was brought to tears.

I felt God's presence that day in my car so strongly that I felt it necessary to pull off the road. Believe it or not, sometimes I do not always listen when God speaks, so God had to resort to using a "two-by-four" to the back of my head. The bang to my head and my heart brought quite a revelation. I had to give up control. I could not even say one word.

My husband had taken a new job to get out of a bad situation at another. The job he took provided low pay and no insurance and, in my mind at least, was temporary. There was no way we could live on this job for long.

My husband liked the job, his boss, and the people he worked with, but I did not feel that he was looking for another job hard enough. He always looked at the little picture; I looked at the big picture. That picture showed us in financial ruin before a year was up. That was frustrating to me because of all the time it had taken to build up our excellent credit rating. Everything lay in the balance as my husband seemingly dillydallied looking for jobs.

One afternoon I was so angry at the way things were that I did not feel I could take any more. If it had been up to me, I would have gone out and applied for jobs for my husband myself. That was the day God did batting practice on my heart and head.

Suddenly, I knew that God did not want me to say a word about anything job related. I should not even ask my husband whether he wanted to get the newspaper (with its want ads) or offer my opinion even if I was asked. This was extremely difficult for me.

Amazingly, my husband's job lasted a lot longer than it was supposed to. Somehow, God provided for our every single need each month, and He did it without my help. Imagine that!

Is there an area of your life where you need to give God total control? Give it all to Him. Your reward may not come when you think it should or even what you think it should be, but a life that is obedient to God is infinitely better than a life not lived for Him.

Thanks, Ruth, for another insightful article.  I hope and pray that you all got some God-directed benefit from reading it.

And now may the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob just keep us safe, individually and collectively, throughout this night or day and especially in these last days in which we live. Your Christian friend and brother, Paul