The last few days we have had the pleasure of the company of our good friend, Bradford Smith. We’re having a great time with him visiting and it is so convenient to be staying at our friends home for the month because we can offer our guests their own room(and it’s more than our living room floor)! Though the weather has been windy, rainy and glum the last few days have been very good.

Last night I had dinner with a friend and we talked about how results and future events are in God’s hands. We both have a tendency to want to do things to somehow produce, what is in our minds, the right results. She encouraged me by saying that God knows every detail of the stories in my life and is working them out from beginning to end. I should work with Him by being faithful in obedience, thankful in prayer and content in His will. This morning I read a quote by William Penn that addressed well this issue of perspective, “Disappointments that come not by our own folly are the trials and corrections of heaven. It is our own fault if they do not prove to our advantage. To see the hand of God in them, with a humble submission to His will, is the way to turn our water into wine. If we look only to our losses, consider how little we deserve what is left. Our passion will cool, and our murmurs will turn into thankfulness. In Him, his humble, sincere disciples find more that all that they lose in the world. All we have is the Almighty’s; and shall not God have His own when He calls for it?”

Bobby and I have had many conversations recently where I need this perspective. May it be about troubled students, family matters or our taxes…it doesn’t really matter if things are turning out how I had hoped or deemed right. What matters is what the Lord is working together and whether or not I am found faithful in believing Him.

“‘I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future‘.” Jeremiah 29:11