“God’s time is not our time.”  That is what one of you reminded me of upon finding out that our latest test results were still positive. Thank you, Brother! Yes, God’s time is not our time. We thought we would recover from Covid infection in a week, but we are now in our third week. Not only is God’s time not our time, but also God’s plan is not our plan. Suddenly everything stopped and we are to stay home—like it or not. God’s plan is not always our plan. Amen.

We may have made plans for us or somebody else—plans that were good—but then God stopped these plans. We may have wishes for us or for somebody else—good, not sinful wishes—but God did not grant them. In fact, He decided to do something against our wishes. And we may have experienced failure—something that we did not expect—and consequently we ought to pay a hefty price for it.

E. Stanley Jones, a former American missionary to India, made an insightful comment, “Many a time God lets us fail in a secondary thing in order that we may succeed in a primary thing.”  O how true! I have seen this principle at work not only in other people’s lives, but also mine. God allowed me to fail in my counseling class twice, which then forced me to take the same course three times, so I’d go for counseling myself.  And God used this personal counseling to bring about changes that fundamentally transformed my life not only to be a better counselor but also to patch my ragged soul.

So, whenever we stumble upon failure, keep in mind that it is failure in a secondary thing and there is a more important project that God wants us to master. Through failure, we learn what is secondary to us is often primary to God—and vice versa—and what’s primary to God usually centers around knowing Him and trusting Him.

Pastor Paul