Commit your way to the Lord, trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass. —Psalm 37:5
Don’t plan without God. God seems to have a delightful way of upsetting the plans we have made, when we have not taken Him into account. We get ourselves into circumstances that were not chosen by God, and suddenly we realize that we have been making our plans without Him— that we have not even considered Him to be a vital, living factor in the planning of our lives. And yet the only thing that will keep us from even the possibility of worrying is to bring God in as the greatest factor in all of our planning.
In spiritual issues it is customary for us to put God first, but we tend to think that it is inappropriate and unnecessary to put Him first in the practical, everyday issues of our lives. If we have the idea that we have to put on our “spiritual face” before we can come near to God, then we will never come near to Him. We must come as we are.
Don’t plan with a concern for evil in mind. Does God really mean for us to plan without taking the evil around us into account? “Love…thinks no evil” (1 Corinthians 13:4-5). Love is not ignorant of the existence of evil, but it does not take it into account as a factor in planning. When we were apart from God, we did take evil into account, doing all of our planning with it in mind, and we tried to reason out all of our work from its standpoint.
Don’t plan with a rainy day in mind. You cannot hoard things for a rainy day if you are truly trusting Christ. Jesus said, “Let not your heart be troubled…” (John 14:1). God will not keep your heart from being troubled. It is a command— “Let not….” To do it, continually pick yourself up, even if you fall a hundred and one times a day, until you get into the habit of putting God first and planning with Him in mind.
________________________________________________
Journal DJR
Good Morning Lord,
There he goes again! With the Imperatives. “God will not keep your heart from being troubled. It is a command— “Let not….” Chambers seems to focus on the Imperatives. And imperatives don’t work so well for me or most people. I don’t think you created us that way…(Tell a 5 year old, Don’t touch the cookies) Even the weather man gets better results with “travel advisories” instead of “travel commands” What works best for me is to recieve these “Commands” as advisories or suggestions. I’m seeing that this fits with who you are and how you operate, which is all about Relationship. People in a love relationship don’t thrive by giving each other commands. Both meanings are obviously true. They can be Commands or Suggestions from a Loving Father. I just find it more valuable and motivating to focus on them as advisories from One who has my best in mind.
___________________________________
Richard Rohr Devotional
Electric Circuits
Wednesday, July 5, 2017
Moses’ experience of the burning bush (Exodus 3:1-6) links action and contemplation as the very starting place of the Judeo-Christian tradition. His encounter is surely an inner one, but it immediately drives him outwardly, as deep inner experience tends to do. It is a transcendent experience, yet note that it is based in nature rather than a synagogue or temple. Often it is in the open spaces of the natural world that the inner world is most obviously recognized, as the Desert Fathers and Mothers and Celtic Christianity remind us.
Immediately after Moses had his heart-stopping experience, YHWH said to him: “I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt. Now, go! Tell Pharaoh to let my people go” …..(continue reading…)
