Psalm 46:10 “Be still, and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted on the earth!”
Christmas season is usually one of the busiest times of the year. While it may be almost a cliché to say that it is none-the-less true. This is a busy time of year for most people.
My wife and I felt that in the last couple of weeks. We had the usual things to do and to prepare for, including activities at work and church and in our own lives. Then, into that we had the extra things that Christmas brings with it like a special event at our church which involved a lot of extra work. We expected those things and prepared for them. But, into that expected busyness came the unexpected busyness of our furnace quitting on us and the sudden need to drop everything and take nearly two full days to deal with getting a new furnace.
We were suddenly overly busy, busy beyond what we wanted or could handle.
Into that comes the verse above, one of my favorite verses in the bible. It is also the verse that is up front in the church for us all to see when we come into the sanctuary. But it is also the verse and the biblical concept I forgot as I waded into the busyness of the past week. I tried to handle it all on my own instead of turning to the Lord and waiting on Him.
Thankfully, the Lord doesn’t need my permission to do His work, He does His work with or without me. While I jumped into trying to solve the situation myself by calling a company to come out immediately to look at our furnace and then tried to work with them in ordering a new one, God was at work in a totally different way.
The short version of the story is that after a cold morning my wife went off to care for a lady in the afternoon while I rushed around trying to solve our crisis. Shortly after Debra got to work a lady there told her to call her relative. That relative works for a furnace company. Without my doing anything, God arranged for this man to have his crew installing a new furnace in our house the very next morning and at less than half the price and five days sooner than I had been arranging with the company I had called in our emergency. God was at work in spite of me and in a totally different way than I could have known about or expected.
Instead of running about in a great rush like I was doing, I could have listened to the words of Psalm 46:10, words I know very well, but wasn’t thinking of in my busyness. “Be still and know that I am God.” Debra and I did pray about the furnace before she went off to work, but after she left, I tried to take matters into my own hands, forgetting to let God do His work. As a result, I nearly made a mess of things and paid way more than we could afford or needed to pay. Thankfully, God rescued me from myself.
After Debra called the man her friend suggested all I had to do was sit back and watch God at work. All the work I thought I needed to be busy doing was suddenly taken over by God and I was forced to be still and watch God work. He did way better than I could ever have done.
Why didn’t I do that at first? Why did I worry and try and solve things on my own? Why didn’t I know that God would show up and handle things as He says He will in His word?
Why? Because I was too busy. Instead of taking time to let the Lord do His work, I was trying to take matters into my own hands. A lesson learned. I hope next time a crisis comes up I remember this lesson. But truly, I will likely need to learn this lesson over and over again?
We all need to learn the lesson of waiting on God, don’t we!
Pastor Gary.