God is in Control
I know that You can do everything, and that no purpose of Yours can be withheld from You (Job 42:2 NKJV).
It will make a world of difference in your life if you truly believe that God reigns. No man has influenced my life more profoundly than Samuel Logan Brengle, a commissioner for the Salvation Army. In my teen years I found some little books he wrote, and they influenced me profoundly: Heart Talks on Holiness, The Way of Holiness, and When the Holy Ghost Is Come.
These little books have a very interesting history that I only came to know years after I had first read them. Brengle was a brilliant young preacher whom God led into the Salvation Army. He became the Salvation Army’s great spokesman for the message of personal holiness.
One night a drunken man continually interrupted a service Brengle was leading. Finally, Brengle put the man outside the service.
After the meeting was over, Brengle was the last one to leave, so he turned the lights off and stepped into the street. The drunken man was waiting for him. He struck one side of Brengle’s head with a paving stone and smashed the other side against the building. Samuel Brengle was in the hospital for an extended period, hovering between life and death.
When he finally began to recover, it was a long time before he could resume his former activities, so the editor of the Salvation Army’s magazine asked him to write some articles while he was recuperating in the hospital. Those little books, which have profoundly shaped many Christian leaders, were the fruit of that accident.
We must believe that God is running our lives. The devil can create minor complications, but God is in control whether you are in a hospital bed like Brengle, in a prison like Paul, or anywhere else. God can and will use your circumstances to accomplish his purposes. He is the only one who can produce fruit out of an apparent disaster.
—Rev. James R. Needham, PhD, MDiv
So many biblical stories follow this pattern: “they intended harm, but God intended it for good” (see Genesis 50:20 and context). Counting on God to bring good out of even the most confounding circumstances in our lives means faith can have its work in us, with each experience of waiting upon the Lord bringing new strength for the journey and hope for the outcome. These experiences shift our focus from the hardship we’re enduring to the Object of our faith, Jesus Christ, His power and glory. What hardships are you facing today? What wrongs have been done to you? Where is God in this matter? Fix your faith on His promises and stand on them. —DH
—David Hoskins, Founder & Care Guide, Sanctuary Clinics