It's one thing to read about the sovereinty of God, it's another thing entirely to live each day based on it being true.

Okay already. It's over. The people have spoken. The system worked. Because of the closeness of the vote, one leading newspaper had this headline: The Divided States of America. President Obama has won reelection, the House stays under the control of the Republicans. The Senate remains under the control of the Democrats. Status quo preserved. Three billion dollars later and the more things change the more they stay the same. It is Wednesday, November 7, 2012, and I bid you welcome. The build up to the election over the past couple of months has been very noisy. I'm not talking about the candidates. I'm talking about people on Facebook, those sharing emails, and the conversations I've heard. There have been many angry voices, on both sides. The way some folks described what they believe would happen if the election didn't go their way was eerily peppered with prophetic themes of gloom, doom, and despair. Many of their proclamations were expressed in a apocalyptic context. The hand wringing theme really concerned me. Not because they are not entitled to their opinions but as I heard all of this I was reminded of one of my favorite Psalms, the 146th:

¹ Praise the Lord!

Praise the Lord, O my soul!² While I live I will praise the Lord;
I will sing praises to my God while I have my being.

³ Do not put your trust in princes,
Nor in a son of man, in whom there is no help.⁴ His spirit departs, he returns to his earth;
In that very day his plans perish.

⁵ Happy is he who has the God of Jacob for his help,
Whose hope is in the Lord his God,⁶ Who made heaven and earth,
The sea, and all that is in them;
Who keeps truth forever,⁷ Who executes justice for the oppressed,
Who gives food to the hungry.
The Lord gives freedom to the prisoners.

⁸ The Lord opens the eyes of the blind;
The Lord raises those who are bowed down;
The Lord loves the righteous.⁹ The Lord watches over the strangers;
He relieves the fatherless and widow;
But the way of the wicked He turns upside down.

¹⁰ The Lord shall reign forever—
Your God, O Zion, to all generations.

Praise the Lord!

 

It's okay to be committed to what one believes to be the best course of action. It's okay to aggressively promote it if one feels led to do so. However, those of us who are born again children of the living God must always have His living Presence and His revealed truth as our basis for life and as the reason for our hope for the future. Many misunderstand this to be fatalistic. You know. Whatever will be will be. Not even close. It is faith-a-listic. A made up word but one that says we believe in God and we believe in what He has said. The person occupying the Oval Office does not change one iota of God's Person or His truth. That person acclaimed as the most powerful in the world is just that, a person, along with every other human being who has ever breathed air on the planet as a part of God's created world. And because of that, regardless of voting outcomes or other human machinations, all humanity will experience God's ultimate plan and purpose accomplished. Period. End of story. Amen.

 

I remind us of this because as the title of today's episode implies, it's easy to talk about God's control over all things being the reality of those who know the Lord, but, it is much tougher to actually make our day by day decisions based on thus says the Word of the Lord. Benjamin Franklin had this to say: "I have lived a long time, sir, and the longer I live the more convincing proofs I see of this truth - that God governs in the affairs of men." The great theologian Arthur W. Pink explained it this way: "A consciousness of our powerlessness should cast us upon Him who has all power. Here then is where a vision and view of God's sovereignty helps, for it reveals His sufficiency and shows us our insufficiency." This is the truth folks. I may not always live based on it but I do thank God that my wavering does not change Him or His truth. I commend us all to keep this in mind as we attempt to make our way forward. He obviously wanted us to know these things that we might have assurance during the stormy times that come in this life. May God bless us all is my prayer. Amen.       .....More later.