July 2, 2024 – Just Who Is In Control?

Just Who Is In Control?
July 2, 2024

DAILY PROVERB:

Proverbs 16:8-11
Better is a little with righteousness than great revenues without right. A man’s heart deviseth his way: but the LORD directeth his steps. A divine sentence is in the lips of the king: his mouth transgresseth not in judgment. A just weight and balance are the LORD’S: all the weights of the bag are his work.

 

OUTLOOK ON THE IN BOOK:

    There have long been several views regarding the extent of control that God exercises in the individual life of man. Some believe that man has complete free will, and God has little or no control over one’s life. Others hold the belief that man has no control over his life at all, with the belief that God foreordained in time past whether a person would go to heaven or hell. Then there are the rest of us who believe that the truth lies somewhere between both of those understandings.

 

    Believing the Bible must never contradict itself; we must also look at verse nine in this chapter to help reconcile the question at hand. It says, “A man’s heart deviseth his way: but the LORD directeth his steps.” Man clearly has within himself the ability to make decisions for life. To choose good or evil. If this were not so, we would have no need for the sharing of the gospel at all. Man would simply just do what God designed for him to do.

 

    However, to claim that God does not influence the lives of humans is equally absurd. If we surrender our lives and our ways to the Lord, He will guide us in ways that align with His will and ultimately benefit us. Nevertheless, God, who comprehends the beginning and the end, also foresees the consequences when sinful individuals reject Him. Being God, He can even use those consequences to fulfill the outcomes He has revealed in the pages of His Word.

 

    It has never been, and is not now, God’s desire for anyone to perish and go to hell. However, He has chosen to allow individuals to make that choice. To do otherwise would deprive humans of the capacity to love Him voluntarily. Without free will, we would be mere automatons. God desires for us to genuinely desire to love and obey Him, just as it was in Eden with Adam and Eve, and that fundamental aspect has not changed.

 

THE WORD WALKING IN ME:

    Give control of your day to God and observe what He will do with it and with you. How do you surrender your day to God? You do it moment by moment. The first moment begins right now!

So ask yourself, Just Who Is In Control?

 

IF YOU ARE JOURNALING:

Ask yourself, what are MY THOUGHTS concerning this Passage, and todays Devotion?

 

Do I find within this reading a CHALLENGE for my life?

 

What are one or two things I WILL DO today or this week to accept that CHALLENGE?

  

GOD TALKING TO ME: July 2, 2024

THROUGH THE BIBLE WITH A DAILY PROVERBS
  Psalms 78 – Psalms 84
  Proverbs 16:8 – 11

 

THROUGH THE BIBLE OLD & NEW TESTAMENT DAILY
  2 Chron. 24-27
  Acts 8