A PLACE FOR EVERYTHING
DAY 148: I envy people who can keep an orderly home. I could swear that everything and everyone in my house conspires to keep me from being organized, from the greatest (my husband) to the least (the ferret). Yes, even the ferret! Twice in one week I caught him rearranging my house as he dragged first my husband's belt, and then my 6-foot long computer cord to a special hiding place under the dishwasher (which we had to remove from the cabinets to retrieve the items).
The kids were just as bad when they were young, only their stashes were slightly more obvious: under the bed, the bathroom floor, the kitchen sink, the dirt pile in the backyard. I had dreams that one day I would be a good mom and have a place for everything and make sure everything was in its place. I knew it could be done because I had seen it. I stopped to borrow something from a friend one day and discovered that every single thing in her house had a specified labeled location. There was no mistaking where things were to be stored, from scissors, to spices, to seldom used candle sticks; and she somehow got her family to cooperate! Nothing was ever out of place. I'm not going to lie, there was palpable peace there, being surrounded by total order.
While I may never be able to put my fingers on a pair of scissors when I need them, or find that jar of cumin, I do experience the peace of at least knowing I have a place. Surrounded by my piles and chaos, I rejoice at being reminded in today's Bible passages of the reality that where it counts the most, God has an order than includes me.
Over the past few days, our Bible readings moved through the book of 1 Chronicles. So far it has mostly been full of tedious lists of genealogy. Here and there are little nuggets tucked into the lists for anyone who hangs in there and reads them instead of scanning them. For example, there is this nugget in 1 Chronicles 5 about the leaders of the half-tribe of Manasseh.
24 These men had a great reputation as mighty warriors and leaders of their clans.
25 But they were unfaithful to the God of their ancestors. They worshiped the gods of the nations that God had destroyed. 26 So the God of Israel caused King Pul of Assyria (also known as Tiglath-pileser) to invade the land and take away the people of Reuben, Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh as captives. The Assyrians exiled them to Halah, Habor, Hara, and the Gozan River, where they remain to this day.
For believers who struggle with the tension between leading the world's way and leading God's way, it is certainly a caution that there is a huge difference - and there is a consequence to how we lead. But another truth echoed in that passage... one that is consistently made as I read list after list of the tribes, the leaders, and the lands they inhabited. Each entry reinforces the reality that God had a specific place for each tribe. God had a specific time for each leader. God even had the place and time specified for the entire nation. Notice how the list of the preisttly line ends:
13 Shallum was the father of Hilkiah. Hilkiah was the father of Azariah.
14 Azariah was the father of Seraiah. Seraiah was the father of Jehozadak,
15 who went into exile when the Lord sent the people of Judah and Jerusalem into captivity under Nebuchadnezzar.
God chose the promised place Israel would inhabit, how long they would remain and when and where they would be removed into exile. Even Jehozadak's place in the generation of exile was no accident. God had a place for each person and for the nation. There was nothing random about God's placing in light of His perfect foreknowledge and judgement.
Fast forward several hundred years and we find Paul in the New Testament experiencing the same surety of God's placement. Still imprisoned after two years and giving a defense of his conduct and ministry before the Roman authority, King Agrippa, Paul shares the commission he was given by Jesus.
Jesus told him:
16 ‘I have appeared to you to appoint you as a servant and as a witness of what you have seen and will see of me. 17 I will rescue you from your own people and from the Gentiles. I am sending you to them 18 to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.’
Do you see it? God was and is still making a place. He made a place for Paul, to be a minister of the Gospel yes, but also specifically a place where He would send him among the Jews and the Gentiles. "I am sending you" Jesus told him. And the message he was to give is that "they may receive forgiveness of sins AND A PLACE among those who are sanctified (set apart) by faith in me.'
Even as his defense ends, Agrippa declares that Paul had done nothing to deserve imprisonment- yet that is his place.
32 Agrippa said to Festus, “This man could have been set free if he had not appealed to Caesar.”
It was not up to man's authority to choose Paul's place. God had told Paul he would testify before Roman authorities and against logic he would. That was his place - yes, among those sanctified, but also his place in history, purpose and peril.
In all these passages today, I see God ordering the very things that seem random and chaotic to us. Everything and everyone has a place in His plan. A place for everything and everything (and everyone) in its place. The cooperation part is up to us. Either way, unlike the scissors and the computer cord in my house, nothing that belongs to God can be misplaced in this world -including me, no matter what the circumstances may be.
If you are feeling out of place, will you ask God to reveal His purpose for as you sojourne through? And if you are feeling lost, remember the Shepherd who left the 99 sheep to go after the one who wandered. God will not let you stray too far. You are always in the place where He can care for you.
Day 148 of 365
1 Chronicles 5:18-26
1 Chronicles 6
Acts 26
Psalm 6:1-10
Proverbs 18:20-21
While I may never be able to put my fingers on a pair of scissors when I need them, or find that jar of cumin, I do experience the peace of at least knowing I have a place. Surrounded by my piles and chaos, I rejoice at being reminded in today's Bible passages of the reality that where it counts the most, God has an order than includes me.
Over the past few days, our Bible readings moved through the book of 1 Chronicles. So far it has mostly been full of tedious lists of genealogy. Here and there are little nuggets tucked into the lists for anyone who hangs in there and reads them instead of scanning them. For example, there is this nugget in 1 Chronicles 5 about the leaders of the half-tribe of Manasseh.
24 These men had a great reputation as mighty warriors and leaders of their clans.
25 But they were unfaithful to the God of their ancestors. They worshiped the gods of the nations that God had destroyed. 26 So the God of Israel caused King Pul of Assyria (also known as Tiglath-pileser) to invade the land and take away the people of Reuben, Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh as captives. The Assyrians exiled them to Halah, Habor, Hara, and the Gozan River, where they remain to this day.
For believers who struggle with the tension between leading the world's way and leading God's way, it is certainly a caution that there is a huge difference - and there is a consequence to how we lead. But another truth echoed in that passage... one that is consistently made as I read list after list of the tribes, the leaders, and the lands they inhabited. Each entry reinforces the reality that God had a specific place for each tribe. God had a specific time for each leader. God even had the place and time specified for the entire nation. Notice how the list of the preisttly line ends:
13 Shallum was the father of Hilkiah. Hilkiah was the father of Azariah.
14 Azariah was the father of Seraiah. Seraiah was the father of Jehozadak,
15 who went into exile when the Lord sent the people of Judah and Jerusalem into captivity under Nebuchadnezzar.
God chose the promised place Israel would inhabit, how long they would remain and when and where they would be removed into exile. Even Jehozadak's place in the generation of exile was no accident. God had a place for each person and for the nation. There was nothing random about God's placing in light of His perfect foreknowledge and judgement.
Fast forward several hundred years and we find Paul in the New Testament experiencing the same surety of God's placement. Still imprisoned after two years and giving a defense of his conduct and ministry before the Roman authority, King Agrippa, Paul shares the commission he was given by Jesus.
Jesus told him:
16 ‘I have appeared to you to appoint you as a servant and as a witness of what you have seen and will see of me. 17 I will rescue you from your own people and from the Gentiles. I am sending you to them 18 to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.’
Do you see it? God was and is still making a place. He made a place for Paul, to be a minister of the Gospel yes, but also specifically a place where He would send him among the Jews and the Gentiles. "I am sending you" Jesus told him. And the message he was to give is that "they may receive forgiveness of sins AND A PLACE among those who are sanctified (set apart) by faith in me.'
Even as his defense ends, Agrippa declares that Paul had done nothing to deserve imprisonment- yet that is his place.
32 Agrippa said to Festus, “This man could have been set free if he had not appealed to Caesar.”
It was not up to man's authority to choose Paul's place. God had told Paul he would testify before Roman authorities and against logic he would. That was his place - yes, among those sanctified, but also his place in history, purpose and peril.
In all these passages today, I see God ordering the very things that seem random and chaotic to us. Everything and everyone has a place in His plan. A place for everything and everything (and everyone) in its place. The cooperation part is up to us. Either way, unlike the scissors and the computer cord in my house, nothing that belongs to God can be misplaced in this world -including me, no matter what the circumstances may be.
If you are feeling out of place, will you ask God to reveal His purpose for as you sojourne through? And if you are feeling lost, remember the Shepherd who left the 99 sheep to go after the one who wandered. God will not let you stray too far. You are always in the place where He can care for you.
Day 148 of 365
1 Chronicles 5:18-26
1 Chronicles 6
Acts 26
Psalm 6:1-10
Proverbs 18:20-21
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