My Times Are God's Times

My times are in your hands.
-Psalm 31:15

"I've got you", said the Lord, when you went from one season to another.  You have had failures or dead ends, and the Lord says, "I've got that".

We are anxious about the future and have regrets about the past.  God has both of these, because he has us.  You might be both excited and dumbfounded about your future and that is fine, because God holds the course of your life and has your destiny in mind.

No matter where you have been or what you have done before now, if you are his today, he says, "I've got this".  He has your future, with him and in him.

Your life has had or will have sorrow, grief, and suffering.  You will be rejected, misunderstood, and betrayed.  That is life in Christ.

You will also experience more joy than you can put into words and find the greatest treasure.  You will experience great sorrow and great joy.  There will be times when you experience heavy grief and rich hope at the same time.  That is life in Christ.

I love the words of Soren Kierkegaard, that, "Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards."  Some times or events in your life might not make sense now, but they might make more sense, when you look back upon them, in the future.

When bad things happen, when you come up short, will you get bitter or better?  You might have caused the mess or you might be innocent.  But, are you in his hands?

Is it well with your soul, even though sorrow grief, and loss have ripped through your life?  I want to tell you that God does "matching grants".  He gives you grace, comfort, joy, peace; to name a few examples; when life bestows the opposite of these upon you.

God redeems our past, and is with us, no matter what happens, so we do not fear.  What if this or that negative thing happens?  The answer is that your times are in his hands, so fear not.  There will be trouble, but he overcomes trouble.  He gives provision.

David could say, "my times are in your hands", because he continually committed himself to those hands (Psalm 31:5), and put his trust in the Lord (31:14).  We have to do that too.  Out of the intimate relationship with God, that we have intentionally placed ourselves in, we can say that, "yes, he has got me and my destiny".

That is good news, but it only works if we participate.  And when we function with our lives and times in his hands, he transfigures whatever happens to us.

What if we practice the presence of God in all our times?  What if we see everything that happens to us, even our blunders, as opportunities for God to give us grace?  What if we see misfortune, loss, betrayal, loneliness, injustice, and mis-timed events or delayed blessings as opportunities to go deeper with our King?


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