Many churches throughout the world use a Bible reading schedule called a "lectionary." It's just a fancy word meaning "selected readings." Posts like this reflect on the readings for an upcoming Sunday or other Church holiday, as found in the historic one-year lectionary.
It’s always hard to make predictions. Often it is even difficult to evaluate our current situations. Yet I think Psalm 33:10-11 may just have a strong application to our lives today. “The Lord brings the counsel of the nations to nothing; he frustrates the plans of the peoples. The counsel of the Lord stands forever, the plans of his heart to all generations” (ESV). Who would have thought, a years ago, that our nation would be in the midst (at least I hope we are not near the beginning) of a health crisis, that we would have nearly tripled unemployment, and that financial markets would have gone reeling in the first half of this year? There weren’t really many warning signs about that. Yet we are where we are.
Is God in the process of bringing international plans to nothing? Is he frustrating our plans? Some will ask whether this is God at work! The Bible describes God as the one who knows all our hopes, all our dreams, all our plans, all our cultures, all our finances, and all our weaknesses intimately. Not one of them escapes his eye. And in none of them are we separated from God (Romans 8).
Verse 11 reminds us that our plans are subject to change, but that God’s eternal plan and purpose doesn’t change. His plan is to convict the world of sin, to turn people to faith in Him, and to reconcile the world to himself. This he accomplishes through Jesus’ perfect life, death, and resurrection. His Word says it is for you.
If we want our plans frustrated, we can depend on ourselves or on anything other than Jesus. Or we can look to the Lord, acknowledge that he is the redeemer and Lord of all. We can know that his plan, his intent, is sure, and that it is for our good.
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