Tuesday, January 30th, 2024
What God does not allow to happen.
For a long time, I saw God’s will fitting into one of two categories.
- What He causes to happen.
- What He allows to happen.
I now realize there is a third category.
3. What He does not allow to happen.
In my own life, God did not allow me to die at birth, though I should have and there wasn’t much the doctors could do. Then there was a time I was hanging by my neck on a cyclone fence, with a point of the fence less than an inch from my jugular vein. But God did not allow me to die at that time, nor years later when I should have drowned in Munson Lake.
There have been times too personal and risky to recount here when I could have been incarcerated, lost my mind, been laid off in a college merger, or been taken down by someone bent on destroying me. I could have ended up in major depression for the rest of my life; in fact, I should have. But in all those instances, God did not allow such awful things to happen to me. It was like a hungry pride of lions were surrounding me and closing in. Then, for no apparent reason, they turned around and walked back into the dark forest from whence they came.
I’ve often wondered why, and expect to get an answer one day.
It’s been said that God is the God of a thousand chances. I feel like I’ve used up 900 of them, much like the man in the picture who’s just weathered a storm at sea and finds himself washed up on shore. Like that thankful man, I’ve finally found the safest place on earth.
Perhaps you’ve had similar things occur to you. Situations that could have done you in or greatly impacted your life, but God did not allow them to happen. Perhaps you too have felt like the man on the seashore. Perhaps you too have longed to find the safest place on earth.
Tags: addiction, Christianity, following Jesus, recovery