articles “God, You Were There in the Morning, But Where Were You in my Day?”by Chad Salyn, Executive Director
Don’t you just love the days when you’re up before everyone else and you get to sit down with your tea or coffee, and you have a chance just to be in the quietness of the morning, before your day starts to unfold? For some, those days are few and far between. It is so peaceful, no interruptions, nothing could get you down and you sense a great day ahead of you. There is a bounce in your step, and you’re experiencing the presence of the Lord. It’s an absolute euphoric feeling. You then proceed to invite God into all parts of your day. “God, thank you that you’re with me today, I choose You today, I invite You into all parts of my day, at work, You be the servant my associates need me to be, You be the husband (wife) my wife (husband) needs me to be today, You be the dad (mom) my kids need me to be today, You be my joy, my love, my comfort, my wisdom, and my peace today. Thank you Father, I look forward to the peaceful day in You!” Then...BAM...you go about your day and all hell seems to be breaking loose everywhere! Your spouse gets up and starts yelling at you, the kids are being disrespectful towards you, people at work are upset with you, other people you run into start calling you down, nothing seems to be going right, your projects you had planned for the day are falling short, all the traffic lights seems to be red, accidents on the road, which means your late for everything, and it goes on like that for the rest of the day and seems to get worse when you get back home (or when your spouse gets back home) after an already long day! And you are left wondering what happened? Your day started off so well? It was a great time with the Lord in the morning and you even asked Him to be with you throughout your day; and then you wonder, “Where was He?” And you had asked Him to be in the whole day? It started off so peaceful, and then chaos flooded in all around you! And then there are the other times when you didn’t have the opportunity to have the quiet morning, but as the alarm went off, or your kids got you up, you still invited Jesus into your day with you...in the only 2 minutes you had to yourself, and the day unfolded, and you discovered yet another day from hell!! What is happening here? Where is God in this? Is He there? Do I have to ‘drum’ Him up more, work harder to please Him so he will accept me through the whole day and not just the morning? These are some of the questions I’ve asked, as I experienced these days over and over and over. Let me mention a few things that the Lord revealed to me... First off, Jesus never said that if we ask Him into our day, that our day would be without sorrow and hardship. Remember, He said that in this world you |
will have trouble. And just look at His life, it started in turmoil and often went from turmoil to turmoil. And we follow someone whose life on earth ended on a cross. Second, the Lord cannot give us peace to a false theology, a false way of living. If we are living for comfort as our centre, meaning we will only receive positives in our day, than we are living falsely and will never find His peace. And anyways, why would He give us peace to that, when He has a better way? Would it not be an act of love then, to not give us peace to a false belief system, because He wants us to live life in all of its fullness? He loves us that much; that He, in every moment of the day, wants us experiencing life at its best, all the time, because He loves seeing us enjoying this life that He has created for us. But that will only come His Way, not our own way. He came so that we would experience Life, Life in all its fullness. And the full life will always be found in Him; receiving the negatives and positives that He allows to come in our day. Don’t pray and ask God to change the circumstances of your day, when He allowed them to come to change your ways. And if everything was made by Him, for Him, through Him, and to Him, then everything in our world will preach and teach Jesus. And life teaches us that things only work with both positives and negatives. Take a battery for example, it needs a positive and a negative to work, a magnet can only stick with both a positive and a negative. And the third revelation comes with the word ‘choice.’ The only thing that we can do for God is choose. He cannot choose for us. If God is Love, and He is, than Love has to give choice. If I forced my wife to love me, than is it really Love? God is the biggest gentleman of us all, because He always gives us choice. He never forces Himself on us but lets us choose in every moment of the day. There is a misunderstanding that comes, when we choose and invite God in the morning of our day to be in it all. And we get confused when all hell breaks loose in the day, and we wonder where He went? It is good to choose Him in the morning and invite Him into all parts of your day, and is a choice directed at the right Person, but since God is love and love gives choice, we also still have to choose Him throughout our day. Just as Christianity is not just a one-time conversion, but many conversions over a lifetime (He is constantly conforming us into the likeness of His Son), so to we must not just make the choice in the morning to have Him in our day, but choose Him in everything that comes our Way!! So, the next time you choose Him in the morning and all hell breaks loose in your day, just choose Him again, and you will continue to see and experience the Life and Peace you always have in Him! And when you miss Him in one moment (and you will; we are still a people in process), than just make the choice for Him in the next moment, and you will notice a power that comes over you (called the Holy Spirit) that will bring that Life and Peace, even in the midst of your chaos... that He allowed to come... Awesome!!
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