LOOKING BEYOND……. 25 January, 2026
When things do not go according to plan and I find my agenda is upset, do I believe God’s word? Psalm 46:1-2 declares: “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth be removed and the mountains carried into the midst of the sea”.
Trouble is not in trouble, but as a child of God, it is in my attitude to trouble. Our circumstances present us with opportunities to walk in the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus which has made us free from the law of sin and death, (Romans 8:2). The daily choices we make in our response to our circumstances govern how closely we walk with the Lord who has permitted the circumstance. He may not necessarily have sent them, but in the economy of God, there is no waste.
God permits, in His wisdom, that which He could prevent in His power. These occurrences are opportunities to prove God is who He says He is. I can choose to bow before the throne of His wisdom, secure in the knowledge of His love and keeping power to bring me through to a greater depth in Him. These are times to look beyond the set of circumstances He has permitted for His higher purpose. I do not have to understand in these moments, I just have to trust. As I choose to trust, I discover another measure of the “Spirit of life in Christ Jesus” flows through me in His enabling strength and peace for the journey.
Looking beyond our circumstances for God’s higher purpose is alien to our natural walk, our old fleshly nature. That is why we all have need to renew our mindset in Christ Jesus. Romans 12: 1-2 encourages us: “……….present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good, acceptable and perfect will of God”.
Consider the record in Acts 16 of Paul and Silas. They were beaten, imprisoned in stocks in an inner prison after preaching the gospel. At midnight in the midst of these dire and bleak circumstances, with bleeding backs they prayed and sang praises to God. The other prisoners heard them and then God sent an earthquake. The foundations of the prison were shaken and God miraculously loosed every prisoner’s bands, and opened every prison door. The keeper of the prison awoke from his sleep, and terrified, was about to kill himself, fearing all the prisoners had escaped. Paul called out to him not to harm himself as no one had escaped. The trembling keeper, moved by the Holy Ghost, brings Paul and Silas out and asks what he must do to be saved. Paul spoke to him and all his household regarding the way of salvation. They all received Jesus and were baptized that same night! In the morning the magistrates released Paul and Silas from jail.
Paul and Silas looked beyond their circumstances and chose to praise God in them. How many of us would have done that? Then God stretched His arm and performed His miracles. How many of us in that same situation, would have jumped ahead of God and escaped through the open doors, believing it was God’s deliverance? But God had a higher purpose. Paul was sensitive enough to recognise God’s hand at work for something more dear to God. God, in His foreknowledge, knew the jailer and his household would enter into salvation that night. God loved that man. It was not His will for the man and his household to perish and Paul and Silas were the instruments He used to lead them to salvation…….His higher purpose.
So often we misguidedly pray for deliverance FROM our circumstances, instead of finding God IN them. Every trial has a purpose. If I have never learnt to praise God in my trials, then the praise I give Him when all is well, can only be counted when I also praise Him in the fiery furnaces of life. There is a vast difference between praising IN, not FOR. How often do we look for deliverance and change instead of seeing the opportunity for God to do miracles.
Don’t ask God to change your circumstances. He sent them to change you!
May the Lord enable us to look beyond our circumstances to find His higher purpose.
Photo by Ewan Kennedy on Unsplash