Prayers for the Week – God’s Timing

¹For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
²a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
³a time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
⁴a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
⁵a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
⁶a time to seek, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
⁷a time to tear, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
⁸a time to love, and a time to hate;
a time for war, and a time for peace. ~ Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 (ESV)

Hello everyone, and welcome to this week’s Prayers for the Week post. With all that is happening throughout our world these days, it’s hard to figure out where God is in all of this, and why He hasn’t acted on some things that our human side believes He should be acting on. To all of those situations, I present Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 as evidence for God.

My friends, I don’t have any idea why God would let something like the Charleston shooting happen, or why any of the other shootings that we have heard about happen, but what I do know and believe with all my heart is this simple truth: God’s timing is perfect!

I don’t know why God called home three of Cindy’s Uncles in 12 weeks, or 4 in 22 months, and I don’t know why a drunk driver who kills someone on the road walks away without a scratch while the victim lies dead on the road.  There are so many things I don’t know that I could very likely come close to equaling the number of stars that God has created in the sky!  But at this point in my life, here is the singular thing that I do need to know, and most of the time, I remember this:

I don’t need to know everything, I just need to rely on God, because He knows everything and He will lead me down the right path.

So, my friends, I don’t know why some things happen and some things don’t, except by remembering the words in Ecclesiastes, which remind me exactly why things happen when they do.  So, now, please take a moment and pray with us the prayer that Jesus taught His Disciples to pray:

Our Father, who art in Heaven,
Hallowed be thy name.
Thy Kingdom come, Thy Will be done,
On earth as it is in Heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread,
And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.
Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the Kingdom, and the Power, and the Glory forever and ever. Amen.