He Gives Us What We Need

Hi!

This one is about God's provision so I'm going to tell you a few stories :D woop!

1.  So I don't know if you've ever seen Evan Almighty? Basically there's a scene where the main character's wife is sitting in a restaurant with her three children having left her husband because he has seemingly gone a bit mad trying to build some ark. The waiter comes over and starts talking to her. She talks about her situation a little bit and they start talking about God. What she doesn't realise is, that the guy she is talking to actually is God. He says this awesome quote,

"Let me ask you something. If someone prays for patience, you think God gives them patience? Or does he give them the opportunity to be patient? If he prayed for courage, does God give him courage, or does he give him opportunities to be courageous? If someone prayed for the family to be closer, do you think God zaps them with warm fuzzy feelings, or does he give them opportunities to love each other?"

Such an opportunity came to me and my friend the other day to be patient. We had just made the most delicious looking carrot cake and once we had made a lot of butter icing ready to put on the cake. We knew we should wait until the cake had coolled down to put the icing on it otherwise the icing would melt, but the cake just looked so inviting and after a while we decided to put the icing on it. The cake looked nice for all of about 10 seconds until we realised that the icing was beginning to slide off the top of the cake and pool around the outside of the plate xD it didn't look so delicious then! We definitely should have waited :S

But the good thing that came out of that experience was that we would learn for next time to wait for the cake to cool down. God gave us the experience to equip us for the future! How cool??!

2. Changing the type of story now to a quick one from the Bible. I've not actually got one with me now but I will try and tell it the best I can.

There are SO MANY stories of God's provision in the Bible but I've chosen this one, not because it's better or anything but just because I really like it and it's the first one I thought of :P

It's the story of Esther. To cut a long story short, the king is looking for a wife and asks that all the beautiful "maidens" are brought to him so he can consider them to marry. Esther's uncle Mordecai, sends her forward as she is beautiful and has a gentle and intelligent personality. As you can guess Esther is picked and becomes queen. Unfortunately there is a man called Haman who is an advisor of the king. Haman has a quarrel with Mordecai and plots to get rid of him. Haman appeals to the king and asks that all the people that are the same religion to this man should be killed. Haman said that the group of people were against the king and in those days to kill people that were against the king was totally acceptable. So the King agreed unaware that it also included his wife, Esther. Mordecai got word of this plot and told Esther that she needed to do something! So Esther arranged a banquet and invited Haman along to the King and Queen's dinner table. It was there that she revealed to the King, Haman's wicked plot and that the order included killing her! In the end, Haman ended up being hung in the same gallows he had built for Mordecai.

The point is that, to do what she was called to do: save her people, Esther needed to be queen. To be queen she needed to have the right qualities for the king to want to marry her. God's plan was in it right down to the fine details. This is so comforting to know in the world today that God knows what we need and he provides us with it.

3. Again, at this camp I went to, there was a moment when I left the meeting and went to sit outside on a swing. I'd been feeling pretty emotional what with various things that had come up during the week and I just felt like I needed to sing it out. So after considering it for a while and thoroughly checking no one else was around! I started to sing my heart song to God. It was a really precious time but I didn't really feel like I was making much difference until my mind started wandering back to the meeting I was missing, There had been talk of angels and I wondered if I was missing amazing stuff happening. But then as I closed my eyes I felt God saying why to do you need to be in a meeting? I continued to worship God and as I did I felt the presence of an also worshipping angel on the swing next to me. It may have been the wind or even me having nudged it but when I opened my eyes I saw that the opposite swing was also swinging.

It was the cue I needed to keep on worshipping my Father and after it I felt completely at peace and like I had really let some things out and found a special place with God. God sent the worshipping angel down so that I would be spurred on to continue worship and just generally be with God. Perhaps if I hadn't felt that presence I may have walked away sooner?

I don't know why God sometimes does things but I can trust in Him that he totally has my back and uses it for the better :)

Just conisder any times like that in your life, you may be surprised!

E.C