No Isolated Moments

05 Nov No Isolated Moments

November 5, 2023

No Isolated Moments

 Even as [in His love] He chose us [actually picked us out for Himself as His own] in Christ before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy (consecrated and set apart for Him) and blameless in His sight, even above reproach, before Him in love. For He foreordained us (destined us, planned in love for us) to be adopted (revealed) as His own children through Jesus Christ, in accordance with the purpose of His will because it pleased Him and was His kind intent]— Ephesians 1:4-5 AMPC

God plans our lives before birth; we take our first steps, go to school, learn how to drive or take over the family business. God knows and has prepared everything we need to complete our life journey. Someone may say thank you, Jesus, for everything. I am okay with my life, and someone else may say I cannot believe this is what God had in mind for me; it is complex, challenging, and seems unfair. In the Bible, we have examples of each of these, with turns being experienced for good and difficulty, all with His end in mind. 

The Shulamite woman in 2 Kings 4:8-17, when asked by Elisha what he could do for her for the kindness she had shown towards him, her response was. “I live among my own people [in peace and security and need no special favors].” For this kindness, she was blessed with a son.

Joseph, in the book of Genesis, was a happy young man who had dreams about his future and told his brothers and father not to be proud or boastful but just as excited as people are when something extraordinary is revealed to them. In His case, those he told were not happy about it, and he was sold into slavery. We can submit to God’s plans for us or take the detour; God allows them both because of the free will he gives us to choose and refuse. 

This message today is not age specific as the Shulamite woman was older and Joseph was around 17 years old; it is about knowing that there are no isolated moments or events in our lives. Isolation means being alone, in a separate place, or from people. We are spiritual beings first. Our spirit man is the connection to God, the area of relationship that sweet communion that makes it easy to decern like the Shulamite woman that Elisha was a holy man of God and to build him a chamber on the side of her house. Or Joseph, with all that he went through, we never read where he once complained, but we do read that “The Lord was with Him” and how he ended up being the prince of Egypt.  

Throw your life on the wall of your immigration and look at it. See the hand of the Lord in it down through the years. See the detours we made and how even then, the prayers of the righteous and the touch, not my anointed provision of God, did not let the enemy take us out, lose the shirts off our backs, or give us a new one. Sometimes unfavorable things happen in life, like not getting a deserved raise, pushed me to look for and get a better job. We can look at it and say, as Joseph did in Genesis 50:20, “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good. “

Do you know that the hand of the Lord was on that Shulamite woman through His Prophet Elisha for years, as her son died, and Elisha raised him from the dead 2 Kings 4:36. On another occasion, Elisha told her to leave her home/town because a famine was coming. When the famine was over seven years later, the story of Elisah raising her son from the dead was being told to the King as she was walking in to ask that her land be returned from squatters. She got her home back and then some. 2 Kings 8:1-8, and if we carefully look at our lives, we do too.

There were no Isolated moments or events at all; it was all planned before the foundation of the world for the Shulamite woman, Joseph, back then and for us now. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever, and because He came and completed Father God’s plan for His life, now we have a better promise where the Greater one resides in us and helps us to complete His plan for our lives. 

Theresa Woodard