At about 5:35 am on a Saturday morning, I wake up to use the bathroom and then decide to catch up on my bible reading for the day. I open the book of John’s chapter 6, a chapter that I have read over and over. But then a verse of this chapter opens up to me in a different light on this Saturday morning, thanks to the Holy Spirit. The verse reads thus,
Then Jesus replied, “Have I not chosen you, the Twelve? Yet one of you is a devil!
John 6:70
At that moment, it occurred to me in a different light that Jesus Christ knew from the very beginning that one of His disciples would betray Him, yet He chose them, or rather He chose that disciple. He deliberately allowed and chose for the devil amongst them to walk with Him, dine with Him, work with Him and eventually betray Him. All of this God permitted because of the ultimate good of humanity. He allowed this evil so that Jesus’s journey to the cross, His death and resurrection would happen. If everyone on Jesus’ train were all good, pure, and holy salvation would perhaps not happen and the whole of humanity would be damned and condemned forever.
With this realization, I could not help but cast my mind back to all the evils that God allowed to happen to His children all through scriptures and even in the present time so that Him alone may be glorified in our lives. Acts chapter 7 comes to summarize the ordeal of our fathers of faith and the not-so-good things that God allowed to happen to them for a purpose.
- God allowed Joseph’s brothers to sell him off to Egypt as a slave but nonetheless, God was with Him and had a grand plan for Him out of the whole ordeal in Egypt- Acts of the Apostles 7:9.
- God allowed the famine to ravage the whole of Canaan, a land that used to flow with milk and honey so that Jacob could be reunited with his son- Joseph, who he thought had been dead for years. – Acts of the Apostles 7:11-15
- God allowed His children to be oppressed by another king who knew them not in Egypt so that He could lead them on a journey of faith through the wilderness in order to worship Him just like He led their ancestor – Abraham
- Although Moses meant well when he killed an Egyptian oppressing his fellow Israelites; God allowed him to be rejected and embarrassed. God allowed this so that He could take him to the wilderness of Median to train Him to become the deliverer of the Israelites.
- God permitted for Sarah to wait about 25 years for the birth of her own biological child in order to establish His promise and covenant with Abraham through the promise child – Isaac.
- God permitted the devil to take all of Job’s possession and children in order to show that He is able to restore double fold whatever the devil steals from His children.
If God would not spare His only son from the travails, pains of the cross, be expectant and believe that He would not spare you and I from our own cross as designed by Him. But we can be rest assured that as long as we stay in our relationship and walk with Him, He is with us and He would glorify Himself in us. He would glorify Himself in you!
As I wrapp up, I would like to add that it is also great to be able to discern the not-so-good things that God allows in our lives and the not-so-good things that we allow because of our failure to exercise our authority in Christ Jesus Christ or because of our lack of the knowledge of God’s word concerning the matter. With that said, be rest assured that just as God allowed David to go through so many years of adversity till He gave Him rest. God is bringing you to your place of rest in Jesus’ name. God is bringing you to your place of abundance and expansion, He is only pruning, training, and building character in you so that you can sustain the promotion and even surpass it.
And words of the Lord as He shared with me on that Saturday morning and I a paraphrase, “He is allowing you to journey to that cross so that you can bring libration to generations coming behind you” You would be able to shed so much light on their path because of the knowledge and experience you have gathered as you journeyed to that cross and the generations to come will thank you forever for enduring and conquering by the power of Jesus working in you. 🙂