Dear Members and Friends,
We live in a world of changes. Ever since we were conceived, things have been changing.
Nothing stays the same, and nothing goes back to the way it was. We live in the present moments that are happening—not in the past and not in the future. Everything is now!
Solomon reminds us that there is nothing new under the sun. Were there computers or cars in his day? No! What he is trying to convey is that the thoughts of men, the things that are done, “new” things, “new” ideas coming into being, are all but of the same vein.
When God stopped the building of the tower of Babel, it always interested me that He said in Genesis 11:6: “And the LORD said, ‘Indeed the people are one and they all have one language, and this is what they begin to do; now nothing that they propose to do will be withheld from them.’” The power and ability to learn, grow and create things is something that God placed within mankind. This power has not stopped.
But at what cost? Man was not allowed to proceed then because otherwise God’s plan would have been moving too fast! He had to slow things down, scatter people about, change languages. Now we are once again moving at a very fast pace, and we are building things like quantum computers to make computers faster, and 5G to move data around quicker. In China, they are building an artificial sun fusion reactor at the cost of a trillion dollars.
Change is inevitable. We can count on change. People often fear change because it includes an element of the unknown. When we cannot control an outcome or a certain situation, it can feel scary or frustrating.
The older I get, the more I realize that God’s commands pertaining to our lives and what He has in store for us are perfect. How many times though have I fought to have my ways, my wants, my choices and decisions, without truly allowing God to lead? The choice in how to change is up to us. Do we want to change with God leading and showing us the way to go (compare Psalm 18:35-36; Proverbs 4:20-27)—or do we keep banging our heads trying to stop or divert change?
When we read the stories in the Bible and we view them from the standpoint and the idea that life is change, it is interesting to see how things changed throughout people’s lives. Everything depended on how people followed God and how they did not. It is so easy for human beings who can’t see the future or predict what will happen to make plans without including God. But this is NOT what God wants.
God wants to be involved. In fact, when we allow Him to be involved, our lives will change! And they will change in ways we could not expect. But that initial growth in the mindset of allowing Him to lead us is the hard part! Once we start to grow that mindset, God can start working in our lives more and more.
Christ did this perfectly! His ability to let God lead Him in all things is evident in the stories that we read and in what He had to say. In John 12:49-50, Christ shows exactly what it means to do this: “For I have not spoken on My own authority; but the Father who sent Me gave Me a command, what I should say and what I should speak. And I know that His command is everlasting life. Therefore, whatever I speak, just as the Father has told Me, so I speak.”
For Him to be able to say that means that He had learned to be in subjection to the Father in ALL things; that is, how He could be in subjection in every situation, even if this included trials and suffering. He knew exactly what to say, what to do and what to think!
We need to change. We need to deal with change. And we need to learn to do it with God leading us. The apostles learned this and wrote about it, so that we could come to learn the same thing. In 2 Peter 3:17-18 the apostle Peter (who had to learn multiple lessons in allowing God to lead him through change) wrote this to us: “You therefore, beloved, since you know this beforehand, beware lest you also fall from your own steadfastness, being led away with the error of the wicked; but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ…”
The knowledge of Jesus Christ includes HOW to allow God to lead us perfectly through changes in our lives. We have to be willing to learn how to allow Christ to bring us more in line with God’s Will. I love this Scripture in Romans 8 because if we truly keep it in mind at all times, it shows us that we can have faith at all times, through any and all situations. Verse 28 states: “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose…” If we believe this, then we will work to learn how this happens.
Turning to God and asking Him to lead us is making us free. No longer being frustrated and scared about the future is an incredible feeling. To know that God is for us and is going to take care of everything is life-altering. When we make that change in our thinking and in our minds, we no longer have to be enslaved to this world or anything in it.
The ultimate change is for us to become God beings. It is going to take a little more time and effort for this to happen. But it is the one thing that we look forward to. 1 Corinthians 15:52 tells us that it will occur “in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.” Without God’s Will and His doing, then our hope and belief would be for nothing. We need this change! Therefore we need God to lead us and to show Him that we are willing to allow Him to lead us now.
With Christian love,
Kalon Mitchell
