Ephesians 5:2a And walk in love,

Ephesians 5 lists a number of labels of good and bad behavior. Part of me finds labels both good and bad as a hindrance in walking in the love that is Christ in us. I know there are many who insist that calling sin sin is a necessary thing but one aspect if you give a thing a name, it holds a power in the name that is unwarranted and unjustified.

Sin labels make it all that much easier to become like the Pharisee in the temple who said, “Thank God I am not as that sinner.” The outward view of others sin is not only a window to judgment, it has the tendency to allow us to avoid self-examination and the purging of our own sins. Allow yourself to be called pious too many times and you will start to believe yourself worthy of praise.

Psalm 150:6 Let every thing that hath breath praise the Lord. Praise ye the Lord.

This is the last line in Psalms, the last word if you like. Isn’t that a fitting summation for the Psalms?

Ecclesiastes 10:1 Dead flies cause the ointment of the apothecary to send forth a stinking savour: so doth a little folly him that is in reputation for wisdom and honour.

We, myself included, have a tendency to avoid reading scriptures like this. They are fair warning. The warnings are just as valuable to us in seeking to be everything God has called us to be. The Lord delivered these warns with purpose and to avoid reading them places us in jeopardy of falling into the folly which the Lord would once again have to pull us out.

Galatians 5:15 But if ye bite and devour one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another.

Is not the opposite also true? But if ye praise and glorify one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another.

Love never fails.

Acts 15:18 Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world.

Proverb 16:9 A man’s heart deviseth his way: but the Lord directeth his steps.

Don’t you love it when a plan comes together? Likewise, how frustrating is it when your best laid plans fall apart? Those are human experiences and human emotions. That has nothing to do with our God, the creator and the one perfect in order and performance. Nothing frustrates God’s planning, nothing.

It is beyond our human ability to see all the variables that might play out in any given set of circumstances, much less all of them for all time. That is why God is God and we are not. God knew before He spoke one word into creation all that would happen until the end of time.

Given that God is eternal and time is not an issue for God, how many plans did God scrap before He settle the one we are living out in time? If God chose this plan, isn’t that preordained in the sense that He scrapped all the other plans in favor of this one? Is that too much for you to wrap your mind around? I don’t blame you. It just occurred to me for the first time just now.

Does that make this thought true? No, but I have to ask myself, if God is perfect in performance, wouldn’t His planning of creation also be perfect? Given that He is perfect, what happens with us?

If God directs your steps then the only option left to us is one of awareness and attitude. Awareness comes from knowing God and attitude is developed in relationship.

Psalm 27:13  I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.

Are you going to see God’s goodness or walk around blindly?