Trusting God for Our Future

It’s not over…

Future. A word that is often quite scary and brings with it a lot more questions than answers. A word that can mean many different things to all of us depending on what’s in front of us. Maybe the future is wonderfully anticipated as you’ve got a holiday coming up and so this fills you with joy, perhaps the school holidays are here and you’re thinking about the future of your family, as your children move from one school to the next, maybe you can’t even think about the future right now as you’re just living in the day to day to get through, or maybe even your future right now is not what you’d planned?

Presently, this word brings with it all sorts of connotations in my own life. After recently moving to Canterbury and all the joys of being newly married, I’m applying to find a job closer to this wonderful community and not back to London with a rather long commute. I’ve been thinking about this a lot in the application process and asking myself the questions this week; Do I trust God for my future? Do I see my future the way God sees it?

In 1 Kings 17: 7-16, the widow at Zarephath reminds us of what can happen when we trust in God’s plan compared to trusting in our own for our future. She was afraid that she only had enough oil and flour for her and her son (for one more loaf) and that there was no hope after that. Through Elijah, she trusted the Lord to provide enough for her family and him. We see here that she already had everything in her hands to do what God had asked of her and in her obedience to him, she never went without. In fact, God did the extraordinary. Despite the seemingly impossible risk, she continued to put her hope in God that there would be enough bread for two loaves from the little amount she had left. God was faithful and the jar of flour was not used up and the oil didn’t run dry; she never ran out and her supply never ended.

Although for many of us the future brings with it all sorts of questions, I am reminded that as we put our faith in God and trust His words to us, He is the only one to provide all we need each day and renew our strength for whatever the future may bring. He wants to partner with us and it’s in this obedience that we see his best plan. Without it, the widow only saw the ordinary and thought it was over. With it, we see Him do the extraordinary and that He will show us a future in Him that is secure. It may not be with flour and oil, but as we give God all the things in our hands we know that He can do immeasurably more and that it’s not over until He says so…