Our Lives Are in God's Hands

What are God’s plan and purposes for your life? 

Whenever I ask myself this question and then learn about the life of God’s servants in the Bible, He always reminds me that it is about Him — for His glory, for His plans to be fulfilled and His will to be done. 

Personally, my understanding is that God doesn’t just have plans for my life, but rather, He has plans with my life. This plain and simple word that I have come to understand has changed my way of seeing what God reveals to me every day and what He does. 

A person like Paul became an instrument in the hands of God, who sought above all to make the name of Jesus known to non-Jews. God completely changed who he was and accomplished His will with him. 

As we read the 28th chapter of Acts, we can see that everything that is written there is fulfilling God’s purpose with Paul’s life. God preserved his life and that of those who accompanied him in the storm and the shipwreck. Arriving on an island to testify, he did not die of a snake bite because God’s plan with his life had not yet been fulfilled. He preached about Jesus on his way from Malta to Rome and the times he was in those places, God’s plan was being fulfilled with the life of Paul and with the people who heard the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 

Arriving in Rome, he spoke to the Jews who were there and continued to fulfill God’s purpose. And so, it was with Paul until the end of his days and in his letters to the people in the places where he had been, leaving instructions on life and doctrine for the church of God. 

And this is only what is mentioned in chapter 28 of Acts. But if we remember everything Paul experienced to fulfill what God had commanded him, we know that he was stoned, persecuted, imprisoned, a couple of times they already left him for dead, more than once he received 39 lashes, and all this just to win Christ, leaving everything aside, even his titles and position to serve God. 

Something I learn from the life of Paul is to accept and endure what God allows, to let God perfect Himself in weakness, and also to wait for God’s will with me. Today, I can practice my career and serve others and work for God, leaving my life in His hands and always giving glory to God in everything, and for everything.

Our great and wonderful God used and will always use his children to fulfill His plans and purposes. 

Perhaps, instead of thinking about what God has for our lives, we should consider what God is going to do with our lives, serve Him and believe that this is the best for us. Paul did what God had told him to do and was diligent in doing His will. God’s will is pleasing and perfect (Romans 12:2). 

I think we must understand that following His path, living our lives only for God and serving Him, is to know and understand that God is doing His will with us, as Paul writes:

It is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure (Philippians 2:13 NKJV).

And for this reason, we must always be ready and attentive, able to raise our hands and say, “send me” (Isaiah 6:8). Would you pray a prayer to the Lord to use your life and place you in His perfect will, with Him?

We can learn to be always grateful for the will of God because we are instruments in His hands. We can also say that God’s plan with our lives is being fulfilled for His glory, understanding that when those plans are fulfilled, we will also say:

I have finished the race, I have kept the faith (2 Timothy 4:7).

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Scripture is taken from the New King James Version^®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.