I came across this phrase, “When God hijacks my life” recently in my reading and finds it interesting.
• It was used in the good sense. When God surprises you with something that you do not expect and is unprepared for, and takes you on a new path or a new direction.
• Your whole life changed as a result. It’s like God hijacking your life’s plan.
• What do you do? Will you still trust God? Can He disrupt your plan without shaking your faith?
I want to share from Abraham’s experience, starting from Gen 12.
• God showed up in his life and Abraham was taken onto a journey, one that would take him from his home and into uncharted territories.
• This experience would not only change him and his life, it will change the world.
God came to Abraham in Haran and announced His PLAN for his life.
• It is easy to tell me YOUR plan; it is quite another to tell me YOUR plan FOR MY LIFE. That’s intrusion. You are infiltrating into my privacy.
• But not with God. This life of ours is His anyway. And He knows it best, how we should live it.
God proclaimed a blessing! A big one, for Abraham, for his people (family), and eventually for the whole world.
• God says, I WILL BLESS YOU. And you will become a blessing. “All the peoples of the earth will be blessed through you.”
• “We are blessed to be a blessings!” (That’s the theme for KBC SS camp)
• And how is He going to do that? The blessings will reach the world through Jesus Christ, a descendant of Abraham.
• The world will be blessed through Jesus Christ.
This “hijacking” of a life is a good one. God has a great plan for Abraham. He is not going to stay in Haran for the rest of his life.
• I believe God has a great plan for everyone here, if we truly understand His heart and learn to submit to Him.
• When God interrupts our lives – with or without your permission – He is doing that to show us His good will.
• It may not looks that way or feels that way, initially, but trust Him. God has His purpose. It makes sense to God!
GOD STEPS IN TO BLESS YOU
God steps into Abraham’s life to BLESS him, not to harm him. He steps into our lives to make it BETTER, not to make it more MISERABLE.
• Notice this. Every line in that proclamation has “I WILL…” They are PROMISES of God.
• Nothing is immediate. Nothing imminent. None of the promises is fulfilled instantly as God speaks.
This is what makes it difficult for us. We prefer instant gratification and instant answers to our prayers.
• What Abraham got is a promise, and so, what do you do with a promise? You trust.
PROMISES ARE MEANT TO BE HELD
Which is probably the hardest thing for most of us. We find it hard to hold on.
• Abraham has to learn to TRUST God and wait for His Word to come true.
• His grip on those promises wasn’t that tight, at the beginning. He struggled through, actually.
• Faith in God has to be taught in the arena of life. You cannot teach that in a classroom.
God EXPECTS man to TRUST His Word. He expects us to BELIEVE Him.
You know how the Bible eventually described Abraham? It says in Gen 15:6 “Abram believed the Lord, and He credited it to him as righteousness.”
• That’s amazing. Did Abraham doubt? Yes, of course. At least two times (recorded ones).
• Once in Egypt when he was afraid that the Egyptians (no fear of God in them, 20:11) will kill him for his wife. He lied that Sarah is his sister (12:13).
• Then we have the famous account of Abraham laughing when the angels came to tell him and Sarah that they are going to have a child (he was 99 years old).
• By then he had already gotten a child through his Egyptian maidservant Hagar (when he was 86 years old), some 13 years ago.
Before he made the mistake in Chapter 16, the Lord assured him at least twice:
Gen 13:14-17 “The LORD said to Abram after Lot had parted from him, "LIFT UP YOUR EYES from where you are and look north and south, east and west. 15All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever. 16I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth, so that if anyone could count the dust, then your offspring could be counted. 17Go, walk through the length and breadth of the land, for I am giving it to you."
Gen 15:4-5 “He took him outside and said, "LOOK UP at the heavens and count the stars--if indeed you can count them." Then he said to him, "So shall your offspring be."
Both times the Lord says LOOK UP. That’s what we do, right? When you are despondent and depressed, you looked down.
• The Lord says, “Look up and be reassured of what I’ve already promised you!”
The amazing thing is, how then can the Scripture say Abraham believed God, when he actually doubted?
• It can because faith in God is not a destination but a journey. It is not an achievement but a willingness of the heart.
• Abraham has faith not because he did not ever doubt, but he was willing to trust. There is a willingness to believe God, a desire to obey God, to listen to God, to submit to His plan.
FAITH IS A WILLINGNESS TO TRUST GOD
Faith is a WILLINGNESS to believe God DESPITE the ________
• It is a willingness to TRUST Him REGARDLESS of _________
• It is like the father of the demon-possessed boy crying out to Jesus in Mark 9:24 - “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!”
• He even used the word “unbelief”. I am willing to believe, I want to. Help me!
Faith in God is not a destination we arrive at or an achievement we can attain to.
• It is a journey with God. A journey of obedience and willing submission.
• It was a journey Abraham took when he left Haran and began the lifelong experience of LEARNING to trust God.
Do you know how long that journey is? From the promise to the birth of his son Isaac, that’s 25 years.
• 25 years of trusting and waiting for the fulfilment of God’s promise!
• He was finally challenged by God to offer up this only son, and he obeyed without a question. That would add another 20 years, probably.
• We have no record of Isaac’s age at this point. But if he is able to carry the wood needed for the sacrifice to Mount Moriah and bring it up, scholars say he must in his teens at least, not a small boy.
• You can say that Abraham reached the pinnacle of his faith in God after 40 years, of walking with God.
TIME IS ON GOD’S SIDE
Time is on God’s side. He uses it lavishly to accomplish His purposes in our lives.
• We see that also in Moses’ life. 40 years in Pharaoh’s court, next 40 in the wilderness tending the flock, and the last 40 leading Israel out of Egypt.
• In David’s life too. He was anointed as a young boy to be King of Israel. It was only 7 years later that he was enthroned.
He uses the JOURNEY to mould us, to teach us and to prepare us.
• We don’t quite like that. We want shortcuts. We want solutions in quick time. Instant faith, if possible. Cut away all the trials and struggles and the pain.
• But God does not work that way. He has His purpose in everything, even in the hatching of an egg. You try to speed up the process, you’ll kill it. Let the chick struggles through and crack the egg shell on its own. She will come out fine and fully develop, ready to survive in this world.
We are the same. God uses the journey to grow us. Stay positive. Don’t grumble. Put your trust in God, because He is right there with you.
ENJOY HIS PRESENCE IN THE JOURNEY
Abraham showed me such an attitude. Each time when he settles in a place, there is something he will do.
• When he reached Shechem (12:6), he built an altar there to the Lord, who had appeared to him.
• When he reached Bethel (12:8), he built an altar to the Lord and called on the name of the Lord.
• When he moved his tents and went to Hebron (13:18), he built an altar to the Lord.
This is how he connects with God. He builds an altar and calls on Him.
• God is with him every step of the way and he knows it. Wherever he goes, he seeks His presence.
• Look up and remember His promise. Look to Him and enjoy His presence. The journey will be much sweeter if you do that.
[Play videoclip: TRUST by Sheila Walsh]
