Last week, we focused on how to be in sync with God, especially in our prayers. But how do we do this? Here is a devotion that reminds us of how our relationship with God should be defined:

IN WORD The casual relationship with God takes Him to be a good-luck charm. The world is full of people who will pray to God, praise His goodness, speak of His plans, and call themselves His children.
Yet when trouble comes, they complain that He is not treating them well. They wonder what they have done to deserve His disfavor. He isn’t serving them as they expected.
God is not a good-luck charm. He is not the amulet we hold in our hands as we play the roulette wheel or the stock market. He is not the great coach in the sky who was on our side when our team won but was not when we lost. Our prayers are not the mantras we chant so that we won’t have any trouble this day. He is not the big Santa Claus upstairs who keeps track of all our wishes in case we’re good. And His Word is not our horoscope, telling us all the tricks we must do to be successful in our ventures.
No, all of these approaches to God have elements of truth but end up as lies. He is more than a dispensable “blesser,” available when we want to use Him and irrelevant when we don’t. He is the Governor of our lives, the Sovereign who directs us in every way we should go, the Blesser who measures His blessings by the depths of His grace, the Shepherd who will lead us through both comfortable plains and difficult valleys. He is the God of real life.
IN DEED Real life has troubles. God will protect us from many of them, but He will also walk us through many of them. He will do what is best for us, not what our shallow hearts dictate to Him. Like Job’s wife, we have a hard time understanding that. We worship Him more desperately in a storm than in a calm. It’s good for us to know, when times are tough, that God is sovereign over our circumstances. He has allowed them, because there was something good in them to allow. We have a lesson to learn and a Savior to lean on. Trust that He has you there for just those reasons. “Oh, for a spirit that bows always before the sovereignty of God.” – Charles Spurgeon (in “Walking with God” by Chris Tiegreen)

For many people, we want God to bless our will rather than to follow God’s will. Then when things don’t turn out, we blame God. But perhaps the reason things don’t turn out is because we didn’t listen to God and follow His leading.
Take time to reflect on Job 38 – 42, a chapter a day, and contemplate on God’s answer to Job. Ask the Holy Spirit to help you better understand God’s goodness and how to trust and obey. Have a blessed week! - from Singapore, Pastor Sam