We don’t know what will happen to and around us during 2008.  But regardless of what it will be, God’s provision will be exactly what we need when that time comes.  Consider…

tornado-rainbow.jpgHebrew boys were deported to Babylon… the King had a dream… Daniel interprets the dream… Daniel gets a promotion… Hundreds of years pass… Herod decides to kill boys in Bethlehem… an angel warns Joseph to take his wife and baby Jesus to Egypt… and the poor couple “just happens” to have the financial means to take the trip… live in Egypt… and then return to Nazareth.

  Question: Would God begin a chain of events taking place… hundreds of years before a particular situation occurs… so that when a particular time comes about everything is in place for certain people to carry out His will?  (Pause) The answer is a resounding YES!  Not only is that true for Biblical Characters, it is true for every believer!

  God will provide because He promised to.  Thus Romans 8:28-29.  We also know God provides because of Romans 8:32-39 and Hebrews 13:5.

  There was no way Daniel could begin to know or realize that (Or how) the events in his life would be a blessing to others all the way up to the year 2007!  He probably wasn’t thinking past the events taking place at the moment.  But we have the perspective of 2000+ years and God’s Word to help us.

  Consider: God protected baby Jesus by sending him and his family to Egypt when Heord ordered all boys under the age of two in Bethlehem to be killed.  This poor family had the financial means to take such a trip because some wise men (Magi) from the east gave them expensive gifts… one of which was gold.  The magi got to Bethlehem by following a star and hearing from Hebrew Scribes where the Messiah would be born.  The Magi followed the star because they somehow knew about the coming Messiah.  They knew about the coming Messiah becuase of teachings that had been handed down to them for many years.  The person who first taught Magi about the coming Messiah was most certainly a man named Daniel who was their leader.  Daniel was their leader because he had told the King of Babylon what his dream was and it’s interpretation.  Daniel was in Babylon to be able to interpret the dream because his nation had been conquered by Babylon.  And as part of this event, he was deported from Judea to Babylon to live.

  So Mary, Joseph, and Jesus were financially able to travel to Egypt to be protected from a contract put out on the lives of young boys by Herod… by Judea being conquered by Babylon… and Daniel being deported!  (Pause)  Consider that God is just as interested in your life as a believer in Christ as he was protecting His own son!

  The attitude suggestion for 2008 is this… Trust God because He is in complete control of all things!  Here is a quote from J.M. Boice in his commentary on Daniel…

  If God does not control our lives… from the actions of kings and others in positions of power to the most minute circumstances… then everything in life is uncertain.  We are victims of circumstances, and whatever happens will happen.  Que sera, sera!  But if God is sovereign, as the Bible declares Him to be, and if He is our God… if the promises He makes and the actions He takes are certain fulfillment… then we can be confident of the future and know that we will be able to live our lives in a way that will please God.

   Jesus in Matthew 6:25-33 “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? 26 Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? 27 And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? 28 And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin,  29 yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.  30 But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31 Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. 33 But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.