It's all about Timing 

Sunday, November 24^th 2024 (week 89)
 
2 Corinthians 4: 1-18
 
In sport, timing is everything. Whether it’s hitting a ball, getting that forehand tennis stroke perfectly timed or in football rising to head a well-placed corner kick into the back of the net. I am always amazed at pace setters who run the same speed around a track many times so that the top runners can make sure they don’t out-pace themselves. Similarly, I never cease to be amazed at how, in my favourite sport of motor racing (yes, I confess to being a petrolhead!) twenty drivers can drive the fastest cars around a track of approximately two miles and cross the finish line within a tenth, or even a hundredth of a second of the next man. But there is one example of timing that impresses me even more than Lewis Hamilton.
 
I have been watching a situation as it reached boiling point at home and our office. Last night, at home with my wife, it erupted. At the (peaceful) end of our “marital discussion” I reminded her that there are some very good things apparently about to happen in our business and our lives.
 
This morning God revealed once again His perfect timing. My early morning reading mentioned that William Wilberforce discerned a clear sense of God’s will to use his political position to abolish slavery. But it took him fifty years before it was banned in all British colonies. The work being done in our family business doesn’t quite match the abolition of slavery, but it does seek to end a long-running series of scams that have robbed at least eighty thousand ordinary people of significant sums of money. In doing so the business will also produce money that can be used to help many others in need over the coming years. Like Wilberforce, I have no doubt that God has called me to do this as the first part of His plan for this time in my life but that we will face challenges as the enemy attacks His work in whatever way he can.
 
But it was the fact that it took fifty years for Wilberforce to reach his goal that also struck me this morning as one of the things I had reminded my wife about last night was that next year we will hopefully, with the help of God’s Holy Spirit enjoy celebrating fifty years of marriage despite many setbacks.
 
In the reading from Corinthians, we see that Paul also faced all sorts of challenges and discouragements whilst fulfilling the ministry God had given him. All of our lives will bring challenges; when they do, we have choices. We can walk away, curl up into a ball and watch as the rest of life passes by or we can do as Paul instructed his friend Timothy and “Run your best in the race of faith, and win eternal life for yourself; for it was to this life that God called you when you firmly professed your faith before many witnesses.” (1 Tim 6:12, Good News)
 
Our best race will be run if we turn regularly to God’s word. God’s timing and provision of His word to me this morning were all I needed to be reminded of His presence with me and that God’s work done in God’s way will never lack God’s provision – and God’s provision is always perfectly timed.
 
Prayer: Lord, it is impossible for me to comprehend how your timing of everything is so perfect but I know that it is. Thank you for caring about us so much and for being interested in all the details of our lives. Please help us to trust you for your perfect timing and provision of all that we need.