Skip to main content

The Battle of Wills: God vs. Me


Very recently, I was reading 1 Chronicles, and I stumbled upon a verse that really highlighted the difference between God’s will for our lives and ours. Before I go into a full-blown analysis, here it is:

“King David rose to his feet and said: “Listen to me, my fellow Israelites, my people. I had it in my heart to build a house as a place of rest for the ark of the covenant of the Lord, for the footstool of our God, and I made plans to build it. 3 But God said to me, ‘You are not to build a house for my Name…” (1 Chronicles 28: 2-3)

Ouch. What struck me most about these verses was the fact that no one would have thunk it! David wanted to do a beautiful thing for God; out of immense love for Him, he wanted to build a temple in God’s honour – “a place of rest for the ark of the covenant of the Lord” and the “footstool of our God”. But get this: AS GREAT AS THE INTENTION WAS, IT WASN’T PART OF GOD’S PLAN – and not even David's amazing heart going to change that! God wanted Solomon to build a temple for Him – not David!

Oftentimes, we tend to believe that because something we’ve chosen to do is sweet, kind, compassionate, thoughtful or honourable, it’s automatically what God wants us to do. But here, God tells David the contrary!

As Christians, – wherever you are in your walk with God – it tends to be a constant battle between our will and God’s. If we’re being totally honest and open, many times you just want to do you own thing – because it makes sense, it seems feasible, and you slightly suspect/subconsciously believe you could kind of, sort of achieve it on your own!

Lots of preachings, Bible verses and conversations have helped me understand that God’s plans for me are far greater and better for me than mine will ever be, but one realisation that really helped me with this struggle (and I believe can transform the way you think about God’s plans for you) is this: God is WAY too powerful, and WAY too in love with you to mess up your life. Take it from me – He knows what He’s doing!

David could have chosen to be bitter about the whole thing, carrying the burden of rejection on his shoulders, but he knew God well enough to know that He had bigger and better things in mind – things far beyond what he could ever imagine. To be honest, God doesn’t need your permission to do anything He so desires, but more than anything, God wants you to trust that He’s got you!



Kunmi x



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Simple, Practical Solution To Reading More of Your Bible

At the beginning of the year, I decided I wanted to read the entire Bible - for the second time - in a year. (I also started using these amazing reading plans on my even more amazing Bible app, YouVersion. It's awesome; check it out! )  My aim is to get more of God's word into my head, mind and heart, and as a result, get to know Him better, as... "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was  God." (John 1:1) Simple, yeah? If God and His Word are one, then by getting to know one more, I get to know the other, right? But to achieve my goal, I obviously had to carve out more time to read God's Word.  Now, truth be told, I often find reading the Bible a little bit tedious (I'll have you know God appreciates my honesty), ESPECIALLY when it gets to certain, not-so-Jesus-loves-you-you-can-do-no-wrong-everything-is-all-GOOD chapters like Numbers, Leviticus and a few others (let's cut them some slack, shall we?). But I rea...
2 comments
Read more

What Teaching Young Kids About The Holy Spirit Taught Me

I'm lucky enough to teach a lovely, lively bunch of children at Sunday School every week. Two weeks ago, at a Saturday session at church, I had learnt more about the Holy Spirit, who He really is and why we have Him (and need Him). Immediately, I thought: Hey, this is a great lesson to teach the kids soon. Yesterday, I decided today would be the perfect day to approach this topic with my young squad. I particularly thought this was a good idea because I needed to learn more about the Holy Spirit. While preparing to teach, I researched how to go about teaching younger children about this not-so-easy topic. You hear so much about God and Jesus, but not that much about the Holy Spirit (which they affirmed today, btw). I got help from this great Sunday School website, which suggested to use a great visual analogy: An egg. An egg is made up of three parts: The shell, egg white and yolk. Although the different parts exist, it's still an egg; each part is 'folded' into ...
2 comments
Read more

What I Really Learnt About Prayer This Week

With prayer and I, it's been a mostly up-and-down relationship. We haven't always seen eye-to-eye, we've fallen out of love quite a few times, and we've oftentimes flat out ignored each other over the years. Luckily, it's been more on the 'up' lately, for which I am super glad, because God knows I need it more than anything. The real transformation came when I realised that I didn't have to say the "right" things when I prayed, speak 'Christianese' (meaningless words that God is supposed to be impressed with), or lie to God about how/what I was feeling. A good friend of mine, Jen, once said, "Don't tell God, 'Oh Lord, I just want to worship Your holy name', when in fact you are about to combust from pain, sorrow, difficulties and frustration." That statement TOTALLY changed the way I pray. Now, that's not to say that I only run to God to cry about my problems (there's ALWAYS something), and I am complet...
Post a Comment
Read more