Bags of Groceries

Donna sat next to me on my plane flight home. I was blessed to get to know this incredible woman.  Donna is the President and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of HMS, a company she started. As she shared with me some of her life story I was most impressed by her humility and her sense of gratefulness.  

While in college, Donna had to take care of her younger siblings because her mother’s rheumatoid arthritis was so severe and her father had left the marriage and moved away.  Because she was accepted into a prestigious program she had to move her family from Connecticut to Loma Linda, California.  Six of them made the cross country trip with no idea where they would live.  Yet shortly after they arrived, a school employee told Donna about a vacant home within sight of the elementary school and close to the university campus.  The owner, a missionary doctor assigned to an overseas mission post, rented the home to them. 

At this time in her life, Donna was learning what it meant to trust in God.  One day as she returned from school to make lunch for her siblings, she discovered they had absolutely no food and there was no money to go shopping.  Not knowing what to do, Donna prayed.  As she opened the door (from which she had entered moments earlier) to go outside to consider her options, she nearly tripped over something in her path.  To her amazement, there were two overstuffed bags of groceries and no person in sight! 
 
Meditation
Philippians 4:19—And my God will supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus.
 
As a youngster I memorized Philippians 4:19 and even today it is one of my favorite verses. There was no doubt in the Apostle Paul’s mind that God would provide for the believers in Philippi. Why wouldn’t he be confident, this man who abandoned power and prestige to follow Jesus?  God rescued him from angry seas; held him through beatings and rock-throwing haters; protected him from starvation; preserved him from wild animals; and fortified him when despair was his robe!    

​One of the definitions of provision is “arrangement or preparation before-hand.”[1]  Do you know that God fills your bags before you even know that your cupboard is empty? That’s the kind of Father He is. We don’t need to worry or give up. We dare not take matters into our own hands.  We simply need to come to Him with our honest requests and believe that this awesome Father who cares will fill our bags when they need filling.  Oswald Chambers noted in The Love of God, “Look back over your own history as revealed to you by grace, and you will see one central fact growing large—God is love.”  When we put our hope in His Son, Jesus, we avail ourselves of His “riches in glory.”  That is the Father’s plan.  Do you trust Him?
 
Inspiration
Are you tempted to seize control from God rather than waiting for His provision?—Bill Perkins inthe Jesus experiment
 
©2014 Daniel York  ARR. Reveration is the weekly devotional ministry of First Cause.  If you would like to receive these devotionals go to www.firstcause.org and click on the “Click here to receive weekly devotionals” box.  Unlimited permission to copy this devotional without altering text or profiteering is allowed subject to inclusion of this copyright notice.      
 
Ecclesiastes 12:10-The Teacher sought to find delightful sayings and to accurately write words of truth.  (Holman CSB)


[1]http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/provision?s=t